You’ve heard of who Steph Smith has worked with: HubSpot, The Hustle, a16z… She's the queen of “authentic virality.” Here are 10 highlights from my chat with her: 1. How do you be great? Just be good, repeatedly. 2. Writing classes in school focus on grammar and meeting a word count. But they completely ignore something far more important: the ability to identify interesting questions. 3. Writing forces you to exercise parts of your brain that are typically on auto-pilot. 4. If you’re a writer, your voice is your moat. There are a million business publications, and yet a few business writers make it big due to the unmistakable tone of their voice. 5. A follow-up insight: copy-pasting someone else’s growth strategy doesn’t work because the voice that suits them doesn’t suit you. Everything-including your content strategy-should be downstream from the texture of your spirit. 6. Early in her writing career, Steph would read books by world-leading experts and quote them in her essays. She would also email them with a link and comment. They replied 100% of the time. Lesson: The doors are more open than you think…give them a push. 7. Insincere work rubs people off the wrong way. They can smell the lack of conviction. If you don’t want people to walk away thinking something’s “off,” be sincere. 8. People start using humor when they're confident speaking in a specific language. There's a parallel in writing: creativity starts once you understand a topic really well. 9. The best writing advice is to live a life worth living. No morning routines, knowledge management tools, or frameworks will ever come close to the creativity boost that comes from stumbling upon something that you feel must be shared with the world. 10. When people think of you, specific adjectives should come to mind. Jack Butcher is polished. Tim Urban is quirky. Steph Smith is approachable. Who are you?

Such an awesome guest - her course Internet Pipes is absolute fire!

Steph Smith For President!!! 🙌🏽

I first learned about Steph from Nathan Barry’s Billion Dollar Creator and I fell in love 🤩 She’s incredible! Grateful that KZfaq suggested this wonderful interview! 🙏🏼❤️ SO well done!

Steph Smith is a gem !🙌🏼

I love the point about doing things that checks out for you. The trade off when it's intangible (ie online) can be harder for creators. Self imposed expectations can be hard to get rid of.💕 I like the distinction on making decisions based on the lens of if you are a passion-driven creator or business-driven creator. Focus on the strange. Find people who will encourage you to work on the strangeness. Master your strange signals. Lean into your fascinations. 😅love the index finger perspective. I'll add that you can know your view if you look at a mirror. So learn to pick your mirrors. For example, How I write is serving as a guide and gives a lens. It is a form of a digital mirror that can help you know your perspective and develop your voice. This was a fun conversation. Thanks, Steph and David. I enjoyed it.

She's awesome online and even more so in real life. I'm a huge fan!

Loving this convo! Thank you both for sharing!

loved every minute of it!

Excited for this - watching now!

What an awesome discussion!! Thanks for sharing this with the community! Also wanted to mention that Steph's podcast is also super cool and insightful.

Always a pleasant suprise with the guests! Great to see Steph on the pod. And the quality is top notch as usual.

So many nuggets of gold in this one! Great conversation.

Brilliant ep Steph & Dave... learnt much. Thank you.

Why haven't you gotten Nicolas Cole on yet?

I love Steph smith! Great writing and super talented. She is like my dream girl 😂. Too bad she’s married. Although she seems super organized and put together and I am not. More of a go with the flow thrive in chaos type of person

I came to hear what she had to say and the guy can´t shut up!

badass

steph smith has legs! of course she does but never seen them so i was a bit suprised

Good stuff, David and Steph!!! I just subscribed. Thanks for sharing this