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Whatever would Henry have said?
(3 minute read.)
F*** appropriate.
I'm encouraged that Jeffrey continues to post personal stuff.
I welcome 'raw tales' of what we think and feel, what's happening in our lives, the screw-ups, etcetera. And advise clients to 'share accordingly'.
And while there's a bunch of reasons (humanise the brand, encourage engagement, etcetera) why posting personal content on a business site can be commercially advantageous, that's not why some of us do it. It's important, in other ways.
Why is such stuff important? In the style of H Miller, here's why…
The Smut of Being Real (or, Why I Bleed on the Page of My Business Site).
They tell you not to. The experts with their clean fingernails and SEO-optimized smiles. They tell you to keep it tidy. Polished. Impersonal. 'Keep it professional.' 'Maintain boundaries.' God forbid the reader should smell your sweat, feel your indecision, taste the blood you coughed up at 3am while trying to believe in something that doesn’t yet pay rent.
But here’s the deal: I’m not a brand. I’m a human being. And if I can’t be that on my own damn website, where can I?
There’s a lunacy in pretending we’re not the thing that drives the business. We’ve created these digital storefronts with glass walls, open 24/7, but we’re told to stay hidden in the backroom, behind a velvet rope of curated bios and smiling headshots. You want to talk about marketing? Here’s some: people can smell fake like dog piss on carpet. They know when something’s been written by a ghost or an algorithm or a person trying to be someone they’re not.
So yes, I post things that some would call inappropriate. Not sexually explicit or unhinged—just honest. Maybe a little too human for the LinkedIn crowd. I’ve written about grief, panic attacks, failure. I’ve admitted not knowing what the hell I'm doing. I’ve confessed love. Raged. Questioned. Wept. And not for applause or 'engagement' or conversion rates. But because it was true, and writing it was the only way to stay sane.
I don't want to be a 'thought leader'. I want to be a human being who thinks. Sometimes those thoughts are messy. Sometimes they contradict each other. Sometimes they're not useful or sellable or on-brand. But they’re mine. And if someone finds something of themselves in what I write—some resonance, some echo—then maybe that’s worth more than all the clean copy and clever CTAs in the world.
Look, I get it. Some people do this stuff strategically. The vulnerability-as-a-tactic crowd. The 'look at my hardship to build brand equity' folks. Good for them. But for some of us, this isn't PR, it’s personal. Not a hook—just the raw meat of our lives, flung on the table because we don’t know how else to tell the truth. We don’t post it for traction. We post it because not posting it feels like lying.
In a world of curated personas and ten-dollar words, realness is obscene. That’s what makes it necessary.
So yeah, maybe I’m doing it all wrong. Maybe I’ll scare off a client or two. Maybe someone'll call it oversharing or self-indulgent or unprofessional. But I'd rather lose business being real than win it by being dead inside.
Got it?
For avoidance of doubt, real authenticity is a vital antidote to the somewhat vulgar influencer-style 'my beautiful life, shiny manufactured moments'… vacation in Cancun, that new Rolex I just bought, the stupidly-expensive coffee I drink, etcetera.
And, despite the advice of 'it's crucial to maintain a professional tone and relevance to your business', sometimes what's considered inappropriate is really the most appropriate.
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