Writing from experience
Your ability and willingness to write about what you know is your superpower
Gary Bloomer | SHAKING THE TREE # 210
Even if you’re not some sort of romantic poet like our friend above, your story matters.
Not only to you, but to a hidden group of people who have yet to discover you.
There’s a myth in marketing and content creation—and something of a myth and in writing in general, come to think about it—that your craft and expertise must be honed, acquired, polished, detached, and perfectly structured before you share something—anything—with the world.
Let me rephrase things here: that’s nonsense.
You don’t have to be an expert, or skilled, or super talented to begin. You simply need to start doing something—ANYTHING—to get your foot in the door, so to speak.
Take my contributions to the Know-How Exchange of MarktingProfs.com as an example.
I’ve been answering question on this forum now since May of 2009. But when I first started, no one had heard of me and to be honest, I was shit scared of getting involved because I’d convinced myself I had nothing of value to offer.
But it turned out that that wasn’t the case.
I let my lack of smarts stop me from contributing for almost 18 months before I finally got around to answering a question. And then an odd thing happened: people began listening. Over several months, my opinions gained more and more traction until I found myself on the Top 100 leader board.
What I hadn’t realized was that it’s our most compelling insights, the biggest lessons we’ve learned about ourselves and the world in general, and the discoveries we’ve made about life and about who we are and why we matter, it’s all of those things that make us who we are and that give us value because those things have come to us from real world, lived experience.
And despite what we may have been led to believe in the media, none of that stuff is smooth sailing. Rather it’s more likely to be the messy, noisy, shitty, imperfect, real stuff of everyday life and of daily living.
Over the years—whether it’s been through my contributions to the MarketingProfs Know-How Exchange, or via building communities for myself or for other people on social media, or through my writing over the last two years here on Substack—one simple lessons floats to the surface again and again: people connect with authenticity, not with authority.
1. Experience beats theory
I’ve found that the best answers I’ve provided on MarketingProfs weren’t the ones pulled from textbooks but from hard-won lessons. When someone asked, “How do you revive a dying Facebook group?” I didn’t quote best practices—I shared how I rebuilt engagement by shifting from broadcast-mode to real conversations.
The same applies to my Substack posts. Readers don’t want vague musings; they want “Here’s what worked (and what blew up in my face).”
2. Writing from experience builds trust
Social media is flooded with self-proclaimed gurus who’ve never actually done the things they preach. But when you write from experience, you’re not just sharing knowledge—you’re inviting people into your process.
When I’ve written about community-building, it’s seldom been the abstracts of theory. It’s usually been about the late nights I’ve spent tweaking engagement strategies, or about the interactions and experiments that failed, and the moments when a random post unexpectedly struck a chord with someone because something I’d said built an element of trust or reinforced someone’s belief.
3. Your unique perspective makes a difference.
Your thoughts, memories, and opinions and the things you have seen and experienced are unique to you. So use these things to your advantage.
In my Substack, I’ve written about everything from LinkedIn engagement tactics to why most “growth hacks” are BS. Those posts resonate because they’re filtered through my lens—not regurgitated from some trending Twitter thread.
The basic take away: start where you are
You don’t need a decade of experience to write with authority. You just need to be honest about what you’ve learned so far.
Did a project fail? Write about it.
Did you stumble on a weird little tactic that worked? Share it.
Do you have a powerful conviction that sets you apart from other people in your niche? Don’t shy away from defending it.
The best writing doesn’t come from a place of “I know everything.” It comes from “Here’s what I’ve seen—what do you think?”
That’s how real connections are made.
As always, thanks for reading.
—Gary
Feel free to follow me on Twitter and LinkedIn
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P.S. Next time on Shaking the Tree … The bar is lower than you think!
ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Originally from the U.K., Gary Bloomer is a writer, branding advocate, marketing specialist, and an award-winning graphic designer.
His design work has been included in Creative Review (one of the UK’s largest design magazines). Since 2009, he has answered over 5,000 marketing and business questions in the Know-How Exchange of MarketingProfs.com, placing him among the top 3% of contributors. He lives in Wilmington, Delaware, USA.