Confession: I Stopped Replying to DMs. Here’s Why (And How I Fixed It)

Confession: I Stopped Replying to DMs. Here’s Why (And How I Fixed It)

At one time I loathed the little red dot that indicated notifications.

That is the notification dot every user experiences on their Instagram home page. "A ton of Requests—99+."

When I started off as a content creator, I was always replying someone. I replied to every like (🔥), every question, and every "Hi". The fact that there were some people interested in me as a creator made me feel great. I could be the one who was different among the creators—the one who really cared and was devoted to the community.

But, eventually one of my Reels got more views than expected.

From a fun chatting place, my inbox was transformed into a stress source overnight. Hundreds of messages per day were filling my inbox, out of which nearly 90% were the same questions:

"Where did you get that lamp for the desk?"

"What is this app for editing?"

"Are you offering a preset pack?"

I made a lot of effort to keep up with the flow. I would be sitting on the couch from 8 PM to 11 PM every night doing this (distantly) while Netflix and my partner were around me, ignoring them and just copy-pasting the same link to the same lamp over and over again.

I felt dead. I no longer was a creator, but a customer support representative.

Ultimately, I got exhausted and burnt out completely. I just stopped checking the requests folder. I felt bad and guilty each day for being disloyal to the people who had always been there for me, but I had no other option. I chose to keep my mind uncluttered.

Afterwards, I got to know Alex.

Alex is a fellow creator working in the same niche as mine. He is twice as much followed as I am, but he looked... relaxed. He was always updating the Stories, replying to comments, and basically interacting.

I inquired of him, "Bro, what do you do with the DMs? Is there an assistant or what?"

He was cracking jokes and at the same time showed me his phone. "No assistant. I just reproduced myself."

He introduced me to PILOT DM.

He browsed his DMs and displayed a chat from ten minutes back. One follower inquired, "What kind of camera do you use?"

With no wait—none of Alex’s performing actions on his phone whatsoever—his account instantly generated the reply: Automatically that too with personal touch of human.

[Start the conversation today with PILOT DM]