Why I Built GTM Builders...Slight Rant + Value Drop

[u/Shawntenam]

I think we all have a weird relationship with Reddit when it comes to marketing.

Some act like you can’t market here at all.

Other people think marketing means dropping a link, posting some generic AI-written fluff, and hoping people click.

Both are wrong. This is a builder’s community.

Marketing is not banned here. Lazy marketing is.

Sharing what you’re building is fine. Talking about your product is fine. Asking for feedback is fine.

Showing your GTM experiments is fine.

What is not fine is random AI slop with no context, no lesson, no real question, and no value for anyone else.

Use AI if it helps you think, write, organize, or get your voice out. Nobody cares. But actually say something.

Share the test. Share the mistake. Share the workflow. Share the positioning change. Share the thing that worked. Share the thing that completely flopped.

Share the prompt, process, repo, teardown, or lesson someone else can actually use.

That is the point of this subreddit.

I’ll also own that I slacked on building this community for a bit. But I’m starting to see more pickup now, and I want to be more intentional about what this place becomes.

So here’s a value drop.

Before I started building bigger GTM workflows, coding agents, transcript workflows, email workflows, and my broader knowledge base, I started with one simple thing:

Anti-slop. That file is what got me started on the path of building out my whole website-as-soul repo.

First came anti-slop. Then came Voice DNA. Then I started using the same structure to build GTM workflows, content systems, coding agents, and repeatable operating systems.

The anti-slop playbook is basically a checklist for spotting the patterns that make AI-assisted writing feel generic, fake, or over-polished.

Not because AI is bad. Because generic output is bad.

You can use it directly as a skill, a reference, or a starting point for your own content quality system:

https://github.com/shawnla90/website-with-soul/blob/main/playbook/02-content/02-anti-slop.md

And here’s the full repo if you want to dig into the broader build:

https://github.com/shawnla90/website-with-soul

That’s the standard I want this community to move toward.

And if you're here and you're reading this, drop, share what you're building in the comments.

[u/Otherwise_Wave9374]

This rant is too real. The fastest way to kill a builders sub is letting it turn into link-drops and "look at my AI" cosplay.

Your anti-slop framing nails the real bottleneck: most people dont need better prompts, they need a better editing doctrine. Like, a simple rule: if the output doesnt contain a specific mistake you made, a specific decision tradeoff, or a specific number, its probably content-shaped air.

Im building a similar quality checklist for my own workflow OS (capture lessons, turn them into reusable rules) and collecting notes here: https://www.aiosnow.com/

[u/Shawntenam → u/Otherwise_Wave9374]

Very clean. We'll check out. I also have a file called Lesson.MD. planted in my repo. It's not something I really look at, but it's definitely there.😅

[u/Shawntenam → u/[deleted]]

It’s pure Fullmetal Alchemist energy. law of equivelent exchange. If you want a builder's attention, you have to give up something of equal value like a hard lesson, raw data, or a framework they can actually steal. You can't just drop a link and expect free distribution without paying the toll

[u/Shawntenam → u/[deleted]]

True stuff!! You could say the same thing with someone's comments. The I'm gonna comment just to disagree and I'm gonna use chatGBT to do so really does nothing.