Building a Six-Figure Business without Social Media: A Chat with Amelia Hruby

As social media changes to more "media" than "social" elements, many have chosen to leave social media platforms. But how do you leave when social media is your main avenue for marketing your creative ventures or your small business? In this episode, I chat with writer, teacher, and founder of Softer Sounds Amelia Hruby about her journey building a six-figure business after leaving social media. Through her success, I hope that every creative who feels disillusioned by social media knows that they can leave these apps and still be successful creatives.

Amelia's website
Listen to Off the Grid on Spotify or Apple
Listen to the softer cast on Spotify or Apple
Get the FREE Leaving Social Media Toolkit

Do you want to quit social media? blog by Alexandra Franzen
Why me and my business don't do social media by Leonie Dawson
The truth about going mega-viral, part one by Emily McDowell on Substack

Transcript

Raya: 0:15

Welcome everybody to the Sheer Creativity Podcast, the podcast about creatives for creatives. And today I have Amelia Froobie. I was going to get the Froobie in there, but I mean, writer, teacher, small business mentor, founder of the feminist podcast studio, Softer Sounds, which is a podcast studio for women and non binary entrepreneurs and creatives. And you also host two podcasts, Off the Grid, which is a podcast for business owners who want to leave social media. Raising my hand now. And the Softercast, where Amelia answers all of your podcasting questions. So welcome, Amelia.

Amelia: 0:59

Oh, thank you so much for having me, Laraya. I'm really excited to be here with you and to talk about creativity.

Raya: 1:05

Yeah. So I want to start off by just learning more about you. So tell us more about younger Amelia. What was she passionate about? Did she always want to be, maybe not a podcaster, but maybe a teacher or a speaker?

Amelia: 1:21

Yeah, thanks for the invitation. So when I was a kid, I definitely wanted to be a writer. I loved writing. I used to make books. I would like write stories and then illustrate little cardboard paper books, um, and read them to my class in like first and second grade. I really loved it. So I guess in that sense, I've always been a writer. I've always been a public speaker and, uh, I also have always loved teaching and school. I loved school. I was definitely like the weird kid all the way, honestly, through college. I mean, I even went and got a PhD. So like, I loved school. It was like my thing. I was into it. I enjoyed it. And. I really loved teaching, which I got to do as part of my PhD program. So my mom always jokes that like on the last day of school, I would always like come home with my friends and then like play school with them. Like I was not ready for summer break. I was like this super funny kid who loved school, who loved to write, who loved to talk in front of people and talk with people. My mom has another funny story of me as like a four year old. I would go around the house and get every adult in the house and bring them all into the living room and set them on the couch. And I just look around and I'd say, let's chat. And I would just look at them expecting them to talk at me. Um, yeah, I've loved talking. I've loved speaking. I've loved writing. I've loved teaching. And all of that has kind of come together in the work that I do now with podcasting.

Raya: 2:50

Yeah, that's so cool. I could just see little you going like, okay, now it's your turn, speak.

Amelia: 2:58

Talk to me, please. And now you talk to me. Yeah, that was definitely me.

Raya: 3:02

So what did you teach when you were going for your PhD program?

Amelia: 3:07

Yeah, so I taught philosophy, my PhD is in philosophy, and the courses I taught ranged from like introduction to philosophy, um, and then I taught a lot of philosophy of sex and gender, so sort of like from a feminist, philosophy from a feminist perspective, um, and then a couple other things, but mostly kind of an overview of the Western canon with a focus on feminist theory and thought.

Raya: 3:31

Is, is it when you were in your undergrad years that you became enthralled with feminism?

Amelia: 3:39

Yes and no. I think that I definitely became enthralled with philosophy when I was an undergrad and I went to a women's college. So I definitely had like a perspective around like sort of the importance of having spaces for women amidst the patriarchy, but it was a pretty conservative school. So there actually like wasn't a lot of feminism there, um, necessarily or not overtly. So like there wasn't, I didn't take a class on feminism or feminist theory as an undergrad. That really came when I went to grad school. So I, um, grew up and went to college in North Carolina, and then I moved to Chicago for grad school. And I would say really like I just met so many more like progressive people, so many activists and organizers. I got more involved in feminist organizing around the city. A lot of that actually happened for me through Chicago zine fest. So I was, um, I wrote and created my own zines and I sold them and I read at some of the events around the zine fest and like met a lot of really great people that way. And they really like taught me and radicalized me and supported me and kind of learning a lot more about Feminism and, and justice more broadly.

Raya: 4:53

Oh, that's pretty cool. So when did you first get on the dreaded social media streets?

Amelia: 5:02

Yeah, so I joined Facebook in high school, which for me would have been like 2007, something like that. At that point you still had to have like an EDU email address to be on Facebook. So it wasn't like open to everyone yet. Um, and then I got an Instagram in college. So I first got on Instagram, I'd say in around 2011, I think. Um, and that was like the primary social media platform that I've been on. Like I had a Twitter account, I had a TikTok account for a minute, but like Instagram is where I was platform building. It's where I was like spending a lot of time and I was on it for 10 years overall.

