You need to lay a solid foundation before you can build a tall and sturdy structure.
Author: Leon Abboud
Translation: Shenchao TechFlow
My journey as a content creator began 8 years ago. Along the way, I have made almost every possible mistake in trying to develop and monetize my brand. Here are the 5 mistakes to be most wary of, hoping to help you avoid these costly lessons.
Mistake 1: Treating your brand as a hobby rather than a business
Most creators remain in financial hardship for a long time because they position themselves as "creators." When you only see yourself as a creator, you focus on optimizing clicks, likes, views, and various metrics thrown at you by the algorithm.
Top personal brand creators view themselves as a business. You are a company, albeit one with just yourself, and this company is named after you.
Once you complete this mindset shift, everything will be different. The creator's mindset is: "What content should I post tomorrow?" while the business mindset is: "What processes can convert strangers into customers?"
You will stop asking "How can I get more engagement?" and start asking the key questions that truly drive growth:
What am I selling?
Who is my target customer?
What kind of experience path have I designed for users?
How do I publish content that makes users more willing to engage with me and ultimately purchase?
This shift in thinking can transform scattered content into a long-term money-making machine.
Creators who chase exposure will eventually fall into the "engagement treadmill"—a never-ending cycle. You can only keep running until you are completely exhausted. Escape this trap, or it will consume you.
Mistake 2: Lacking a clear niche
If you try to speak to everyone, you will ultimately find that you resonate with no one.
It's like standing on a bench at a train station shouting, "Hey, everyone pay attention!" No one will turn around. But if you shout a specific name, like "Mike," the person with that name will immediately look at you.
This is the effect a good niche can bring—you can precisely attract a specific audience within your target area.
A strong niche needs to have the following qualities: it should have profit potential, be attractive, and provide enough content creation material.
Many people are unsure of what their niche is and don’t know how to find it. For me, I like to ask myself this question:
"What is something I am naturally passionate about, willing to go all out to become the best in the world at, and that people are willing to pay for?"
The intersection of these three elements is your niche. It must be something you are genuinely interested in and passionate about; something you are willing to invest time, energy, and effort to excel at; and something that people are willing to pay for.
For example, areas like Real World Assets (RWAs), stablecoins, and prediction markets are all great niches. There are many people in these fields who want to understand industry trends and use that knowledge for personal growth or career development.
This is the definition of an excellent niche.
A simple self-assessment question: "Can I create a long-term operational newsletter around this niche?" If the answer is yes, then your niche is viable. If the answer is no, then you may have just chosen a direction that feels "right" rather than a true niche.
Most creators fail because they want everyone to like them. They chase as many views and exposures as possible. But in reality, successful brands are not built on popularity but on clear positioning.
Mistake 3: Using cheap-looking brand materials that lower account image
People quickly browse thousands of personal profiles every day, and you have less than half a second to convey value.
If your profile picture is blurry, outdated, AI-generated, or from a "dead" NFT project (like one you minted in 2021), you will immediately lose appeal and status.
Remember, your status is not fixed; it can quickly decline due to these details.
Your personal profile is not a decoration; it is your "storefront." It should enhance your sense of value, not detract from it.
A clear profile picture, a clear banner image, and a clear bio—these are essential. If you don’t want to use your own photo, choose a community or identity that truly reflects your values and carries status.
There are now hundreds of active NFT communities offering high-quality profile pictures (PFP) at various price points. You don’t need to own a CryptoPunk to appear wealthy or professional. What you need is material that enhances your brand image, not content that diminishes your sense of value.
Additionally, do not use hashtags in your bio, nor overly broad terms. Your bio should clearly state three things: who you are, what you do, and why people should respect you, and that’s it.
Mistake 4: Creating content without building a monetization funnel
This is a mistake I made for a long time in my creator career. I created purely for the sake of creating, never formulating a strategy for monetizing my content.
What was the result? I accumulated hundreds of thousands of followers, but when I tried to monetize, I found my income was minimal. The reason is simple—right from the start, I did not establish a proper ecosystem for my content.
It’s like building a house. You need to lay a solid foundation before you can build a tall and sturdy structure. And for any business, this "foundation" is monetization capability.
Most creators publish content without any backend structure to support it. They rely on the virality of their content, hoping that one day a sponsor will come down from the sky and save everything. But this is not building a business; it’s gambling in a game with no guarantees.
A real brand needs to have a clear "funnel structure":
Top-level traffic-generating content;
Lead magnets to attract potential customers;
Mid-tier paid products;
High-end core products;
And long-term assets that can continuously generate income.
With such a structure, every piece of content you create will have a clear purpose and meaning.
Without these, you may gain followers but not make money. And in this industry, that is the worst combination. You may become "famous but poor," ultimately feeling exhausted from the futility of it all.
Mistake 5: Stopping learning and growing after choosing a niche
Choosing your niche is just the starting point. To become a top expert and best creator in that field, you must always stay at the forefront of industry development.
Your field is evolving at lightning speed, constantly changing. There are always new hot topics, new announcements, and new trending discussions emerging.
You need to become the "go-to expert" in this field, and the way to achieve this is through continuous learning. This means you need to constantly absorb content, read relevant books, listen to podcasts, and more.
My personal habit is to read one marketing book each month, which keeps me at the forefront of marketing knowledge. You need to become the "encyclopedia" of your industry.
People will follow the smartest individuals in the industry, not those who lag behind. Users enjoy reading in-depth content and gaining knowledge from it.
The speed at which you learn and document determines the speed of your growth.
Once you stop learning about your field, you also stop growing alongside it.
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