Are you looking for a short cut?

There’s no such thing as a short-cut in a relationship.

“Do I have to write a regular newsletter, Stella?”

Great question – because it’s highlighting a paradox I’m seeing out there.

But first, a story.

When I was in my twenties, I led a bike trip across the U.S. with 12 high school students. I’ve always been into adventure, and I love riding bikes. So what’s not to love about riding 3,000 miles across a continent with 40 pounds of gear in your panniers?

(Side benefit: you need a lot of calories to sustain biking all day. I was a fiend for Little Debbie Oatmeal Cream pies, peanut butter, and chocolate bars. I also ate a lot of donuts and chocolate malts. And I still made those spandex bike shorts look good!)

We started out in Savannah, Georgia. We camped out on Tybee Island. Woke at dawn. Dipped our back tires in the Atlantic.

And proceeded to ride across the country on bicycles.

Here’s the thing about riding bikes across a continent with 14 people: it requires a lot of water. And a lot of bathroom breaks.

So not more than 12 or so miles into our trip, we stopped at a gas station west of Savannah.

To refuel on candy bars and enjoy the luxury of toilet paper (by the end of the trip, the kids – guys and gals — would pull over on the side of the road and run behind a bush. But it was our first day. We still clung to certain hallmarks of civilization).

A guy in an SUV pulled up to fuel his rig.

“Hey, where y’all headed?,” he asked.

“Los Angeles!,” one of the kids replied.

“No shit,” he replied. “That’s a long way from here.”

About 3,000 miles and 6 weeks, to be exact.

Here’s the thing – he wasn’t telling us anything we didn’t know. It’s not like that was new information.

Oh wait. California is a long way from Georgia?! Shoot. We gotta get a better map.

Not one of those kids said, “yeah, you’re right. Better get a bus ticket.”

They just accepted the fact that we had a long road ahead of us.

And, with clear eyes, they knew what was going to get us from here to there. Waking up every morning and getting on the bikes and riding all day long. Seventy miles. Eighty miles. A hundred miles. Whatever the mileage was that day. They were doing it. And they were going to stay with the group.

Because there really was no other option. That’s what they’d signed on for.

Around Santa Fe, the mood changed when we got asked this question – “where are you going?” Instead of hope, the kids began to answer with certainty.

“We are going to Los Angeles,” they’d reply. And then, inevitably, someone else would offer, “yeah, and we started in Georgia.”

I’d watch the faces of my pack of now-veteran long-distance cyclists beamed with accomplishment and pride.

I tell you this story because I am reminded of those kids every time an entrepreneur tells me they want to be of service to the world… but they don’t want to write a newsletter every week.

Because it takes too long. Or they want someone else to do it for them. Or they are intimidated about coming up with all that content. (What if no one reads it?!)

I get why a business owner would have those reservations.

But just like biking 3,000 miles across the U.S., I don’t think there’s a real short cut.

Now, I get that there are a lot of folks hawking short cuts online. How to game the search engines. How to buy more fans on social media.

But I’m skeptical about how those short cuts work over time.

Maybe it’s because I believe that building an audience online is actually about something that it’s pretty hard to “short cut.”

Relationships.

I actually believe that, when you write a newsletter with great content, week in and week out, you are actually building a real relationship with the people on your list.

And just like relationships offline, relationships online aren’t exactly “short cuttable.”

So, when business owners ask me “Do I have to write a regular newsletter, Stella?”

My answer is: depends on what you want. If you want big numbers on the social media score board… or to appear on the first page of a google search… no, no you don’t.

But if you want loyal fans who buy everything you offer, and tell their friends about you because they genuinely value your expertise, then the answer is yes.

If this is an issue in your business and you are ready to do something about it, join me for the next Writing That Sells production lab.

Mighty thanks to Marcus Povey flickr photostream for the map.