My Top 5 Mistakes As A Content Creator (And How I'm Fixing Them in 2026)

In 2017, I started creating content on Instagram showcasing the projects I had started building.

Over the years, I did some things very well, like posting daily on Instagram for just over a year. However, I also made too many mistakes to count. So many mistakes that I felt burned out in 2024 and posted almost content (other than writing) in 2025.

In 2026, I'm completely locked in to put what I learned in 2025 into practice and share everything along the way so you don't have to make the same mistakes I did.

Mistake 1: No Consistency

Other than 1 year of consistency, I was all over the place, posting twice a day for a week, nothing for a month, every other day for 3 weeks, nothing for 2 months and shouldn't have expected any results.

I got to wrapped up in pushing for volume without having the foundation of consistency down first. Instead, I'm focusing on being consistent first, then crank the volume while maintaining consistency.

Mistake 2: Overcomplicated or Overlooked Analytics

We've all heard that data should drive your decisions and I had listened, but made the fatal mistake of overcomplicating my Google Sheets tracker so it was almost impossible to keep up.

If the analytics model creates so much friction that it's unusable, it's worse than not looking at the data at all (which is what ultimately happened). Instead, I'm focusing on a simple weekly review across platforms to see what is and isn't working, not tracking every single metric that is available for every platform.

Mistake 3: Abandoning 1 Platform For Another

After my year of consistency on Instagram, I decided to put my efforts into YouTube, but effectively abandoned Instagram in the process.

If something is working, keep doing it. It's totally fine to expand, but as long as the effort is maintained where momentum already exists. I've been consistent with articles for a month and will keep that up while also introducing additional platforms.

Mistake 4: Not Having A Clear Strategy

I had many goals—a separate mistake—but nothing backing up those goals to achieve them in reality.

James Clear said it best in his book, Atomic Habits, "You do not rise to the level of your goals. You fall to the level of your systems." Now, I'm taking my content strategy and focusing on building the systems to sustain it instead of constantly thinking about goals.

Mistake 5: Giving Into Imposter Syndrome

The dreaded imposter syndrome hits and my biggest mistake was attempting to come across as an authority on something because that's what I mistakenly thought I should do.

Dickie Bush has talked about how he spent time being honest about being a curious learner of something and sharing what he was learning as he went. Dickie's mental framework of sharing as you're learning defeats imposter syndrome because there is no pretending, only open honesty.