So, you want to be a content creator?

Elena Verna shares her personal journey as a content creator, from starting on LinkedIn with bite-sized frameworks and memes to building nearly 100K Substack subscribers and 230K LinkedIn followers. She explains her original motivation — sharing real practitioner knowledge to counter generic online advice — and walks through her content strategy, monetization approach, and editorial process. The post candidly covers both the rewards (career impact, income diversification, meaningful connections) and the downsides: the grind of scheduled publishing, online harassment, criticism from people who haven't read the work, and the tension between authentic experience-based writing and audience expectations. She closes with three practical tips: engage with commenters, be unapologetically yourself, and find your creator-market fit.