TLDR: I’m struggling. The math isn’t mathing — and my body really is keeping the score.
Today’s newsletter is a tender one — one that I’ve wanted to write for a long time but have felt too shy, embarrassed, and anxious about. I’m afraid that in sharing my social media woes, you’ll be annoyed, put off, challenged in a way that makes you sign off this newsletter. Really, what’s happening is that there is a protector part of me that doesn’t want to be vulnerable in this way — and by “this way,” I mean, this part of me doesn’t want to talk about money struggles.
This part of me uses stories like “there are so many people who are struggling so much more than you are,” and weaponizes my poor kid trauma against me: “you’re freaking out for no reason. This is just your poor kid trauma talking.” So this is my attempt to challenge all of those stories that keep me small and afraid and inauthentic. It is my hope that you’ll continue reading.
I’m really struggling to be on social media right now — and by social media, I mean instagram, as that’s really the only form of social media I use. The platform has increasingly made it more challenging for artists and writers to share their work with the world. First it was introducing reels and trying to push that on creators. Then it was using the algorithm to punish those who’re Pro-Palestinian. And honestly the list could go on.
It used to be the case that a post I made with some memes and some promotional content would get seen as much as a post with just memes. But that’s no longer the case. I wanna share the nitty gritty here because I think that so many folks assume that when you have as many followers as I do, that it equals a ton of buy in. (Again, am hoping here that you stay with me — even if for just a peak behind the scenes of content creation on IG.)
The Woes be Woe-ing
Let’s look at a post I made earlier this week. Despite having 353K followers, my post only reached 32K, or about 10%. Out of the 32K the post reached, only 19% engaged with it by commenting, liking, sharing, and/or saving. And of those 6000, only 23 people clicked on a link in my profile (likely to the discord server I was promoting in the post).
Now this post was definitely on the low slide of numbers that I usually see. Let’s look at a post with higher numbers.
Now here the numbers are obviously different. This post reached 121,627 followers (here I’m looking specifically at followers, as they’re the most likely to sign up for something I’m sharing). There were 220 external link taps and over 300 comments — the majority of which are commenting so they can receive a DM with a link to my patreon/discord server. Of those, I had 64 people sign up. 0.128%.
As of today, I have 251 paid subscribers to my Patreon, for a total of $883/month. Now that is largely because folks are getting the perks of a discord server that I moderate, and access to special events that I host. But let’s just say that these subscribers were just there to support the memes I make. On average, I spend 2-3 hours a day creating memes, posting to IG, engaging with your comments, and sharing on my stories. So that’s a total of 10-15 hours a week of work, or 40-60 hours a month. The majority of the majority of hourly salaries in California currently range between $24.66 (25th percentile) to $27.50 (75th percentile). At the low end of my hours, I should be making $986.40/month and at the high end $1650/month.
Now let’s also consider that I pay someone to make the image descriptions for each of my posts, because with my chronic pain, I can’t spend any more time on social media that I already do. They get paid $30/hr and work 5 hours per week, for a total of $600/month. If we were to subtract their pay from the amount I make from my Patreon (again, pretending that my Patreon isn’t for the discord duties I perform), then I’m left with earning $283/month.
Of course, I do make some money through products on my website, which I promote through my Instagram. But as it stands right now, sitting at 3/4 of the month through June, I’ve made:
Some factors to consider here include the fact that I spent the majority of the month promoting the Palestinian t-shirt collab fundraiser I did, which I did not earn any money from because it was all donated, and the fact that I’m doing LA Zine Fest this coming weekend and am hoping that I’ll bring in enough from that to make up in sales lost on my website. Of course, some months are better than others, but lately that’s been because of sales I’ve had to run or because of pre-orders for my new chapbook, to help cover the cost of printing.
Why isn’t the math mathing???
