Shawnee Leonard

Audience ownership has always been at the heart of what we’re building at beehiiv. Your newsletter gives you a direct relationship with your readers. Community takes that one step further by giving readers a place to connect and build deeper relationships on a platform that’s owned by you, not faceless algorithms. Whether they’re united by a shared love of design, startups, or even the World Cup, human connection is more important than ever. And as of yesterday, you can foster those connections on beehiiv. Here’s why building a community on beehiiv is fundamentally better than using a standalone community platform: > Move readers from newsletter to community in just a few clicks > Offer one unified paid subscription across your newsletter, podcast, and community > Use automations to send timely, personalized messages to members > Sync newsletter posts and podcast episodes to your community in real time > Host live webinars and events directly within your website and community > Understand your audience holistically across your entire ecosystem 🫶 And there’s so much more coming soon.

After working with hundreds of executives over the last five years at LinkedIn, I've noticed a simple pattern: the leaders who build the most trust aren't necessarily the most polished. They're the most genuine. I recently sat down with M.T. Deco to discuss executive thought leadership, the evolution of executive content, and what separates leaders who build influence from those who get ignored. One insight stood out. The leaders who succeed on LinkedIn over the next few years won't be the most polished. They'll be the ones who consistently share their expertise, perspectives, and experiences in a way that feels authentic. Too often, executive content is treated as a distribution channel. But, the leaders seeing the strongest results think differently. They use LinkedIn to build relationships, participate in conversations, and give people a window into how they think. A few reminders for executives and their comms teams: • Share perspectives, not press releases • Prioritize quality over quantity • Experiment with formats that feel natural • Don't underestimate the power of commenting and engaging with others • Think like a community builder, not a spokesperson If you're interested in executive thought leadership or where LinkedIn is headed next, you can check out the full interview here: https://lnkd.in/e2aYKN8y

Soccer reminds us that individual talent can only get you so far. Every winning team needs a strong starting 11. 🏆 To win in business right now, you need: 🛡️ Defenders who can protect the organization. 🤝 Midfielders who connect ideas, people, and data. ⚡ Forwards who create opportunities and drive growth. Here is our starting 11 for a future-ready workforce: 🧤 In Goal: > • Risk Management 🧱 The Defense: • Cybersecurity • Problem Solving • Adaptability • Attention to Detail 🧭 The Midfield: • Communication • Collaboration • Data Literacy 🚀 The Forwards: • AI Literacy • Leadership • Creativity If you were the manager, what skill would you sub into your organization’s starting 11? Let us know below! 👇

I've been a creator journalist for 1.5 years, and I can say this is the one change that supercharged my growth on short-form video platforms. When I first started In The Hyphen, my YouTube channel, TikTok, Instagram and newsletter covering Latino culture in the United States, I would post short-form videos on Tuesdays and Saturdays. My reason for that was two-fold: 👉 That's all I had time for 👉 I (erroneously) reasoned that that was a way to trick the audience into thinking I was "always on." If they saw a video from me Tuesday, they could think, "Ah, Fernando's next video is coming Saturday. That's not too far away." Similarly so, if they saw a video of mine on Saturday, the Tuesday video didn't feel that far away. Needless to say, that's not what the audience thought. I can barely keep track of my own publishing schedule. How can I expect my audience to do it? By happenstance, I met with a content strategist almost a year into my journey who was trying to sell me on his new company. It turned out I wasn't a good fit for his services, but he did give me one piece of advice. "You should post Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays," he told me. Why? Weekends were far too unpredictable with people enjoying their time away from work, not glued to their phones. On Monday, people are still warming up to the week. Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday people are in their routine, picking up their phone a predictable amount of time. By Friday, all bets are off. I decided to do what he suggested. The change in publish schedule was followed by the fastest growth in engagement and followers on Instagram and TikTok, specifically, but not for the reasons the strategist suggested. See, what I was doing before, was that I was pre-producing my Tuesday and Saturday videos. By doing that, I wasn't really applying learnings from the Tuesday video to the Saturday video. My videos were also so evergreen that they weren't speaking to what was going on *right now* in the conversation. When I started publishing Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday, I inevitably started making the videos the same day they were published. This allowed me to cover topics currently in the zeitgeist, but by doing this three days back-to-back, it also made me a better short-form video producer. I was not only getting incrementally *faster* at writing, shooting and editing by the time I made the Thursday video, but I was also getting *better* at all those skills. I started recognizing what a good hook sounded like. I started developing a sense for what good, engaging editing felt like. And my shooting started developing a distinct visual language followers could recognize when my videos popped up on their feed. TL;DR: If you want to grow in short-form video, challenge yourself to make one video a day for a consecutive amount of days. Links to my Instagram and TikTok in the comments if you want to see my progression!

It's soooo easy to start a business all you need is to: 1. build out an email list 2. create a pretty website 3. build a product people want 4. have a way to make $$ from day 1 5. accept payments and run analytics 6. have easy ways for new people to discover you 7. publish podcasts so people can go deeper with you.. EASY... right?? RIGHT? 🙃 When I first started building businesses ~8years ago (which is 77entrepreneur years, btw) each of these things required me to learn, pay for, and manage different tools. Now I run my (fun + calm) 6-figure business from wherever i happen to be in the world with one tool that happens to do ALL of the above: beehiiv Whyy? Because I'm allergic to complex setups and obsessed with SIMPLIFYING so I can spend more playing outside in the forest I'm thinking of running some free coaching sessions to help you build a fun + calm business too Would you be most keen on: A: newsletter growth (we just passed 70,000 subscribers & i have many lessons!) B: launching products C: nailing distribution D: nailing monetiziation / your biz model E: something else?? PS: grab a cheeky discount here https://lnkd.in/emDtuG-W) #beehiivpartner #ad

There are two ways to write a founder newsletter. Brand voice: polished, designed, written like "the company" is talking. Founder voice: written like one person talking to one reader. Nathan May, who built a newsletter agency to a million dollars in under a year, picks founder voice every time. He described his own newsletter as "the ugliest newsletter in the world." On purpose. No design team. No graphics. Just a memo from him to you. He sits down, writes it like an email to a friend, and hits send. In a world where everything looks AI-generated and over-designed, that plain memo stands out. Polished isn't the goal. Felt is the goal.

Brands aren't ignoring you because your content is bad. More times than not… Your PITCH is the issue (sooorry lol 🙃) I’ve seen thousands of creator “pitches” that basically say "looooove your brand, wanna collab??"... and then wonder why they get ghosted. So lemme break down the exact 4-part framework I've used to land $5M+ in brand deals (and coached thousands more creators to land their own dream deals... Swipe through, and SAVE it for the next time you reach out to a brand. What's the #1 thing you struggle with when pitching brands?

If you look hard enough, you can hear "LET'S GO, MOUNTAINEERS!" filling the stadium.

I'm thinking about a different format for the New Media podcast: Like Acquired, but for new media founders, creators, and brands. We break down the business model, story, numbers, and strategies behind the founders on the bleeding edge of media and the creator economy. Think breakdowns of founders and brands like: Hormozi, Caleb Hammer, Codie Sanchez, Mr Beast, Tom Segura (YMH), Breaking Points, 1440 Media, MarketBeat, Lenny Rachitsky, TBPN, Mark Rober, Danny Go, and many more Would you listen to an hour-long deep dive podcast like this? Yay or nay?