Raya: 5:46

So what did Social media feel like to you in the beginning stages?

Amelia: 5:53

In the beginning, it was really fun, honestly, like I loved it. I got to see what my friends were up to. I got to share fun pictures from like when I would go on trips or when I would like have a really great meal. I definitely took a lot of like flatly photos of coffee that I was drinking like that was like the aesthetic. Um,. But I really just loved having these like peeks into my friends lives and the moments I wasn't with them and being able to share those of my own. And I would say it was really fun. And I just felt closer to the people that I loved and cared about. Like, even if we weren't in the same place or the same state or the same country, even I still got to feel close to them. And I like really treasured that.

Raya: 6:36

Yeah, I feel like the early social media really did value human connection, and then it just took a sharp left.

Amelia: 6:44

Um, yes.

Raya: 6:48

But when did you start seeing a shift in how social media affected your daily life?

Amelia: 6:55

So I definitely noticed that I spent a lot of time on the apps pretty early on. So I think that like scrolling for me became pretty addictive within a year or two of being on the platforms. It's just I was like scrolling to update myself on like what my friends were doing and I have like experienced a lot more FOMO during that time and just a lot of, um, and honestly felt kind of like surveillance of like, I was just always watching what other people were doing and watching what I was sharing. And like, I noticed that start to seep into my experience. Within like two years of being on social media, I would say within the first year or two that that started to feel present, but over time, I shifted from just sharing like me having fun with my friends to sharing more like what I would call content. So, like. Things that I had like a goal. I wanted them to like get people to do something. I wasn't just like sharing for fun. I was sharing because I wanted people to read my blog or buy a course from me or order my book. And as I did that, I became much more attuned to how the algorithm like surfaced or didn't surface your content for people. And that no matter how many people were following you, only a very small percentage of them were seeing your work. And so I could really feel social media impacting my creative energy because it often felt like I would put so much energy into creating something and then so few people would see it and that really started to make me feel a lot of like this whole negative dark cloud around creating things at all and that really blocked me for quite a while. I would say, and I started to just feel like I was only making things for the algorithm. I wasn't making them for myself or for my community anymore. And that felt really, really bad. I'm curious if you can relate to that or if you feel like you have experiences. Yeah.

Raya: 8:58

I've primarily been on Instagram as well, and I am a poet. So I usually. Especially during, like, the pandemic, I used to just go outside with my tripod and take pictures in nature, and I really loved doing that, and at first they were getting, like, some good engagement, and then it would be, like, 12 likes, 9 likes, and I'd be like, do you guys even like me anymore? Like, um, I'm, I'm assuming the shift happens when it, It's like not family and friends anymore and keeping up with people for human connection and you're just switching from human connection to I want you guys to see this and act on it like a call to action type of thing. Wanting people to see what we're putting out there.

Amelia: 9:49

Yeah, exactly. And I think that. It's a really slippery slope, right? Like, you know, some of some people, you know, I could really clearly for myself aim, like when I started writing different sorts of things for social media, but I've talked to plenty of friends who, you know, they're still just like sharing their dog pics, but they notice when one only gets. Three likes and the last one got 30 likes, you know, like, I think some of it is also the emphasis on these particular metrics in the social media space, particularly on Instagram, but also on Twitter, Tik TOK, or anywhere else that you might be, um, they really shape everyone's experience of the platform, whether you. Are using it as a content creator or a personal brand or you're just using it as like a human being who wants to connect with people you love because I still hear from all my friends who are not, you know, content creators. They're also like, yeah, I'm trying to be on social media to see my friends, but I don't see any of their stuff anymore. And it's frustrating. You know, I think it's, it's impacting all of us.

Raya: 10:54

Yeah. Like my feed right now is probably reels from people that I will never meet ever in life, and I may see the occasional people that I follow, but yeah, I don't really get to see the people that I actually actively want to see.

Amelia: 11:16

Yeah, and like, and it's so true and I think that I think of that as like a really Instagram phenomenon, because I think that Twitter has always been about parasocial relationships with people that you don't really know. And TikTok, especially like, I don't know anybody who follows anyone else they know on TikTok. Like you follow content creators on TikTok and that seems to be like shared similar to YouTube. Um, but I think that on instagram, and I think to some extent on Facebook as well, like you think that you're there to connect with people that you know in real life, and then your experience is so different than that, and I think we just really saw that shift happen on Facebook and Instagram like these meta platforms specifically like they were designed and started out as ways to find human connection to be social and like the it was like social and the media was the byproduct but now it's media and the social is the byproduct for sure.

Raya: 12:12

Yeah and I remember when like I don't know if it was one of the Kardashians or something where they were trying to get Instagram to shift back to the old algorithm and just pictures. And I read an article where somebody was saying, well, that wouldn't really work because now we're wired to make content. And because there's a minority of people who are dominating reels and you see kind of the same faces sometimes. Not a lot of people are making their own content for themselves anymore. They're kind of just consuming it. I don't know if going back to the old way, I don't know if anybody would post, you know?

