Every Creator Needs An Enemy (Or Two)

Every Creator needs an enemy.

And by an “enemy”, I don’t mean it in the traditional sense, like an evil villain or even a specific person.

An enemy can be an ideology, narrative, or set of principles. It just needs to be something that you vehemently disagree with.

Having an "enemy" means being very specific about what you're for, and what you're against. It helps group your audience into two very distinct camps:

1. I vehemently agree with this person and want to continue to consume this message.

2. I vehemently disagree with this person and am no longer interested in consuming this message.

This is common in politics, activism, and other industries where there is a for/against style of marketing.

And the best creators use this strategy over and over again in their content, their message, and their products.

Here’s a simple process for how I set my “Enemy Perspectives”.

Start With Sub-Topics

Whenever I Tweet or write a post on LinkedIn, I stay pretty honed in on my umbrella topic, which is Solopreneurship.

But I do so in a way that lets me talk about many different sub-topics underneath that umbrella. That’s because I’ve already gone through the process of breaking Solopreneurship down.

Some of my sub-topics include:

• Ownership
• Wealth
• Knowledge
• Audience
• Content
• Products
• And many others

Assign Your Enemy Perspective to Each Sub-Topic Group

Let’s take the sub-topic “Ownership” for example.

By sitting down and giving some deep thought about ownership, I can easily jot down a few ideologies or narratives that I vehemently disagree with.

Here are some of my Enemy Perspectives around ownership:

• Perspective: The only company that cares deeply about you is your company of one.
• Enemy: Corporations
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• Perspective: You must escape the rat race to truly become wealthy.
• Enemy: The rat race
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• Perspective: The likelihood that you become wealthy working for someone else is slim.
• Enemy: Corporations
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• Perspective: Wealth is about doing what you want, when you want, with whom you want.
• Enemy: The traditional narrative of sacrifice until you're 62 and retire.

By completing this exercise, I’m creating “enemies” that I can attack with my social media content.

When you attack a set of ideas or a common narrative, you will naturally form a following of people who agree with you and draw the ire of those who disagree.

This is a very often overlooked part of building a close-knit, sticky audience that stays with you on your journey over time.

What are your sub-topics and enemy perspectives? If you're struggling to work through this process, consider watching my Content Operating System which helps create 6-12 pieces of unique content from one single idea.

Good luck out there.