Why Great Content Creators Obsess Vertically, Not Horizontally

Adam Biddlecombe had 100,000 followers on LinkedIn. People came to him constantly saying: “Build on X. Why aren’t you building on X? Why aren’t you building on YouTube? You’re leaving money on the table.”

He said no. Every time.

Instead, he obsessed over LinkedIn with a single-mindedness that borders on compulsive. “If I’d have split my time, I probably wouldn’t have done any of them as well as I have done this one,” Adam says. “When I was most productive, I am quite singly focused.”

The logic is brutal: “I have so many hours in the day, I can focus my time on growing on X or I can focus my time on growing my LinkedIn faster. And it always made more sense to me to do that.”

The Math of Divided Attention

Platform building is not a straightforward returns calculation. It’s exponential. The first 1,000 followers take months. The second 1,000 take weeks. By the time you’re at 50,000, momentum compounds and growth accelerates.

But the moment you split your attention, you lose the compounding benefit.

Let’s say you have 100 hours a week to work with. You spend 50 hours on LinkedIn and 50 hours on X. You’re at 20,000 followers on LinkedIn and 1,000 on X. The LinkedIn growth has hit some momentum. By allocating 50 hours to X, you’re not gaining anything new—you’re just moving halfway backward on the thing that was working.

Adam measured the distribution difference directly: “The amount of time it would take me to make an X post versus a LinkedIn post was the same. And the distribution I’d get from LinkedIn was 100 X what I get from X.”

That’s not a close call. That’s a massacre. If one post gets 10x the distribution for the same effort, you have a platform hierarchy. The decision is made.

“So I would always think, okay, so I have so many hours in the day, I can focus my time on growing on X or I can focus my time on growing my LinkedIn faster. And it always made more sense to me to do that.”

The Platform Specificity Problem

Most creators use the strategy of “repurposing content.” Write one thing and publish it everywhere. It’s efficient in theory. In practice, it’s lazy and it shows.

“I don’t believe so,” Adam says when asked if copy-pasting across platforms works. “I mean, we did try that and it didn’t work.”

When Mindstream tried reposting LinkedIn content directly to X, the engagement was negligible. But a carbon copy of a LinkedIn post isn’t native to X’s culture. X rewards density, attitude, and call-and-response dynamics. LinkedIn rewards narrative, credential signaling, and long-form thinking.

The content exists in different contexts. A thread works on X. A multi-paragraph update works on LinkedIn. A short video works on TikTok. A 20-minute video works on YouTube. These aren’t just format differences—they’re audience psychology differences.

“To do anything well, you have to kind of build it for that platform,” Adam explains.

Modern AI tools make it tempting to think you can systemize repurposing. You can’t. What you can do is have a hero piece of content (like an interview), then create platform-native versions:

• Clip 2 minutes for YouTube Shorts
• Extract a 280-character insight for X
• Write a narrative summary for LinkedIn
• Build a carousel for Instagram

But each one requires native thinking. The YouTube clip needs pacing and hook logic. The X post needs conversational tone. The LinkedIn version needs credentials and longer context. Systemizing the format is possible. Systemizing the thinking is not.

The Opportunity Cost Argument

Adam places this in the context of founders who feel like they should be everywhere.

“It is very tempting to go horizontal, but I think you’re going to get more returns are vertical.” He pauses. “And, you know, back to you in this channel, if you obsess over making the best YouTube content in the world for the next two years, everything will work out. And these ancillary things, all the different ways you can monetize it will become obvious to you.”

This is the key insight. Most creators are anxious about missing distribution. What if YouTube is the real goldmine and I’m sleeping on it? What if TikTok goes viral and I’m not there?

The paradox is that by being everywhere without focus, you’re guaranteeing you’ll be nowhere in particular. You’ll be a mediocre version of yourself on five platforms instead of an exceptional version on one.

“Whereas there may be not, you know, now there’s, there’s like everything possible. Whereas if you just go deep and this channel gets absolutely huge and people absolutely love what you’re doing, you, you, you won’t need to worry about how you’re going to make money from it. It will, will kind of land in your feet, you know?” Adam says.

The monetization opportunities emerge from obsession. Someone with 100,000 highly engaged LinkedIn followers gets unsolicited sponsorship offers, speaking engagements, consulting proposals, partnership requests. The person with 10,000 followers spread across five platforms gets few opportunities anywhere.

When to Go Wide

Adam’s honest: there’s a point when vertical obsession pays off enough that going horizontal makes sense.