Amelia: 12:57

Yeah, I think we've lost a lot of the like personal vulnerability that used to really fuel the platform in that way. And I think that you're right. I feel like. As everyone has become a content creator, like it's just created more of a divide between like creating and consuming, um, or, well, at the same time, it's like very confusing it like you can very easily become an accidental content creator on these platforms, um, but also it's so easy to just like consume, consume, consume, consume and never create anything. So I think it's really like quite the conundrum that we get wrapped up in. Especially as creative people, when we go to social media platforms, like what are we creating? What are we consuming? How are those interrelated? And like, what amount of our time is spent in those different modes? Like all big questions that come up at my work.

Raya: 13:51

Yeah. How did you feel about how much time you were spending on the apps?

Amelia: 13:58

I was definitely spending way too much time on the apps. My own estimation of too much, like, I mean, hours and hours a day. Like when my partner and I first moved in together, I would just sit on the couch in the evenings for like two hours and like move things around in my planning Instagram feed planning app, because that was still when feeds were thing and now no one shares anything in their feed. So, um, you know, I spent so much time scrolling on the apps and just as much time planning my content for social media and all of that was way too much of my precious time.

Raya: 14:37

Being a social media manager is a full time job within itself, but when you want to fit in just your personal life and your actual job that you want to do, like whether you have a small business, you can't take on that full time job of being a social media manager and still care about the things in your business that you want to do. It ends up with you being burnt out.

Amelia: 15:04

Yeah, absolutely. And I think this comes up a lot for small business owners. That's like You need to spend the time doing the thing that is your business and find ways to be marketing your business that are not draining or detracting from the time you're spending on your business. And you're totally right. Like social media manager is a job. Similarly, like podcasting is a job. And so finding ways that you're either getting the support you need or streamlining your systems so that you really can do them as like a small facet of your time or the work that you're doing, and they don't take over everything. Um, I think it's really important for small business owners. Well, simultaneously, like maybe you want to be a full time podcaster. Then you have to treat podcasting like your job and really give yourself to it and put a lot of work into it to become you know, a successful high earning content creator, because that is a thing that you can be. Anyone can be, um, but it's also a lot of work. And I think a lot of people look to content creation and they think they should be able to just kind of like put a little time in and make a lot of money. And I'm like, you know, if you're making a lot of money doing content creation, you're working really hard too like, it's also a lot of work to get that going.

Raya: 16:21

Yeah, a lot of brand deals, a lot of editing, a lot of, yeah, I don't think people think about all the ins and outs that go into content creation.

Amelia: 16:31

Yeah, absolutely.

Raya: 16:32

So what was the needle that broke the camel's back when it came to you being on social media and deciding, eh, I don't want to be here anymore.

Amelia: 16:44

Yeah. So for me, it kind of happened slowly. And then all at once, like I knew I was feeling worse and worse from the time I was spending on the platform. I knew that, you know, those that dark cloud I had mentioned, like the algorithm was impacting my creative process and energy. And it was also impacting my self worth, which is kind of, I think you spoke to a little bit, like it was making me wonder, like, is my work worse and people aren't seeing it? Like, am I not good enough anymore? And that's why this isn't getting engagement. And so I was really sitting with that. I was like, this is having a really negative impact On my self worth and on my creative practice. And then at the start of 2021, I wrote this like very long list of rules for my Instagram use is basically a boundaries list. And I was like, this will sound familiar for anyone who's tried to set boundaries with social media, but like my list was something like. I will delete the app on the weekends. I will log on Monday mornings and be on the app for an hour. I will delete it again. I will log back on, on Thursdays to engage with posts and look at stories. It was like, I will post one feed post three stories and one reel a week. Like, you know, it was all this like boundaries and content planning. And I wrote that whole list for myself. And when I got to the end of it, I realized that. The only other times in my life that I had needed that many boundaries and rules were in like really dysfunctional toxic relationships or for me, um, if you're familiar with attachment styles, like really anxiously attached codependent relationships, like those were the only times when I had needed that many boundaries. And I just had this like light bulb moment where I was like, Oh, I am in an anxiously attached relationship with Instagram and I don't want to do that with an app and I don't have to like I can this is not like a beloved person. I now have to sort this out with like it is an app. I can step away and no longer be engaged with it. And so at that point, I decided it was time for me to leave social media and I made the commitment to leave and I shared that with my community on Instagram, and I left social media about two months later on April 9th, 2021.

Raya: 19:08

Oh, wow.

Amelia: 19:10

Yeah, I know the exact date. I celebrate it every year.

Raya: 19:13

Honestly, it's, that's two years.

Amelia: 19:17

Yeah, it's been over two years now.

