Prompt Playbook: Getting your first 1,000 Followers PART 2

Hey Prompt Entrepreneur,

Some of my biggest business deals have come through TikTok.

I know, I know. TikTok? That app where teenagers dance and people lip-sync? That's where serious B2B clients are hanging out?

When introducing myself at entrepreneurial and AI events I often have to embarrassedly say “oh yes and I’m a TikToker too”.

I’ve managed to stop appending “for my sins” to that intro at least!

But it's true. TikTok absolutely slaps for business. I've landed speaking gigs at conferences, consulting contracts, and enterprise-level clients—all from content I've posted on TikTok. One 2-3 minute long video on the RISEN framework has led to around ~$100,000 of revenue alone. Mad.

The lesson here is crystal clear: don't make assumptions about where your audience is hanging out. Your potential customers are real people with varied interests. That buttoned-up CEO you're targeting? They might be scrolling TikTok while waiting for their coffee, just like everyone else.

This brings us to a crucial point in our "First 1,000 Followers" journey. Today, we're answering the vital questions: Where should you build your audience? What format should your content take? And how can you leverage existing networks to accelerate your growth?

Let's get started:

Where Your Audience Gathers

The first rule of audience building: go to where your people already are. Don't expect them to come to you.

Ain’t no Field of Dreams here. Sorry Kevin.

This seems kinda obvious, but I've seen countless entrepreneurs launch newsletters or blogs, then wonder why nobody's reading them. They're building on digital ghost towns while their audience is elsewhere.

Basically - I don’t care if you prefer to be on a certain platform. If your audience isn’t also there it’s a waste of your time. We’re doing this to grow a business and the number one with a bullet fix is to be where your customers are.

Here's a quick rundown of where different audiences tend to gather in 2025:

• LinkedIn: Professionals across industries, particularly in B2B, consulting, HR, finance, and enterprise tech. More senior roles tend to be active here.

• TikTok: Surprisingly broad demographics now, from teenagers to C-suite executives. Particularly strong for reaching 25-45 year olds across diverse industries. Yes, for real - it’s older than you’d expect.

• Instagram: Wide demographic reach with strength in creative industries, eCommerce, coaching, lifestyle businesses, and consumer products.

• Twitter/X: Tech, media, politics, finance, and industry commentators. Great for peer connections.

• YouTube: Excellent for educational content and in-depth expertise across virtually all industries. Skews slightly more technical. Huge long term audience potential.

How do you know where YOUR specific audience hangs out? Here are three practical research methods:

1. Go straight to the source: Survey your existing customers or colleagues in your target industry about which platforms they use most frequently. Don't ask where they "professionally network"—ask where they actually spend their time.

2. Search platform-specific: Look for relevant hashtags or keywords on each platform. The volume and engagement of content in your niche is a good indicator of audience presence. For me for example I’ll check the hashtag or topic #AI and check the relative volume.

3. Competitor analysis: Where are other experts in your field building audiences? Where are they getting the most engagement? If they are all on a certain platform that suggests there are audiences there.

The platform with the highest concentration of your ideal audience is where you should focus first. But—and this is crucial—don't overthink this decision. Because of reasons we'll discuss shortly, it's more important to start creating than to spend weeks agonising over the perfect platform.

Momentum and speed beats all.

Short-Form Video Dominance

OK here’s the next biggie: format.

For speed: if you're starting to build an audience in 2025, short-form video should be your primary content format.

Simple as.

I've experimented with every content format under the sun—long-form articles, Twitter threads, LinkedIn posts, podcasts, YouTube videos, you name it. Nothing—and I mean nothing—has given me the reach, engagement, and conversion that short-form video has.

This isn’t just me either - it’s the industry leading format.

There are several reasons for this dominance:

1. Algorithm favour: The major platforms are all pushing video content heavily in their algorithms. Audience members spend more time watching shorts which means more time on platform which means more advertising revenue.

2. Attention advantage: Video engages multiple senses simultaneously (visual and auditory), making it more attention-grabbing. It’s literally “multimedia”.

3. Connection factor: Seeing your face and hearing your voice creates a stronger para-social relationship than text alone ever could. People feel like they know you. I’ve had multiple people come up to me to me (including once whilst I was getting a haircut!) and ask if I’m “that AI guy from TikTok”.

4. Barrier to entry: Fewer people are comfortable on camera, meaning less competition in the video space.

"But Kyle," I hear you saying, "I hate being on camera! Can't I just write articles instead?"

Look, I get it. I wasn't exactly thrilled about putting my mug on camera either when I started. But here's the tough love you need: if you want the fastest path to 1,000 followers, video is it. Full stop.

In fact in my AI Authority Accelerator it’s a requirement. I’ll be helping people get over camera fear but it’s still required! Waitlist here btw.

Starting Platform Strategy

Now that we’ve started to work out WHERE your audience is and WHAT format to use, let's talk about the practical starting point.

For most people building an audience from scratch, I recommend starting with either TikTok or Instagram Reels. Here's why:

TikTok advantages:

• Most forgiving algorithm for beginners: TikTok evaluates each video independently, giving every upload a chance to go viral regardless of follower count.

• Superior in-app editing tools: TikTok's native video editor is remarkably powerful for a mobile app.

• Discovery-focused: The For You Page is designed to surface new creators, unlike platforms that prioritise accounts you already follow.

Instagram Reels advantages:

• Integrated with Facebook ecosystem: Content can reach both platforms.

