[#009] F*** Social Media: What Is Social Media Really Costing Your Business?

Somewhere along the way, social media stopped being one way to market a business and became something we were all expected to do.

I have spent years doing the things we are told will help grow a business. I listened to the experts, took the courses, learned about hooks and algorithms, and tried to understand how to capture attention and build influence online.

But the more I learn, the more I find myself questioning, "Is this actually the best way to build the kind of reach we need?"

For SYMMETRY Neuro-Pathway Training, the mission is to make brain regulation accessible to everyone. That requires reaching a lot of people and teaching them why brainwaves matter. I think we began treating reaching people and reaching people through social media as though they were the same thing.

They aren't.

The bigger realization for me is that this simply does not suit me.

I don't like social media, and I don't want to feel the pressure to participate in it anymore.

In the middle of absorbing everything the experts were teaching, I realized I had been trying to force myself to fit a mold that doesn't fit me or the mission of SYMMETRY Neuro-Pathway Training.

That realization was reinforced when I listened to a Blinkist summary of The Long Game. The idea of creating white space made me think about the difference between building a business with intention and letting the business dictate how I spend my time.

So I wrote three words in my journal:

"F*** social media."

And then I sat with the relief that followed.

None of this changed what I want to build.

My vision for SYMMETRY Neuro-Pathway Training is for it to become a household name, the way Kleenex is to tissue and Band-Aid is to bandages. And I mean that literally.

I see a day when someone hears that a family member is struggling, an athlete can't perform, or an employee can't focus, and one of the first questions that comes to mind is: Have you had your brain mapped?

A day when Neurofeedback is as normal as going to the dentist. When measuring and regulating your brain is something everyone does and has access to, not something you have to be lucky enough to discover or desperate enough to go looking for.

That is the mission. Every person, everywhere, with access to brain regulation.

Getting there will take providers, schools, healthcare systems, employers, veteran programs and trusted institutions making brain regulation available to the people they serve.

Social media may help us tell people about it. But telling people about something and making it accessible to them are not the same thing.

And that is where the irony becomes hard for me to ignore.

The Irony of Marketing Brain Regulation on Social Media

We want people to understand why their brainwaves matter and know that neurofeedback exists, especially when they or someone they love is struggling and the answers they have been given aren't enough.

And yet, we keep turning to social media to reach and educate them, which means we're hoping that somewhere in the middle of everything competing for their attention, they'll happen to find us.

Or, more accurately, that we'll create a good enough hook to make them stop scrolling.

There is something deeply backwards about that.

Especially when you consider how the hook actually works.

Social media runs on intermittent, often unpredictable rewards: a like, a comment, a notification, something new every time we scroll. Those rewards reinforce behavior and engage the brain's reward circuitry, where dopamine plays an important role. Research using simulated social media environments has found that receiving and giving likes engages neural circuitry involved in reward and reinforcement. [1,2]

Stress is part of the picture too. Problematic social media use has been linked with higher levels of stress, anxiety, depression and sleep problems. Negative social comparison and fear of missing out have also been associated with poorer well-being. [3,4]

And being connected online does not necessarily mean feeling more connected. A meta-analysis of more than 48,000 people found that passive and problematic social media use were associated with greater loneliness. [5]

That doesn't mean social media is inherently bad or that everyone who uses it will experience these effects.

But given what we do, I can't ignore the contradiction.

We are on the other side of the same system.

We monitor performance, watch engagement, create more content and try to figure out what will make someone stop scrolling long enough to hear what we have to say. In the process, the platform isn't only competing for their attention. It's competing for ours too.

We are trying to capture their attention while allowing our own attention to be captured in return.

And I keep wondering: Does this really make sense as the primary path for people to find us?

What is Social Media really costing us?

That question becomes even more interesting when you add up what businesses are spending to participate.

Global social media advertising spending reached an estimated $276 billion in 2025. [6]

More than a quarter of a trillion dollars.

And that's just the advertising.