Raya: 19:19

Wow. You have a toolkit, which everybody should get. I have it in my notion right now, uh, leaving social media toolkit where you have your five step plan for leaving social media. So did you have that already set up and did you follow that plan or did your plan look a little bit different?

Amelia: 19:39

So that plan is kind of reverse engineered from my experience leaving so like the plan did not exist before I left. I left and then I looked back at what I did and wrote the plan for folks tuned in who are curious, like a real quick overview of the steps is like step one is deciding that you're going to leave and when you'll leave. Step two is announcing your exit and telling people how they can stay in touch with you. So I just mentioned like those are two things I did. Step three is requesting your data from the platform and archiving it offline. This is a step I think a lot of people forget about, but if you were like me and you spent a decade as a content creator for Instagram, I had a lot of stuff there and I didn't want to just lose it. So I spent time. I requested the official like data from Instagram, and I spent even more time just like screenshotting and saving things I wanted to keep. And then step four is to decide if you're going to leave your profile up or delete it entirely. And if you are going to leave it up to change your bio profile, all of those pieces to say that you're not active there anymore. And step five is to sign off. So those are all things that I did in my process of leaving. And I think that looking back, like in the five step plan, it feels so easy and empowering. And I love that. But like when I was doing it, it was much like murkier and less clear to me what it was really going to take to leave. And like, I had this real fear that I was going to miss something or mess something up. And I really had to also grapple with like my fear of FOMO. Like nobody else is leaving just cause I'm leaving. So everything's going to keep happening here. And I had to sit with that and process that and like release it and all of that was happening while I was doing those five steps.

Raya: 21:36

Yeah. One of the questions that I had for you is how did you release the fear of leaving social media? Because I feel like that's something that a lot of people feel, especially small business owners that you work with. There's this, well, how am I going to do it if I don't have social media? And I think you said on one of your podcasts, and I don't know why we don't think about it like this, but people have actually ran successful businesses prior to social media existing. So why do we feel like we can't do it? But I guess because it's such a prominent part of our lives and people push it so hard that you, if you have a business, you have to be on these apps. Then we don't think about it that simply like that.

Amelia: 22:23

Yeah. So I definitely think in this day and age, like marketing and social media marketing have become synonymous. And part of the work that I'm doing is really trying to pull those back apart. Like marketing, social media marketing is one type of marketing. It is not the only type of marketing. And I think that's really important. And I'm always trying to remind people of that. And I think you're so right in pointing to how people feel like it's really scary to reject the traditional wisdom, the common wisdom, like what everybody believes to be true, that if you have a business, you have to be on social media or your business has to be on social media. And so I think there's a lot of different fears that come up when you think about leaving. And I actually have a workshop about this inside of my membership, the interweb. And so there's a workshop I have. I guess a workshop series called business success without social media. And step one of that series is clear the fear because it's the first thing we have to do. If we want to actually do this work, we have to acknowledge the things that we're afraid of about leadivg social media, about marketing our businesses differently. And we have to find ways to release that. So for me, I did a lot of acknowledging fear. You know, I was really afraid that if I left social media, no one would ever find my work again, that everyone would forget me, that I'd never get invited to anything, that I'd never find clients. All of that came up and I had to, I really like to have sort of practices of being in conversation with fear. And so I kind of had conversations with those voices, acknowledging them. And I let myself spend some time sitting with like, what if that's true? What if I don't get invited to something? And I was like, well, that's okay. So that became a practice of just me being like, and that can be okay. And that can be okay. I would have had this affirmation and running. And I also think that's where it's really helpful to like, if you're sitting with a lot of fear, I think tools like visualizations, body work, uh, breath work, meditation, like some type of practice to move the fear through your body is also really helpful. But I think the first step is like acknowledging that you have fear, naming those fears, and then finding ways to process and release them. And that is kind of part of what I walk through in that workshop. And there's another workshop inside of the interweb that my dear friend Grace Allerdice leads. It's a visualization for kind of communing with social media and the role it plays in your life and being in conversation with it and talking to those fears and I was working. I invited her to create that because I was working with her 1 on 1 when I left social media and she was kind of guiding me through some of these practices energetically and in an embodied way so that I could actually move through the fear to get to your question, like the fear was there. It was present. I was naming it. And then I was working with somebody I really trusted to help me process and release it. And that was just so supportive and liberating and really necessary. Like, you won't be able to leave social media if you just spend the whole time pretending you're not afraid of it. Like, it doesn't work like, like avoiding repressing, ignoring the fear is not going to get you there. So let's find ways to like, yeah. Be with it and move through it.

Raya: 25:56

Yeah, I love all of that. I also feel like it's, it's even more fearful to stay kind of because the, the feeling of FOMO, the feeling of comparing yourself that will only increase the longer you stay. So, yeah, I fear staying more than leaving, but it's, I don't think there's enough content on how to leave, which is why I love what you're doing.

