How to gauge the state of your local tech community

I sign up for a ton of email newsletters.

Part of it is because I want to try keeping up with what’s happening in all the communities we’ve visited over the past few years.

Part of it is because I want to see what other copywriters and authors are sending out to their audiences.

Part of it is because I want to feed my extreme FOMO for information.

Anyway, that’s not the point…

The funny thing about the end of every year is that every single local tech newsletter ends the calendar year with a retrospective look at their local entrepreneurial community. And they usually sort it by the number of clicks (in an attempt to “prove” what the readers cared about over the past twelve months).

Maybe it’s because they think it matters. Maybe it’s because they don’t have anything else to write about over the holidays. Maybe it’s because they’re desperately trying to boost their clicks before the end of the year.

Here’s the thing: the state of your local tech community isn’t measured by web traffic reports.

You measure the state of your local entrepreneurial community by the number of companies created. By the jobs created. By the revenue growth created. You measure the state of your local entrepreneurial community by a different measuring stick.

It’s not about people’s clicks. It’s about people’s actual work.

 


Also published on Medium.