Besides the horrifying nature of the algorithm, here are some other hypotheses:
Hypothesis #1: We’re in a recession and people just don’t have the funds to support their fav creators because they’re barely surviving as it is. What I know from sales is that the majority of people who follow me are lower income because the low end of my sliding scale is the most regularly chosen. (Please reach out if you have any pointers on building a fan base of more affluent folks.)
Hypothesis #2: People’s funds — limited or bountiful — are going to support Palestinians. This is really just me being hopeful.
Hypothesis #3: Everyone is tired. You might be sitting there thinking “I’ve been meaning to sign up for X, Y, or Z thing Margeaux is offering but that tab has been swallowed up amongst my million other tabs and things I need to do.”
Hypothesis #4: This is one that I’ve thought about A LOT over the years. We’ve become used to absorbing labor for free. This is actually kinda what Instagram wants. It wants to be a place where you get sucked into mindless scrolling for hours and don’t exit the app (again, algo woes). But it’s more complicated than that. We don’t see the memes or reels or other things people create as labor.
One of my fav humans on the internet, Jessica Daylover of Remodeled Love, has literally shared screenshots of people DMing her or commenting on posts complaining that she promotes her stuff too much and so they’re unfollowing her. While I’m grateful to have never received those messages myself, I know that the truth is that there are people who follow me who’re annoyed when they reach the end of a meme carousel and there’s promo content there.
I’ve recently decided that after years of saying no to offers of sponsored content, I’m going to start saying yes to companies whose values align with mine. And I worry that it’s going to annoy folks.
The Solution???
The options, as far as I can think of:
Hustle even more than I’m doing already in the hopes that people will actually see my promotional posts and sign up for things (and tbh I’m already doing this so much). I could run more workshops, or my peer support group, but the reality is that I just don’t have the capacity right now. Being a full-time student again has been incredibly hard on my body and with two and a half months left of summer, and upcoming edits to make on my book manuscript for my editors, I don’t know how I can hustle more than I currently am.
Leave IG and put my memes on Discord only and behind a Paywall in the hopes that my absence on the platform will incentivize folks to pay even just $1/month for access to the work I do in the world.
Leave social media and find other ways to do the work that I love to do in the world?!?! I mean, I am kinda already doing that by launching the discord server, writing here, accepting speaking gigs when they’re offered, and writing to stores to see if they’ll carry my products.
Write this newsletter in the hopes that even a small number of the folks who read this will subscribe to my patreon. (Or, conversely, upgrade to a paid subscription here.)
If you made it this far, it’s my hope that you’ll consider option#4. Because I really love existing on IG and I just don’t know how else to make it sustainable. And if you don’t have $1/month, because I know how real that is, there’s a lot you can still do.
SHARE!!! I have pinned some of my products on my IG profile. You can find a post there and share it on your stories. Bonus points if you add some words of your own. You might not think it will make a difference — especially if you have a private account and/or a small following — but referrals and word of mouth make A HUGE DIFFERENCE.
HIRE ME!! Do you work for an organization that could use some trauma-informed training??? I’ve done countless workshops on conflict transformation, boundary setting, storytelling, zine-making, meme-making, and so much more!! Check out my offerings here. Don’t see something there that you’re looking for? Email me at hello@margeauxfeldman.com
Hi Margeaux,
I've never been able to get Instagram to work for me, so can't be much help.
Good luck to you, and thanks for being vulnerable.
Thank you for sharing and being vulnerable! I think one thing to consider about the algorithm, as well, is that a lot of people’s feeds are likely to be drastically different than they were before Oct 7. I know that mine is now mostly dominated with genocide and I have to consciously seek out other content. So sometimes that means I have to search for something else and I don’t always remember to do that when I’m so engaged with the horrors of the world. The other thing to consider is that I feel like everyone I talk to is burnt tf out, including very much myself . I don’t have extra money, time, energy or bandwidth to add anything more to my plate. While I would love to do some enriching activities, engage with others and have some time for my interests, I find myself craving rest and recovery in my limited downtime. Wishing you a path forward that feels good to you.