Amelia: 26:24

Yeah. Yeah. Thank you. I appreciate that. Yeah. I think you're so right that like any fear that you have around leaving is actually based in something that's not working in your experience of being there. And also there's not a whole lot of content around leaving social media. I agree with you. There are some people that I admired and looked at when I wanted to leave and found some of their work, I'm trying to think of their, their names so I can name them like one. I think her name is Leonie Dawson is her. Yeah. So she has a marketing without social media course. And then there's also, um, Alexandra Franzen. She has some work around not being on social media and I think a list of ways to share your work without social media. That was really inspiring to me. So there are a few other people out there, but for me, it was like, nobody's making a podcast about this and I love podcasts. So that is absolutely what I want to create.

Raya: 27:29

You did a episode about this on off the grid, but I wanted to talk about it here as well, um, you talked about this element of grief about leaving social media apps and I find that that's something that people talk about. I'm on Substack as well. And a lot of writers and a lot of journalists, actually, I didn't, it didn't really compute to me that journalists and writers were very big on. I refuse to call the app X because

Amelia: 28:01

I know I've been saying Twitter all this conversation too.

Raya: 28:05

The app formerly known as Twitter. A lot of them had grown such a following on Twitter and leaving that platform actually brought a lot of grief to them. So what did grieving social media look like for you? And also after you completely left after April 9th, did you have like withdrawals of like, maybe I should go back or just like a back and forth type of thought process?

Amelia: 28:33

Yeah, I love that last part of the question too. I don't get asked that very often, but I think it's very real. That's sort of like a lot of people leave and return. And I don't think that any choice we make has to be a choice forever. I'd say for me, I never considered returning as like the personal brand version of myself. I did for a while have a Finsta where I followed like less than 100 people and people I actually knew and a couple of like physical locations in my local community. But even that I deleted a while ago, like I was like, yeah, um, I still don't really want to be on here at all. I had quit being an influencer and I've never gone back to that, but I also just quit being on the apps altogether. And I think that has to do with the fact that I did spend time grieving. And I think so often when we get caught in a pattern like that, where we're like, I leave and I come back and I leave and I come back. It's because we haven't actually processed. Grief or other feelings. It could be grief, could be anger, could be resentment. Like there are lots of feelings wrapped into that. But for me, it was grief. I really had to sit with. And I think this is really common, but people won't say it. And I'm going to admit to it, which is like, I wanted to be internet famous. Like I wanted it, I wanted hundreds of thousands of followers. I wanted to just like hop on stories and chat and have tons of people be excited about everything I was saying and doing that day. Like I did want that. I saw other people have it and I wanted it and it was not happening for me. Like maybe I did that and like a couple of people cared that much, or even a few dozen people. But like my, my Instagram account never grew past 3000 followers. And that's just how it was. And I had to grieve that I had to like acknowledge that I had that desire and I had to let it go. It's like, I am not going to be an Instagram influencer. That is not my life. That is apparently not my path. And I need to let myself feel that and not everybody wants to be Instagram famous, but often there is some dream that we're holding on to when we stay on the app on any social media platform longer than feels good. Like if it has stopped feeling good and you're still there, there's probably a dream that you have that you're like holding out for. I talked to a lot of people where that dream is a book deal, like a lot of people, like I want to publish a book and everyone tells me you have to have a social media following to publish a book. So I am still here and I can relate to that. That is part of my journey, like I invested a lot of time and money into growing my Instagram following because I got a book deal and I wanted my book to be successful, but it still didn't work out for me. And I think that that's really like where the grief comes in. And that's also why I think that like, I haven't had felt any desire to go back because I actually like process that grief. I grieved. And now like, I literally like, what would I go back for? Like I can't come up with any reason that I would be there because I let go of all of the sort of like false narratives, as well as like the desires that kept me there. And it was certainly challenging. Grief is really hard whether you're grieving a person or you're grieving a dream. They're both really hard, but I think that it's really important to learn how to do that as people and as creatives because also as creative people, we will have so many projects that just like don't take off and we have to let them go and we have to like kind of put them to bed and let them be gone and grieve them. And I've also had that in my creative life. I've had so many podcasts that are like over now and it was really sad. And I like cried when I recorded the final episode, but like I grieved it and it's okay. It can be over and done. And I think that applies to social media and our relationship to social media platforms as well.

Raya: 32:50

That's so good. Now, I'm like, what's the dream, Laraya? What are you keeping this for?

Amelia: 32:57

Yeah. Yeah. The why I, Uh, I think there's a coach. I don't remember which famous coach. It's not my idea, but like just the practice of like asking yourself why, like five times to try to get deeper and deeper into why you're doing something like, Oh, I'm still on social media. Why? Oh, because I want this. Why? Oh, because of that. Why? And like keeping like to keep going into it. I'm a really big fan of that sort of like questioning and self reflection.

