You Are The Media (YATM) is the home for marketing misfits. It started in 2013 at the seaside, in England 🌊 The community is built around creativity, interdependence, visibility, experimentation and co-learning.
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Hi YATMers, I'm El Deane, your friendly, whole-of-market Mortgage Advisor serving everyone from first-timers to seasoned homeowners and investors, without the broker fee.
There are two things I find myself saying at this time of year: Christmas is busy, but your remortgage deserves attention, and also, why are your full beams on!? 😵💫
Ignore or set aside the end of your mortgage product and you might pay for Christmas twice. Give me 4–6 months’ before the end of your product and I’ll do the rest.
My recommendation today is music. If you need a soundtrack today (and forever because I love him 😍), I’m hooked on Orville Peck’s latest EP, Appaloosa. Let's make sure we connect today.
When you build a space people come back to, you owe it to them to keep showing up.
Over time, that space stops being just “content” and starts becoming a community, a place people feel part of, not just something they scroll past.
If you’re a small business, creator, coach, consultant, or studio, you already are the media for the people who choose to pay attention to you.
Your job isn’t just to get seen. It’s to become the place people choose to come back to and feel proud to be part of. That means taking responsibility, being creative, and building something people can belong to.
This happens when there is a direct connection between you and your audience, a newsletter, an ongoing event, a space you host, where it’s more than just creating content.
This has been one of my biggest lessons. It’s the shift from “doing content” to “being the media.”
Content is something people consume.
Media is something people can belong to.
These are the paths that turn strangers into subscribers, and subscribers into friends who bring more people with them.
Where This Started & Why It Matters Even More In 2026
I started YATM in 2013 as an experiment to see if I could have a direct link to an audience, where becoming self sufficient was my primary drive. Not just for me, but for other people too.
It’s changed a lot since then, but there is still a through-line: notably the weekly newsletter and live events.
Today, the gaps are even wider than a decade ago:
😟 Algorithms decide which tiny slice of your followers sees a post.
😟 AI recycles ideas until our feeds and world sounds the same.
😟 Platforms tweak the rules and what once worked for you, can change overnight.
What I am banking on for ’26 and what ‘you are the media’ means is making a space people have an affinity with, that represents identity, connection and shared experiences. Get people to come to you and stay with you.
When you become your own media company, you:
☀️ Own the route in You have a list, not just a following. You can address people directly.
☀️ Control the rhythm You choose the tempo, not a platform dashboard.
☀️ Become the default choice When people in your world ask, “Where should I go for this?” your name comes up first.
It means that people are not reliant on the big name, but the connection you have built with the people who want to hear from you.
The Practical Pieces (How You Become The Media)
Here are the core building blocks that I have used over the years. It represents a simple, repeatable system you can take responsibility for.
What you see below is effectively a time stamp from where you start, to finding momentum.
1. Choose your home base. Where do you want to address people from? For most small businesses, that’s an email newsletter with a simple web home for people to leave their email on your website.
2. Decide your rhythm. Choose something you know you cannot stop and try to make it weekly, or at a push fortnightly. The reason is because you want people to see you are committed, consistent and serious.
3. Make subscribing a clear path, not an afterthought. You’re not chasing impressions, you want to build a list of people who said, “I’m here for you.” Treat building subscribers as a focal point in your promotional activity.
4. Use publishing as practice, not just promotion. It’s not just about having a schedule, it’s there to sharpen your thinking and progress over time. Coming back to a regular publishing place is intended to help improve your ideas.
5. Add live touchpoints. Find ways where people can come together, so they can meet each in the same shared space. It could be a live session online or a lunch. The turns a “list” into a community and content into relationships.
6. Keep a simple feedback loop. Look at what’s landing, what resonates or where people are stuck. You let their questions shape the next thing you make.
This is where You Are The Media has lived for years, as a media company in miniature and a community for small businesses who want to promote themselves without relying on algorithms.
This is how you shift from “I share when I want” to “I run a small, focused media operation around the work I care about.”
It Works When You Have Constraints
When you frame your work, it becomes easier for people to recognise you.
It is hard when you stare at a screen for inspiration, which is why building routines start to build progress and give your work shape.
This is what I’ve seen work in terms of building your audience and putting your stamp on things.
For a small business, it could be:
🏠 One main home base. This could be your newsletter, or a podcast or a show. It’s something you anchor everything else to.
It also helps you from spreading yourself everywhere. Social is used for distribution and awareness, whereas your home base is to build connection and relationships.
🏠 A signature style. This is the way you talk, the stories you choose, the examples you keep coming back to.
Over time people recognise your fingerprints. My style has always been about doing the work and then reporting back. Lived experience has shaped my voice and built my confidence.
🏠 Recurring features and formats. Familiar, settled rhythms help build relationships and act as structured shortcuts.
For instance, Lunch Clubs are centred on themes that are relatable to small businesses. The regularity helps people make the association.
🏠 A commitment to experiment in public. Try a new format or segment as a way to involve people.
The intention is to take your audience with you so they feel part of it while you figure it out together.
Constraints aren’t there to limit you, they stop you drifting into places that eat up time and energy.
Let’s Round Up
For years, “the media” meant big organisations with cameras, studios and editors. Today, it’s you, me and anyone prepared to take the responsibility of showing up seriously.
The return is for you to be the person or small business that:
🙂 Knows who it’s for
🙂 Shows up regularly
🙂 Speaks honestly about what’s happened to the people who matter
🙂 Enjoys the craft enough to keep going when nobody’s watching yet
🙂 Builds a space people can feel and be part of
The goal is to no longer shout into the void, but talking to your people, directly.
You’re not just using the media, You Are The Media.
👉 The celebrification (and potential slop-ification) of Substack is here
You keep going...
If you can keep going with something, a regular email, an ongoing podcast, a rolling blog or event series, you get better at it.
You find its benefits seep into all areas of your life, not just your business.
Whilst we live through uncertain times, the very act of producing content and creating something that resonates with or helps others, is an act of empowerment - a place of strength to build from and all the better weather the challenges that lie ahead.
YATM Bristol is now up to book 👋...
The YATM live events start in February '26. Bristol is now up and running (this pic we last did an event back in 2023 at The Strawberry Thief).
I hope we're now coming nearer to where you live or easier to get to. The plan is to get one location working and then we head to the next home.
Poole | Thursday 5th February and theme is trust, book here
London | Thursday 12th February and the theme is connection, book here
Bristol | Thursday 26th February and the theme is being you, book here
Events will also be in April and then it's Creator Day in May.
The workshop that went down a storm, we're going to deliver a version for YATM Club.
If your business is busy and you want to refine your direction, this hour together workshop is a moment to take stock, realign, and make sure the path you’re on actually belongs to you.
The Power of You is about returning to the centre of your work, reconnecting your values, your intention, and your creative drive so your output doesn’t just perform, it fits.
If you would like to make YATM Club your home for 2026, join the membership space. It’s designed to help you stay relevant, creative and connected.
I recorded this when I woke up. Have a great Thursday your side...Mark
You Are The Media (YATM) is the home for marketing misfits. It started in 2013 at the seaside, in England 🌊 The community is built around creativity, interdependence, visibility, experimentation and co-learning.
