January 23, 2025
Stop Building Your Online Presence on Rented Internet Platforms
If the last few years have taught us anything, it’s how suddenly things can change.
Instagram was founded by a small team – until they were forcibly purchased by Facebook, with its incessant scandals. Twitter was the place to find breaking news until Elon Musk turned it into his personal playground. TikTok just got banned, until it wasn’t…?
What do these things have in common?
They are all rented platforms.
It’s more important than ever to understand what this means, so let’s break it down. There are three primary types of platforms I want to discuss:
- Rented Platforms
- Leased Platforms
- Owned Platforms
1. What is a rented platform?
A rented platform is one you can sign up to, with or without payment, in order to control an individual profile, but not the platform as a whole. Any monetization that happens is shared with the platform, but only if you comply with the terms of service. Even then, you’re subject to the whims of algorithms and billionaires.
Rented Platform Examples:
- Facebook, Instagram
- X/Twitter
- TikTok
- YouTube
- Medium
- Patreon
- Etsy
- Google Business Profile
You do not own your Facebook page or Instagram profile. You do not own those millions of followers on TikTok. You could spend hours writing brilliant content for your audience, interacting, building engagement, gaining followers, but if X/Twitter shuts down tomorrow, you lose everything.
The platform owners can give you the boot whenever they like, for the vaguest of reasons, and there’s nothing you can do about it. Last week I saw someone lament the fact that a new hire did not follow their process for LinkedIn outreach and got his (boss’s) account shut down – on his first day. Oops.
2. What is a leased platform?
These platforms lie somewhere between rented and owned. They’re customizable, and you pay to own your content, but not the infrastructure it’s built on. They’re usually subscription-based and easier to set up, but you’re still subject to the platform’s terms or price hikes.
Leased Platform Examples:
- Shopify
- Squarespace
- Wix
- Weebly
- WordPress.com
- Webflow
- Substack
- Circle
Yes, you could pay Squarespace and build your own website, but technically, they can still kick you off. I once spoke to someone chasing the green rush (cannabis) who was having trouble building an e-commerce website. No one knew how to handle the industry yet so they just refused. Imagine pressure being placed on certain types of websites or causes, so the platform caves and shuts down sites to avoid being targeted. They can absolutely do that, and I suspect we’ll see more of it in the near future.
3. What is an owned platform?
An owned platform is one fully under your control. You get to decide the design, the functionality, the process, everything. You own all the data, you don’t have to share revenue (other than with payment processors, which is true anywhere), and no one can kick you off because you ARE the platform. They might be more costly to set up (technical expertise required), which is why the leased platforms came into existence, but you have more control over ongoing costs because you get to make all the decisions.
Owned Platform Examples:
- Self-Hosted Website (WordPress.org)
- Static Websites (old-school HTML, CSS files)
- Self-Hosted Online Courses
- Email Marketing List
- Self-Hosted Podcast
- Custom-built Apps
What’s a self-hosted website?
Here’s where I need to get nerdy for a minute. You’ve probably heard of WordPress, and it’s what my website agency specializes in. Well, there are actually two types. WordPress.com is no different than Squarespace – it’s a leased platform where you pay a subscription to get a custom WordPress site with reduced functionality. WordPress.org is where you download the open source software, which you then install on your preferred web host’s server.
Self-hosted means you host yourself, and it’s the type of website we build precisely because you own it. If you decided you didn’t want us to host your website anymore, you could pack up your site and move to a different host, and there are tons to choose from. If a host decided they were going to raise prices, or were shutting down, you could just leave. There’s no way to pack up a Wix site, just like there’s no way to pack up a Facebook page, because those things only exist on Wix and Facebook.
Email Marketing Matters
Let’s think about all those TikTok followers you could lose if it does get banned. What if you had them all subscribe to an email list? If you decide to set up shop on a new YouTube channel, you could then mass email your fans to let them know, or maybe you just decide to email your content straight to their inbox.
When I started this newsletter, I did not use Substack because I wouldn’t have owned it. Instead, I chose to host it on my personal (self-hosted WordPress) website, and I send it through Mailpoet email marketing software, which is the software we provide to clients at my agency. It runs inside of the WordPress dashboard, so everything is in one place. An email list can be packed up and moved to any email marketing service, so if I decide Mailpoet no longer works for me, I could change easily migrate to a new platform.
Data is valuable. All these different platforms exist to package your data in ways you can use, display, and share it. Build things so you own the data in a format that’s platform-agnostic.
Rented/leased platforms are still useful.
There are pros and cons to different types of platforms.
- There’s more security and long-term stability in owned platforms, but it’s harder to “get found” because you’re not part of a network.
- Leased platforms have limitations, but can greatly simplify setup if you’re just getting started (you can always upgrade later).
- Social networks are (and will continue to become) increasingly unstable, but you also have the ability to get in front of more people.
The key is to use platforms strategically. Make an owned platform your primary foundation, then use rented platforms to drive traffic to it.
The best example of this is the podcast I’m cohosting and producing:
- We’re using a leased platform for distribution because I simply don’t have time or interest in building out the infrastructure from scratch, and it made connecting to Apple Podcasts and Spotify a breeze.
- Our website and email list are owned platforms, so all content we produce outside of the recordings will live there.
- We share episodes on LinkedIn, and I post them on Bluesky1, which are rented platforms and help drive traffic to the podcast and website.
Do you have a strategy for using these different platforms? How do you plan to change or shift in 2025?
Always start with your high-level goals when making these kinds of decisions, and remember that things are constantly changing and require calibration as you grow and learn.
Recommended Reading Watching:
Instead of books, I’m sharing a single video this week, because it’s the most succinct explainer I’ve seen on building an audience. This link will cut straight to where he talks about different types of audiences (not platforms). It helps explain this concept from a different angle. If you’re a creator planning trying to grow online, I highly recommend watching the entire 12 minute video.
The 4 Steps I Used to Build My 700K Social Following – Alex Lieberman
Footnotes:
1 Bluesky is technically intended to be/on its way to becoming a decentralized platform, which is outside the scope of this post and will probably become a future newsletter.
Awesome content here…I totally learned something! Thanks for breaking it down.
Success! That’s what I’m going for, so great to hear. Thank you for reading!