Raya: 33:23

To your point of being internet famous, a lot of people want that virality. They want just that one thing to go viral and then they think everything will be okay and I'll get all these followers and I'll do all these things. One thing I read from someone, I don't remember her name, but I believe she's on Substack as well. But she had also gone viral and she was saying how it can often feel like a lonely feeling afterwards. Because when nothing else goes viral, and you just have this one, it's like, well, how do I keep working up to get more? And there's always this, this feeling of when I get there, but there is a changing goalpost. So, yeah, I think we really have to come to terms with the fact that. Maybe it's not going to end up in the way that we want it to.

Amelia: 34:20

Yeah, I think that is just like a grief of life. Like, we don't always get what we want. Um, it is also 1 of the most beautiful things about life. Like, once we can embrace that, we can actually be open to the path that we're on, and the beauty or joy that we can find there, and yeah, that's just feeling really resonant for me lately. Like I really feel like in leaving social media and launching Off the Grid. I like stepped onto my path and everything that was so hard, like it just, it was all so hard. I was like butting my head against a wall or I was like, I was like moving against the current now I'm like flowing with the current and it's so easy, but I never could have seen that if I didn't like take this step. If I kept like fighting and pushing and I feel really lucky that that has been the case for me and I'm sure it will change. It will get hard again. But I'm trying to enjoy this moment where it's like making sense and with ease.

Raya: 35:25

Yeah, and I feel like that's what we don't really equate grieving in social media. And I feel like there's a lot of kind of predatory rhetoric out there that keeps the narrative going that you have to stay here. People who are like, buy my course on how to succeed social media and learn the algorithm and things like that. But is the algorithm really learnable? Is it really something that you can crack? Or we don't really know why things go viral. We don't really know why things get the, the attention that it does. Sometimes it's just out of the blue.

Amelia: 36:06

Yeah, I definitely, I listened to one of my clients. Sorry. I finished my circle back, finished that thought. One of my clients is holisticism and the 12th house podcast. And they had a guest last year on their other podcast, Good for You, who is very like knowledgeable about Tiktok and marketing on Tiktok. And something that she said that I thought was really important and convincing and like unlocked something for me was that the purpose of the platform, their mission of any social media platform is to keep you on that app as long as possible because the longer you're on the app, the more advertising they can feed you, the more money they can make. And that means that they will always be moving the goal post because once you think you have it figured out, then like, you're like, oh, yes, I figured it out. I don't have to spend so much time here. I don't have to work so hard. I don't have to like strive all the time. But that is. intention with their goal, which is to keep you there as long as possible. So the algorithm is always evolving. So I'm like, by the time somebody writes that course, that's like, here's how it works. The algorithm has changed and it doesn't work that way anymore. And so there are some people who are super innovative and good at always being ahead of a trend, but I wasn't that person. And frankly, most of us aren't. Most of us are like following the trends, not setting or being ahead of them. Um, but it really like was important to me to have that realization of like, Oh yeah, like you can never just figure this out. It's not like something I can learn and then know forever. Like I can't be good at the algorithm forever the way that so many other skills you can learn and maintain. Like once I know how to make a podcast, I can be good at podcasting. I don't know. I'm not constantly like moving the goalpost and like having to start from scratch with how I know how to do it. And that means I can deepen my skills and I can feel like I can improve and grow. Instead of on social media, I just felt like I was always like at the surface level, just like grab, grab, grab, grab grabbing. And I never like got to get better at something and got to improve. I never got to become excellent. I was always just like kind of okay at everything I was doing. And that to me is like really not creatively fulfilling.

Raya: 38:29

Yeah, I love that. So it's past April 9th and you get an idea to start a studio called Softer Sounds. Tell me about the origin of Softer Sounds and what avenues, since you're off social media at this point, what avenues did you prioritize when you launched your podcast studio?

Amelia: 38:53

Yeah. So when I left social media, I knew that I was going to have to start a new business. So when I was on most active on Instagram, I was selling online courses. I was selling my book and I sold some like products like stickers and fun things. And I would say, you know, I made a few thousand dollars a year doing that. It was by no means a full time income. It was very much like a side hustle. And I knew that. When I left social media that business would like kind of die like it just I wasn't able to grow it big enough to become a full time thing on social media and I knew that without social media, I wouldn't get the traffic or the interest for it. So I left social media. I shut all of that down and I decided to start a new business and I had been podcasting for myself and I had been editing for other people for quite a long time, well, for a few years at that point, I guess. And I kind of really practically sat down with myself and I was like, what is my most marketable skill and what can I charge the most for of the things I can do? And the answer to that question was podcast editing and audio editing. And during that time, I was working for a company called sister, and I was teaching this program called feminist business school. And so luckily I also had this whole business education that I had kind of gained over the, a few years working with them. And I put all of that into motion and created Softer Sounds. So it really came out of both this, like, deeply creative, soulful place in myself and this very like pragmatic I need to make actual money and support myself place. And yeah, it kind of all happened at the same time. I left social media in April. I left that job in June. I registered Softer Sounds in July and I launched the company in September of that same year. Yeah. And it was a really beautiful time. I like really gave myself a lot of space to dream it up. I took a lot of courses that summer, like so many like personal development and business development courses. I was really like letting myself sit with all of my like dreams and desires and ideas and kind of brought all of that into what Softer Sounds started out.

