What Does Success Mean to You?

I've been creating Something to Be Desired for four years now. I consider us to be "successful" in that we've kept the show online and interesting despite numerous hurdles.

And yet, whenever someone asks me what my goals are... I realize I can't articulate them, because I haven't defined them for myself.

Things Are Changing

I've been having a lot of conversations lately with social media folks -- and reading a lot of blogs and Twitters -- that lead me to believe the bulk of the people in this space have a hard time defining what success means for them, and therefore understanding the steps they need to take in order to get there.

Last year, PodCamp Boston exceeded expectations because it had never been done. This year, although attendance was up, it was still about 50% of the registered total. Was that a "success"? It depends on whom you ask.

Most of the no-shows were people "outside the fishbowl" -- those interested parties who weren't yet creating content and therefore weren't 100% invested in having a conversation about it.

"How do we get those people involved?" was the question a lot of us have been asking for a long time, and there still aren't clear-cut answers.

Maybe that's because we're not demonstrating that social media is a "successful" investment of OUR time and resources yet, simply because so few of us know whether or not we ARE successful. It's hard to lead by example when you're not sure where you're headed.

What Constitutes Success For You?

Are you a creator? Does the thrill of making something from nothing give you an unequaled charge?

Are you a collaborator? Do you prefer working with others to make something greater than any of you could have done independently?

Are you seeking an audience? What kind of audience? Is it more important for you to have a wide, "mainstream" appeal in your work, or a smaller, highly-engaged readership / listenership / viewership?

Are you seeking investment? What kind of investment? How much money / resources? From whom? What would you do with it if you had it?

Are you seeking to make a living at what you're doing? To become profitable? What's your break-even point? Where will that money come from?

What do you want to be doing in a year? In three years?

Very few of us seem to know the answers to these questions, which therefore prevents us from being able to take the steps to accomplish them. As a result, I see a lot of rudderlessness throughout the medium. I see disinterest, worry, cynicism and frustration. (I should know - I'm the generator of a significant amount of it.)

So, if that's the case, why don't we refocus for a moment and ask ourselves, honestly: What does success mean to you?

And, to kick-start the conversation, I'll list my POV. To me, success would be:

* Being out of debt
* Making a comfortable living
* Having health insurance
* Working as a writer / director / producer
* Having STBD viewed by 10,000+ people per episode
* Earning enough money from STBD to pay the cast
* Seeing STBD become one of the top shows in modern media
* Collaborating with creative people from multiple fields
* Helping shepherd other people's ideas to fruition
* Investing in / growing other small businesses
* Being able to donate time / resources to charities
* Being able to travel

Yours?