"Your article has been shared." "Huh?" -- Is this for real? 🤨

📰 "Your article has been shared."

-- A story about a rather low-key yet interesting event that started with, "Is this for real?"

Hello, I'm Loel.

One day, when I opened note as usual,
a small pop-up appeared on the screen.

"Your article has been shared."

...Huh?

For a moment, I couldn't believe my eyes.

No, it's not that I think "my articles never get shared." But it's not something that happens all that often.
Besides, that article was, in my mind, quite lukewarm.

It wasn't aimed at going viral.
It wasn't a masterpiece I'd poured my heart and soul into, either.
It was something I put out with the feeling of, "Well, it's just an extension of the usual."

So at first, I honestly thought this:

"...Is this for real?"

🐸 When I looked into it, it was a frog

I was a bit curious, so I checked,
and it turned out that "Frog-san," whom I'm connected with on X (formerly Twitter), had introduced my article.

It was a so-called quote repost.
There wasn't a long comment attached,
just a brief, casual remark added to it.

My reaction when I saw that was incredibly simple,

"I'm so grateful."

But from there, the atmosphere started to change just a little bit.

👻 X starts to quietly buzz

Notifications on X started to trickle in.

"Followed"
"Followed"

It doesn't increase all at once.
There's no sign of a buzz at all.

But, there is clearly a different kind of increase than usual.

It's like the water level rising slightly before a river floods.
A subtle change that only those who notice will notice.

I'm doing X on autopilot.
*Just posting note articles without thinking

"Huh? Is something happening?"

When I thought that, it seems that the article had spread
just a little bit.

The point is this "just a little bit," and it can't be called a buzz.
But I definitely had the feeling that "something" had moved.

🧠 SmartNews, I didn't know it had that kind of backend

As I looked into it further,
it became clear that it seems some people read the article via SmartNews.

I understood for the first time today that note and SmartNews are partnered.

I knew the name, but my understanding was just, "Well, they're linked somewhere, right?"

Apparently,

it seems to be a mechanism where articles judged by the SmartNews logic as "this should be posted" are picked up automatically or semi-automatically.

And this time,
my article happened to get caught in that.

When I searched for posts referencing my article on Genspark,
I found 2 out of 5.

Both of those two people wrote,
"I found this article on SmartNews."

So,

"Well, I guess it probably got featured."

That was the conclusion I reached with a fairly modest level of certainty.

🔍 Is it reproducible? To be honest

The thing I'm most curious about here is definitely this.

"So, what kind of article should I write to get featured on SmartNews?"

...Honestly, I don't know.

The more I think about it, the
less clear any reproducibility becomes.

If you ask me if this article
had powerful insights, it didn't.
If you ask me if the structure was perfect, it really wasn't at all.

Was it because it sounded like AI?
I don't really know that either.

I think that on the SmartNews side,

・Popularity
・Freshness
・Theme
・Media balance

there's probably a multiplication of various factors like these.

⚖️ My own hypothesis: The "Balance Theory"

It's just a hypothesis, but
the one that makes the most sense is the "Balance Theory."

SmartNews doesn't just partner with note,
it partners with a huge variety of media outlets.

Among them,

"We don't have enough of this theme today"
"This category is a bit thin"

adjustments like that are probably being made.

And my article just happened to fit
into that "blank space."

It's like the last piece of a puzzle
just happened to be in my pocket.

🎨 So, you don't have to narrow down your theme too much

If it were true,
"Spot Consulting"
"Advisory Consultant"

Perhaps the correct answer is to narrow it down strictly to these areas.

But in reality,

・Marketing
・AI
・Work philosophy
・A slight sense of discomfort

I have written quite a variety of things.

I think the reason it was picked up this time is because of this
variety.

Breaking through with one point is strong.
But if you spread out horizontally,
the "surface area that happens to hit" also increases.

I have actually felt this to be true.

📝 Analyze properly in tandem with action

Finally, the biggest lesson from this time.

After all, analysis is important.

In the past, when I had a post on X that
"Why did this get so many likes?"
,
honestly, I didn't dig deeper.

But this time, when I looked into it properly,
I could see a small but certain "structure".

Not just leaving a log,
but looking back and thinking about it.

Whether you do this or not,
your next move will change quite a bit.

This story is
not a significant number,
and it's not something I can call a success story.

But,

"Oh, so things like this can happen too"

I was honestly glad to think that.

Perhaps, picking up on these little coincidences properly is the secret to keeping at it for a long time.

I will write again.

💬 If you resonated with this even a little --
it would encourage me if you could "like," "comment," or "follow."
(I generally follow back.)

📺 I started a YouTube channel.

It's a video you can listen to casually during your 3-minute morning commute.
It's recommended for those who want to listen to past note content in the background,
or for those who want to get a little extra value,
as I sometimes touch on the contents of paid notes.

Please subscribe to the channel 🙏