Raya: 41:22

First of all, Softer Sounds is such a, a fitting name for your podcast studio because you have the softest voice.

Amelia: 41:30

Well, thank you. I received that compliment. Thank you.

Raya: 41:35

Within the first year of Softer Sounds, what did marketing look like without social?

Amelia: 41:42

Oh, beautiful. Thank you for bringing that back because I realized that was part of your last question, but I didn't answer. Um, so when I launched Softer Sounds, I made a website for the company and then I sent, I think it was like 65 emails to personal and professional contacts that I had made over like since college and I sent personal emails where I was like, hi, so and so it's so great to talk to you or like, I haven't talked to you in forever. I wanted to let you know that I have just launched this company. This is the next step for my career. I'm really excited about it. Here's the website. If you're interested in learning more and I would love to make a podcast with you, or if you know anyone who wants to make a podcast, I would love if you refer me and my work to those people. And that was the launch of the business. And I would say the first quarter of the business so I sent those in September. The rest of that year was work that I got from that, those relationships, like it brought people in. And I was able to kind of start off with sort of a few shows and some other audio projects that people like brought my way because I had sent those emails. So it started with that, like relationship marketing, personal connections from their word of mouth has been so powerful for the studio. So something that's really great about running a podcast studio is we only need like 12 to 20 clients at any given time to be the size and like for the business to run as it does right now. When I started in that first year, I guess I really only needed like eight to 10 clients because it was just me. So my expenses weren't very high and I just needed kind of like just enough people to hit my revenue goals. So, you know, I had a couple of clients from that first email push. They referred me to a few more people and then that became our client base. And then over time, it's just grown through referrals. People have also learned about the show in other ways. So I have an email list that I send, I send a monthly update from the studio. I have done a few podcasting workshops for different communities. Our first year I did a how to launch your podcast in 2022 workshop that brought some people our way. And then I have been interviewed on many, many podcasts about podcasting. So those still continue to bring people into the studio. And then also people find out about Softer Sounds through Off the Grid, like yourself, um, or like Lee(Tilghman) who connected or who you found me through. And so that also, like, has brought more people into Softer Sounds over time. So I'd say the first year was a lot of relationship marketing and and now there's a little bit more content marketing and podcast marketing that's happening alongside that.

Raya: 44:32

Yeah, and I think the, the weird thing about it is that even though it has taken a more content marketing feel, it still feels like I'm talking directly to you. Like, and that's what social media was supposed to be.

Amelia: 44:50

Yes.

Raya: 44:50

But it's more so I feel more connected reading an email from you than maybe I would feel if I was scrolling on your Instagram.

Amelia: 44:58

Yeah, I really appreciate that, that reflection and feedback. And I would say that it's definitely, it's a combination of like, I just think I'm a very personable person and I'm able to write in a really like warm and connective way. And it's a skill that I've honed over time. So I don't want people, you know, it can be really discouraging sometimes I think to people to hear like, Oh, well, that's just how Amelia is. Yes, I'm a very warm, soft, welcoming person, but I've learned how to write in a way that really connects with people. And I've been podcasting for eight years now. Like I've learned how to speak in a way that feels both like really prepared, but also really natural. Like these are all skills that you can develop over time, um, depending on what you want to do. Right? Like some people don't want people to feel like they can be close to them, but I want everyone to feel like they can be close to me, even if I can't be close to everyone all the time. So, um, I appreciate that feedback. Thank you. And I think you're so right that like people think the only way you can do that is on social media, but that's not true. Like podcasts, especially are such a great tool for feeling close to people and nurturing relationships with an audience like the voice is so good at that and like leaning into that is really powerful.

Raya: 46:22

Yeah. So after your exodus from social media, what avenues of expression both personal or professional, do you most value now or enjoy?

Amelia: 46:36

Hmm, what a beautiful question. So I would say when I left social media, I was still writing a lot. And I loved that. I write less now. I really do a lot of podcasting like as a creative practice. I mean, I, I do a lot for work and for the studio, but also like creating my own show and playing with that is really fun for me. I also have some like purely personal creative practices. So I like to quilts. I make baby quilts for all my friends who have kids. Um, I love to read tarot and I have a little personal tarot podcast. I make that's like a really fulfilling creative outlet for me. And I like to like decorate my home, which is really fun. And then I'm not like an interior decorator. This is like, not me, you know, like buying stuff. It's really me just being like, Oh, I want to like make this corner look nicer. What, like, how can I like put like a blanket and a candle and like all these things here? I find like tending to my space to be very creatively fulfilling as well. And so, yeah, I'd say like hometending and quilting are kind of my like private creative practices and then definitely podcasting is the one where I'm really like sharing more publicly and creating and sort of an outward focused way.

Raya: 48:03

Yeah, man, I wish I was a crafter.