• Business features: More robust business profile options and analytics.

• Slightly older demographic: If your audience skews older, this might be a better fit.

This part is super important. And hard to grok unless you try the tools!

Both TikTok and Instagram have start/stop recording features. You hold to record, release to stop. And then you can either keep the clip or discard it. All the clips you keep and spliced together into the final video.

Why is this important? You can record sentence by sentence. No need to memorise a script. No need to get everything in one take. No need for complex editing after recording. You can instead capture everything you want to say straight to camera in a series of small clips.

It’s really a game changer and the main reason I recommend TikTok and Instagram as starting platforms.

Repurposing

Your starting platform matters less than you think. Why? Because eventually, you'll be repurposing your content to multiple platforms anyway.

Here's a secret that most successful content creators know: you don't need to create original content for every platform. Instead, create once, then repurpose strategically.

This is particularly relevant for LinkedIn, which is an incredible platform for business connections but lacks robust native video creation tools.

LinkedIn are pushing short form video (like all platforms) but didn’t bother to add a video recording tool. I’d expect nothing less!

A basic repurposing workflow looks like this :

1. Create and post original video on TikTok or Instagram (because they have great video recorders)

2. Download the video without the watermark (use a tool like SnapTik)

3. Upload natively to LinkedIn with a text intro that contextualises it for the business audience

4. Repeat for other platforms as relevant (Twitter, YouTube Shorts, etc.)

You can also use Repurpose.io to do this all automatically.

This approach gives you maximum reach with minimum effort. And it's particularly powerful for reaching those first 1,000 followers because you're casting a wider net.

One important note: While the core content remains the same, I do recommend slight modifications for different platforms:

• LinkedIn: Add more business context and professional framing in the text

• Twitter: Keep accompanying text short and punchy

• YouTube: Consider grouping short videos into themed compilations

But the key is to start somewhere, then expand. Don't try to be everywhere at once—that's a recipe for burnout and inconsistency. Layer in repurposing as and when you are ready. The main thing is just starting.

The Dream 100 Approach

OK here’s the concrete first step - the Dream 100. I’m borrowing here from Russell Brunson and his Audience Secrets book.

The concept is simple but powerful: identify the 100 most influential creators/accounts in your niche, then systematically build relationships with them and their audiences.

This approach gives you three massive advantages:

1. Market Research: You'll learn what content resonates in your niche by studying successful creators. You can then emulate (cough, steal and adapt, cough) their best performing content, knowing that it resonates with your market.

2. Audience Overlap: By engaging with their content, you'll become visible to their audience (who are also your target audience).

3. Potential Collaborations: Over time, these relationships can evolve into partnerships, shoutouts, or collaborations with the creator.

Here's how to implement the Dream 100 approach:

Step 1: Identification Create a list of the top creators in your space. Use platform search, hashtags, and tools like Creator Marketplace to find them. They don't all need to be mega-influencers—include a mix of account sizes.

Step 2: Systematic Engagement

• Follow all 100 accounts

• Turn on notifications for their new content

• Consistently engage with meaningful comments (not just "Great post!" and please don’t use AI here!!!)

• Reference their ideas in your own content (with credit)

Step 3: Relationship Building

• Share their content with your own insights added

• Chat with the creator in their comments

• Move conversations to DMs when appropriate

• Look for genuine ways to provide value to them, collaboration focused

This isn't about spamming or fake engagement—it's about becoming a valued member of your niche community. These relationships need to be authentic. Spamming will just get you blocked and that relationship is forever cut off. Don’t do it!

Here's an AI prompt to help you start to identify and track your Dream 100:

You are an expert in social media strategy and audience building. Help me develop my "Dream 100" list for my niche.

My niche/focus area: [Your niche]
My target audience: [Your audience description]
Primary platform I'm building on: [TikTok/Instagram/etc.]

First, provide me with:
1. 10 search terms/hashtags I should use to find relevant creators in my space
2. 5 different types of creators I should include in my Dream 100 (e.g., educators, entertainers, news sources, etc. in my niche)

Then, create a Dream 100 tracker template with the following columns:
- Creator name
- Platform(s)
- Follower count
- Relationship status (stranger, mutual follower, DM connection, collaborator)
- Notes (content types that perform well, engagement patterns)

Running this prompt using Grok (X’s AI) works really well because it has up to date data on all the creators on X specifically. A lot of those creators will also be on other platforms. So this is a solid extra step if you have access to Grok.

The end goal here is to be able to leverage the audiences of other creator’s who are already big. That could be a share of your content to their audience. It could be going on their podcast. It could be a joint video. Lots of possibilities! All that help sky rocket your account.

Speaking of…I’m building this directly into my AI Authority Accelerator. Anyone who completes all 30 days of content creation gets featured on my account, exposing them to my 130,000+ TikTok followers. Normally a sponsored post costs $1500+ for reference. Nice way to get an immediate bump! Waitlist here.

What's Next?

Now that you know where to build your audience and which format to focus on, the next step is creating content that actually resonates and builds authority.

In Part 3, we'll dive into the Content Funnel approach—Wide, Middle, and Deep content that works together to attract and convert followers. You'll learn how to create a mix of content that both expands your reach and establishes your expertise.

Remember, we're focused on getting you to that first 1,000 followers—the hardest milestone in audience building, but also the most educational. Once you hit 1,000, you'll have learned so much about your audience and your content style that the next milestones will come more easily. I promise - it does get easier!

Keep Prompting,

Kyle

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