“I do think that there’s a, there’s a point you reach where it’s good to go wide. But for, for us, I was so focused on, just growing narrow, making the best newsletter we could make, giving the best possible results from relationship with the partners that we worked with and growing on LinkedIn as fast as possible.”

Now, inside HubSpot, Adam has the resources to think about multiple channels. But Mindstream’s growth to 210,000 subscribers came from ruthless vertical focus.

The question for creators is: when do you have permission to go horizontal?

Adam’s answer: when you’ve reached critical mass in your primary channel (enough followers that the audience is self-sustaining), when you’ve hired a team who can own secondary channels, or when the distribution on your new platform is materially better than your primary platform.

“Now I do think that there’s a point where it’s good to go wide. But you have to be absolutely brutal with your time because I know that like when I am, when I am productive, when I am most productive, I am quite singly focused.”

For most creators, that point is later than they think. They jump platforms at 30,000 followers when they could have 200,000 if they’d waited.

FAQ

How long should you stay vertically focused before trying other platforms?

Until you’ve hit meaningful momentum on your primary platform—usually 50,000+ followers if you’re measuring follower count. The better metric is audience loyalty: are people re-engaging with your content repeatedly? Do they comment and share? If you have strong engagement, the platform is compound and will accelerate. Abandon it too early and you’ll see slower growth everywhere.

What if one platform has better long-term potential but slower near-term growth?

This is a real dilemma. YouTube has better long-term monetization but slower growth for new creators. LinkedIn has faster growth for many types of content. Adam chose LinkedIn first because it had faster growth (100x distribution vs X), then could have pivoted to YouTube later. Choose the platform with fastest initial growth to build confidence and audience.

How do you know if you’re being spread too thin across platforms?

Honest self-assessment: how much energy did I put into Platform A last month vs Platform B? If it’s below 70/30 on your primary platform, you’re too spread out. If you’re hitting 50/50 or worse, you’re guaranteeing you’ll be mediocre everywhere.

Is there any platform where starting vertical and going horizontal is impossible?

Short-form platforms like TikTok and YouTube Shorts are designed to be supplementary channels. You can be amazing on TikTok but not translate it to a sustainable business because TikTok doesn’t have direct monetization parity with newsletters or YouTube long-form. If you want a long-term content business, pick your primary platform based on monetization viability, not just reach.

What about new platforms like Bluesky or Threads? Should you jump on them?

No, unless they’re growing faster than your primary platform (unlikely early on). The opportunity cost is too high. New platforms are attractive because they seem less competitive. But they’re less competitive because fewer users are there. Obsess over where your audience actually is.

How does AI content repurposing change the vertical-focus argument?

It helps, but not as much as people think. AI can turn a long-form piece into multiple short-form versions faster. But it can’t solve the fundamental problem: each platform has different audience psychology and content norms. AI speeds up the execution but doesn’t replace native thinking. If anything, AI makes it easier to try being everywhere—which is still a mistake.

Can you build something viable on a new platform if it’s your secondary focus?

Sometimes, but it’s rare. Threads exploded because existing Twitter users jumped over en masse. TikTok grew because it was genuinely better at the recommendation algorithm. But organically building an audience from zero on a platform where you’re splitting attention? That’s the long path. Better to wait until you’ve built your primary channel, then layer on secondary channels with actual resources.

What should you do if your primary platform suddenly declines in reach?

Figure out why first. Is it algorithm change, audience shift, or declining effort on your part? If it’s algorithm change (like Twitter’s recent changes), yes, consider diversifying. But most “decline” is when creators get bored and the effort slips. Before jumping ship, renew focus on the platform you built. You have existing followers there.

How do you handle new platforms that are genuinely explosive?

Watch them for 3-6 months. See if your audience type thrives there. If yes, consider it a primary channel worth moving to (not an addition—an alternative). But the bar is high. TikTok needed 2+ years to prove itself for many creator types. Don’t chase platforms on FOMO. Chase platforms where your specific audience is already thriving.

Is the vertical-focus strategy changing as platforms consolidate?

Less likely. The number of dominant platforms is stable (YouTube, Instagram, TikTok, LinkedIn, X, Substack/newsletters). Each has a different audience and purpose. The same logic applies: pick one primary based on where your audience is and where it’s easiest to grow. Only add secondary platforms once you’ve won at least one.

What’s the biggest regret you hear from creators who went horizontal too fast?

They’re always the same: “I wish I’d stayed focused.” The creators with 50,000 true followers on one platform outperform creators with 10,000 followers across five platforms. The regret is always about splitting focus too early, never about staying focused too long.