Amelia: 48:07

I definitely was growing up. I was like totally that kid who like handmade all my Christmas presents and like in college I sold jewelry and like I was very into it for quite a while, less so now, but, but the quilting has stuck around.

Raya: 48:21

Yeah, I used to crochet for a little bit, but I don't know. I just left that by the wayside.

Amelia: 48:29

Yeah, I think also there's like for me, I go through periods where it's like, I really want to do things with my hands. And so that's when I'm like, I'm gonna make a quilt. I'm gonna knit. I'm gonna like, paint something, even I'm not a good painter, but I like to do paint by numbers sometimes. Um, but then other times it's really like, Oh no, I just want to like be in my head. I want words. I want to talk like those are kind of distinctly different feelings for me. It's like, do I, is my creative practice really in my head right now? Or is it more in my body? And I try to let, let that lead me into how I spend my kind of where my creative expression goes and flows.

Raya: 49:10

Yeah, it seems like a very slow living, just relaxing, seeing where your spirit takes you type of feel.

Amelia: 49:20

I'm really glad it comes across that way. I, that is definitely what I aspire toward. I will say like, I spend plenty of days hunched over my laptop, editing six episodes and sending 60 emails. Like that is definitely a part of my life sometimes, but I'm always working towards slowing down. It's like. It's a lesson I have to learn over and over again. So it is something I center in my life, but that doesn't mean I'm all that good at it. I like have to keep trying to slow down.

Raya: 49:51

I don't think anybody's really good at it. We're just trying to aspire to get there.

Amelia: 49:55

Agreed.

Raya: 49:55

Agreed. Yeah. But we're nearing the end of this podcast and it's been great. I've, I'm honestly planning how to get off of these apps.

Amelia: 50:08

Well, I love that for you. There's never any pressure. I always tell people, I don't care if you're on social media or not. I want you to know that you don't have to be if you don't want to be. So if you don't want to be there, that's beautiful. I love that.

Raya: 50:21

Yeah. And I feel like people don't get told that enough.

Amelia: 50:25

Yeah, they much more often hear you have to be on social media, which is like boring.

Raya: 50:34

Well, at the time of recording this, it's in November, but I just wanted to ask you, what are your goals for Softer Sounds for 2024?

Amelia: 50:44

Hmm. Another great question. I think that right now my hope for the studio next year is that we're doing a lot of the same. To be honest, I just released an episode of Off the Grid that was all about feeling like. Softer Sounds grew faster than I knew what to do with, and I think we've scaled back a little bit this fall and things are feeling much more like manageable and supportive and I'm hoping that we can stay in that place next year. I'm also really excited that I think some of my team members will be shifting roles, so they'll be doing more work in the studio and I'll be able to give more of my time to Off the Grid and spend more time creating for the members of the interweb, which I'm really excited about for next year. And I'm also hoping to have a little more time for my own creative practices, like that are not for work or for money, but things that I can do to really like support and nourish my own spirit such that I have even more to give to Off the Grid and Softer Sounds.

Raya: 51:53

I love that. Well, I'll let you take the floor and let people know how they can connect with you.

Amelia: 51:59

Beautiful. So if you're interested in leaving social media, or you want to listen to Off the Grid, you can find the podcast and our free leaving social media toolkit at Off the Grid.fun. So that's the best place to go for that. If you're interested in podcasting with me and Softer Sounds, you can find us at softer sounds. studio. And you can find me personally and sort of the wide range of things that I do at ameliahruby. com. So, of course, we're not on social media, but we have great websites. So head to, I'm sure the show notes will have all of those linked and I would love to hear from you. They also all have contact forms. So like listen to the pod, reach out, say hi. I'm always happy to hear from listeners and offer any support that I can.

Raya: 52:46

Well, thank you for coming on the podcast. This has been great. I'm so excited for this to come out soon.

Amelia: 52:52

Thank you so much for having me. This has been a real joy.

Raya: 52:57

Well, I hope you guys enjoyed Amelia's episode on leaving social media. I honestly believe she's a forerunner in talking about leaving social media platforms, and I'm so honored that she came to Sheer Creativity to tell her story. I felt so validated hearing her experiences and encouraged so much so that my podcast officially left social media on December 27th 2023. I also deleted my personal Instagram shortly after, I don't remember the date, but it was the best decision I could have made for my own sanity and for my own progress in 2024. I wanted to share my own in depth experience on social media as a individual and also as a creative on the podcast. So that's what our next episode will be. So tune in the sheer creativity next time. And remember we got my weekly episodes because this is what's sustainable for me right now. And we'll talk more about my social media experience and what led me to actually leave it. I would love to know how you guys felt about this episode and this podcast. So please leave a review. And also if you want to keep up with me and my personal work as a creative writer, you can subscribe to my newsletter, which is in the show notes. And also in the show notes, you'll find links to the work from the individuals that Amelia mentioned in this episode, and also her leaving social media toolkit, which is very helpful. So thank you for tuning in, and I will see you next time.