It doesn't include the people managing the platforms, the hours spent developing strategy and creating content, or the software, AI tools and outside services businesses add to keep the whole thing running.

Then there is the cost you cannot put on a spreadsheet: the strategic bandwidth, creative energy and hours of leadership thinking diverted away from the actual mission and toward a content machine that demands constant feeding.

I have been one of the people paying that bill.

And once I started thinking about the full cost, I couldn't help wondering what those same resources could build somewhere else.

For us, it could be another provider trained. Another relationship with a school, hospital or veteran program. Another community where people can actually access neurofeedback.

The question stopped being simply, “Is social media working?”

It became:

Is this the best use of what we have?

The cost is higher than the invoice

There is another part of the calculation that doesn't show up in the marketing budget.

The human one.

A 2025 survey of 542 North American content creators found that 62% experienced burnout at least sometimes or often, while 69% reported financial instability related to their work. Ten percent reported suicidal thoughts related to their work. Researchers identified pressures including financial instability, algorithm changes, content performance, toxicity and isolation. [7]

Those numbers come from content creators. Most founders, marketers and staff members aren't professional creators.

But increasingly, we're being asked to behave like them.

I have pushed people who are gifted at serving clients and training providers into content roles they didn't want because that's what we were told businesses needed to do.

And that's where this becomes bigger than an argument about marketing ROI.

When the platforms we're using to reach people are competing for their attention, while the work required to remain visible on those platforms is consuming ours, what is the whole system costing us?

Not just in dollars, but in attention, creative energy, leadership bandwidth and the work we aren't doing because we're busy feeding the work social media created.

So where does that leave us?

I am not saying social media has no value. For some businesses, in some categories, it works.

I'm questioning something much more specific: whether social media deserves to be treated as essential simply because we have collectively decided that's how businesses are supposed to reach people.

For a mission this large, I am no longer convinced that attention alone is going to get us there.

I want to run a company and lead a mission. I do not want to perform one on social media.

The version of success I am building isn't measured in followers. It is measured in families who find their way to neurofeedback, providers equipped and supported, and communities where brain regulation is available, accessible and normal.

I want to spend more time building the kind of reach that exists beyond a feed. Real access. Real relationships. Real infrastructure.

Because the goal was never to become good at social media.

The goal is every person, everywhere, with access to brain regulation.

Add it up

Here is what I would ask you to do.

Look at the last twelve months and figure out what your business actually spent on social media. Don't stop at advertising. Include staff hours, software, outside services, creative energy and leadership bandwidth.

Then ask what came back.

Not just followers or impressions. Look for real, traceable results.

And then ask the question I think we ignore most:

How has it felt?

Not you as a marketing professional looking at a dashboard. You as a human being. What has the constant pressure to post, monitor, respond and keep up felt like?

If it has felt like a treadmill you're afraid to step off, maybe it's worth thinking about what happens if you do.

I know what asking that question revealed for me.

I'm not deleting every account tomorrow. I'm releasing the assumption that because everyone is doing it, it must be the right thing for me, for my company or for this mission.

And if your business has already found a better path, one that doesn't require constantly feeding the machine, I genuinely want to hear from you.

What did you build instead? What actually worked?

Frequently Asked Questions

1. Why can social media be difficult to put down?

Social media provides frequent and often unpredictable rewards through likes, comments, notifications and constantly changing content. These experiences engage brain systems involved in reward and reinforcement, which can strengthen the urge to check, scroll and return to the platform. [1,2]

2. Can social media contribute to stress or anxiety?

Research has found associations between problematic social media use and higher levels of stress, anxiety, depression and sleep problems. Negative social comparison and fear of missing out have also been associated with poorer well-being. That does not mean social media affects everyone the same way or that social media alone causes these outcomes. [3,4]

3. Does being connected on social media make us feel less lonely?

Not necessarily. Online connection can be meaningful, but more time connected digitally does not automatically translate into greater feelings of connection. A meta-analysis involving more than 48,000 people found that passive and problematic social media use were associated with greater loneliness. [5]