Two Days, and What Came Out of Them

I went to a race in California a few weeks ago. Not for work. I went because I was racing my first 30k.

Just because it was a trip for a personal goal doesn’t mean I didn’t capitalize on it for business. Remember, you are your business and everything you do is content, so I wasn’t about to waste a trip that would give me access to people and places I don’t usually get access to.

Here's what came out of that weekend once I got home:

• Two YouTube videos.

• A handful of Reels.

• Two newsletters.

• A Substack article.

• Two strategic partners for CCU.

• Seven coaching conversations.

• One mentorship consult.

• A dinner with a client that did more for that relationship than six months of check-ins would have.

I want to be careful about how that lands, because the wrong read is that I turned a hobby into a content farm. That's not what happened, and if you approach your life that way, you'll be exhausted inside a month, and everyone around you will feel it.

What actually happened is simpler. I went and did something I cared about, surrounded myself with people I didn't know, and told them what I do for a living when they asked.

That's it. That's the whole strategy.

Most coaches will not do that second part. They'll go to the event, have a great time, talk to strangers for two days, and never once talk about themselves. They'll say they're "in fitness," mumble something about training people, and change the subject because saying it out loud feels like pitching, and pitching feels gross.

It isn't pitching. Someone asks what you do, and you tell them clearly. That's a normal thing adults do. The only reason it feels heavy is that you're carrying an assumption into the conversation that nobody else in the room has, which is that stating your profession creates an obligation to sell something.

Nobody that weekend was waiting to be sold to. They asked, I answered, and some of those answers became conversations that became work. Not that day. Later. Because the person now knew a thing about me they couldn't have known otherwise. Not to mention that I love what I do, so when I talk about it, I’m passionate and excited, so people always want to know more about it… and they ask!

The math on this is worth looking at. Two days of being a normal person who says what he does produced more genuinely qualified conversations than most of us generate in a month of posting on social media. Not because in-person is magic, but because the barrier is so much lower and the trust is so much higher. There's no algorithm between you and the other person. There's no wondering if they're real. You shook their hand IRL (am I a cool kid now?).

Now the content side, because that's the part people usually want the mechanics on.

I didn't go to that weekend with a shot list for a video. I went with the standing understanding that everything I do is content, and that if something interesting happens I should have a way to capture it. That's a much lighter thing to carry than a production schedule. Take a few clips. Note the thought you had on the drive home. Talk into your phone or camera for four minutes while it's fresh.

The capture takes almost nothing. The value comes from having a system on the other end that can turn raw materials into finished pieces without you having to start from scratch every time. That's why one weekend produced work across four different platforms without hustling, putting people on the spot or making it seem like I was some sort of influencer, which is true because I’m most certainly not. I had already created the pipeline and the weekend just fed it.

The main reason it worked so well as content is that it wasn't manufactured. I actually cared about being there. People can tell the difference between someone documenting their life and someone performing one. The second kind reads as hollow no matter how good the edit is.

So there are two failure modes here, and chances are that you’re falling victim to one of them. I know because I’ve certainly been there.

1. The first is going out into the world and being invisible. Doing interesting things, meeting people, and leaving no trace of what you do or who you help. All that goodwill, no connection to the work.

2. The second is manufacturing experiences for the camera. Chasing moments because they'll make good posts. That one's worse, because the audience feels it and so do you. Not to mention that you’ll inevitably alienate everyone around you at the same time.

The thing in between these two is just living the life you'd want to live anyway, showing up as yourself, saying what you do when people ask, and having a system in place so the good parts don't evaporate.

Think about the last three things you did that had nothing to do with your business. The trip, the event, the hobby, the thing you do on weekends.

How many people in those rooms found out what you do for a living?

Keep Raising the Bar,

Paul Oneid MS, MS, CSCS