Why aren’t we on TikTok? Can’t AI build up our SEO? How about funny Reels?
You have probably been on the receiving end of these kinds of questions. The implicit assumption is that entering new content channels is easy and worthwhile.
But is that really the case? Should brands simultaneously go after every distribution channel?
If you’re a startup with limited resources, the answer is probably “no.” You want to pick your channels wisely and scale methodically.
We’ve identified five signals to help you decide when you’re ready to diversify your content and invest in a new channel.
Most successful startups initially have a single channel that skyrockets their revenue.
Andrew Chen, a partner at the VC firm Andreessen Horowitz, argues that four scalable channels can drive early user acquisition: paid ads, virality (word of mouth + social media), SEO, and sales.
Mastering just one of these channels can lift your startup.
But most marketing teams are tempted (or pushed) to try out multiple channels at once. This dilutes their attention and makes them less likely to succeed at any channel.
Your initial focus needs to be on scaling a single channel. Only after that channel becomes ROI-positive should you think about diversifying content.
AppSumo, a platform that offers software deals, scaled beyond the 20 million dollars per year mark by focusing on a single distribution channel: paid ads.
At Animalz, we focused first on our newsletter. Only after the newsletter gained significant traction did we expand to other channels.
💡 Learn how to find high-impact channels in our article “Welcome to the Distribution-First Era, Where Strategy Starts With Channels and Ends With ROI.”
The success formula for most channels is straightforward: create channel-native content your audience cares about.
But many teams eagerly jump into content creation before getting to know their audience. They write about topics readers find irrelevant, use industry terms incorrectly, and highlight product features that fail to drive conversions.
AI has only made this problem worse. Mediocre content gets repurposed with the press of a button, so teams produce even more content that doesn’t resonate with the audience and channel.
To be successful on a new (or existing) channel, you should be able to answer these questions about your audience:
Also, audience habits differ across channels. Content that works on LinkedIn might be ridiculed on X (ex-Twitter). Topics that are great for SEO may lead to limited engagement on Instagram.
The productivity platform ClickUp, for example, knows that the kind of project managers they want to reach enjoy funny videos on TikTok. So ClickUp created many of those, like this one:
But the team at ClickUp also knows important but dry topics, like how to build project portfolio dashboards, are unlikely to go viral on TikTok, so they distribute such content primarily through their SEO channel.
Understanding the quirks of your audience on different channels enables you to achieve content-channel fit. That’s when your voice and style resonate with the channel’s culture and vibe, and your content starts driving both traffic and business outcomes.
Figuring out the content-channel fit, along with learning about your audience, sets you apart from the competition — and makes it more likely that you end up dominating that new channel.
Each distribution channel is uniquely challenging to build and scale. Driving thousands, if not millions, of visits or impressions from content channels requires unique skills to master and lots of persistence.
SEO, for instance, takes time as a team grows site authority and refines content that both Google and users will like. (Case in point: SupportLogic took 12 months to 5X their organic traffic.)
LinkedIn, X, and other social channels are increasingly throttling organic content reach. TikTok might not even be around next year. Not to mention that you will face incumbents who already dominate the channel you’re about to enter.
All of this is to say that you and everyone involved need to be aware of the cost, reward, and timelines of each channel.
Without realistic expectations, you might give up prematurely. Or you may be forced to stop by higher-ups who have unrealistic ideas about your new channel.
Take Gil Dibner, the founder of the VC firm Angular Ventures. He launched the now famed The Angle newsletter back in 2018. He wrote columns weekly for nearly four years, producing over 150 editions by himself. And only later on did other team members start taking on some of the responsibilities.
That kind of persistence and experience is what it takes to build a sizable distribution channel.
Another example comes from Tim Soulo, chief marketing officer at the SEO software company Ahrefs. He recently wrote about his experience launching a podcast. He framed his post as “Ten reasons why you shouldn’t start a podcast.”
It was a tongue-in-cheek but candid post about the challenges of starting and scaling a podcast. The team reached 10,000 listens within three months and 11 episodes, averaging around 900 users per show.
Those numbers might sound impressive depending on your perspective, but consider Ahref’s existing reach: a 100+ person company with 500k YouTube subscribers, 105k Facebook followers, 150k X followers, 176k LinkedIn followers, and millions of organic search visits per year. With such an audience, you’d probably expect to drive higher numbers faster for a new initiative.
Soulo’s experience shows that even for companies with widely successful existing channels, scaling a new medium like a podcast is still hard and takes a lot of effort.
A new channel requires someone’s attention. Whether that’s a part-time or full-time expert or outsourced with an agency, there will be extra costs for people and other resources.
You might also need new tools, paid promotions, or even an event. TL;DR: You’ll need some extra budget and that usually requires leadership buy-in.
The leadership team also needs to protect your plans against other internal stakeholders. Another team might argue the budget for your new channel can be put to better use elsewhere.
You need “air-cover” from the leadership team until your plans can come to fruition. Because understanding how a channel works takes time. There are algorithms, communities, trends, influencers, and other factors to consider alongside regular content production.
Take SEO, for example. Maile Ohye, ex-developer programs tech lead at Google, says that “in most cases, SEOs need four months to a year to help your business first implement improvements and then see potential benefit.”
You can try these approaches to secure leadership buy-in:
Prepare these arguments and data points for your boss early on. You also want to discuss them informally with other stakeholders, so that it’s easy for the leadership team to say yes when you formally present your ideas.
You’ll inevitably be asked when the business can expect leads from that new channel.
To prepare for this question, it’s helpful to identify leading and lagging indicators of success.
Leading indicators are metrics like site visits or social shares and comments. You’ll start reporting on them as soon as people start visiting your new channel. Some might call these “vanity metrics”. But as long as you don’t track them in isolation, they are helpful to understand whether your content is gaining traction with your target audience.
Lagging indicators are metrics like conversions or sales revenue. You’ll typically need to wait a bit before your traffic scales enough for these key outcomes to occur.
Tracking and reporting on these success metrics ensures the leadership team is informed and aligned with your progress. It also keeps you and your team accountable and agile so that you can change course in time if necessary.
These five signals aren’t just checkboxes. They are designed to help you strategically build a diversified portfolio of content.
These criteria also prevent you from falling victim to sexy-channel syndrome. You won’t chase every new channel the moment it emerges. Instead, you’ll persist with a channel until you scale it profitably and only then move to the next one.
So, how do you put this into practice? Assess your current content channels against these five signals. See which of these criteria you're not hitting before expanding further.
When you’re ready for a new channel, use our content strategy guide to plan your future actions.
And remember: It’s not about being everywhere — it’s about being where it matters most to your audience and your business.
