Friday Fuel - June 18th, 2020

Happy Friday and welcome to the third edition of Friday Fuel! The last couple of weeks, I’ve included links for the books I’ve been reading, podcasts I’ve been listening to, and projects I’ve been working on, but I wanted to try something different this week. Today I will be focusing solely on Twitter, showcasing its utility as a learning tool.

First off, if you aren’t on Twitter, figure it out. I was admittedly late on the wave, but now I’m hooked. It is by far and away my most used social media platform and serves as my main source for sports analysis, news, and general entertainment. The best part about Twitter is that it’s genuine. You can’t fake intelligence, humor, or creativity. You also can’t fake stupidity. All you see is is pure, unedited, (partially) uncensored content. Twitter’s like a box of chocolates. You really never know what you’re going to get and once you start digging in, it’s impossible to stop.

With that being said, by carefully selecting who and what I follow, I can guarantee that I will learn something new every time I open the app. Here’s a list of five of my favorite Twitter accounts that I learn from everyday (and you should too):

David Perell (@David_Perell) -

Over the last few years, David has built up a name for himself as one of the best writers on the internet. He is the host of the North Star Podcast and the creator of the wildly popular Write of Passage course that teaches you how to accelerate your career by writing online. His essays are great (I linked to one of them in the last newsletter) and he is constantly sharing big ideas, writing advice, and audience building tips. Here is one of my favorite tweets of his (and the one that is ironically pinned to the top of his profile):

ᴅᴀᴠɪᴅ ᴘᴇʀᴇʟʟ ✌ @david_perell

Business writing 101. ∙ Shorten your sentences. ∙ Make your point fast. ∙ Shorten the introduction. ∙ Use simple words. ∙ Add graphs and statistics. ∙ No buzzwords. ∙ Use more periods, fewer commas. ∙ Write for skimming, not deep reading. ∙ Bold the main takeaways.

Jeff Morris Jr. (@jmj) -

Jeff previously served as the VP of Product and Revenue at Tinder (helping it grow to be the top grossing app in the App store) and recently founded his own early-stage VC firm Chapter One Ventures. He is known as one of the brightest, most connected people in Silicon Valley, previously investing in companies like Lyft, Lambda School, and Cameo. His tweets are a wealth of information on entrepreneurship, tech, and investing and often feature a combination of ideas and statistics. Here’s an example:

Jeff Morris Jr. @jmj

Spotify is following Netflix playbook perfectly & has spent $600M in original podcast content & companies in last year. Phase 1: License content w/ low margins as you build scale Phase 2: Produce original content with top creators & focus on margin expansion Amazing execution.

Ian Borthwick (@ianrborthwick) -

If you’ve ever seen a David Dobrik video, you’ve probably heard his classic SeatGeek spiel. Without Ian, none of that would be possible. Currently the Director of Influencer Marketing at SeatGeek, Ian has worked with some of the biggest influencers and media players in the industry. If you are interested/work in media, his account is a must-follow. He often shares mind-boggling statistics (like this one) that will make you question your career path:

Ian Borthwick @ianrborthwick

Most 💵 paid per post: - 📸 IG Story: $1,000,000 - 📺 YouTube: $500,000 -💃TikTok: $90,000 Per Madison Beer, David D. & Addison Rae. (1) IG buy makes no sense (2) massive arbitrage opp on TikTok Note: Amounts they've heard someone getting, not necessarily themselves

Austin Rief (@austin_rief) -

Austin is the co-founder of the Morning Brew. In a short amount of time, the Brew has made a name for itself as the go-to business newsletter for Millennials and Generation Z. Much of their success can be attributed to their conversational, cheeky writing style and their ability to resonate with their target demographic. His tweets covering entrepreneurship, finance, and media are written in the same voice that Morning Brew has perfectly cultivated: Funny, relatable, and informative. In this thread he discusses the importance of finding and hiring undervalued talent when bootstrapping a start-up.

Austin Rief @austin_rief

1/ Running a small bootstrapped startup requires you to find arbitrage in hiring. The only way for us to succeed was finding talent that the market was undervaluing. At @MorningBrew, we looked for the most curious people we could possibly find.

Mark Cuban (@mcuban) -

If you know me, you know how much I love Mark Cuban. One of the things I love most about him is that he is unapologetically himself. The guy doesn’t give a rat’s ass about what anyone else thinks and his Twitter is an extension of that. He’s not afraid to speak his mind and frequently interacts with his followers, always offering sound business insights in the process. He’s a big wild card which always makes for great content.

Mark Cuban @mcuban

It's time to face the fact that PPP didn't work. Great plan, difficult execution. No one's fault. The only thing that will save businesses is consumer demand. No amount of loans to businesses will save them or jobs if their customers aren't buying.

Hopefully one day I’ll earn my spot someone else’s list. In the meantime, you can help me achieve this goal by following me on Twitter. If you were forwarded this email and like what you’ve read, make sure to subscribe to Crashing Up here.