Giving Up 1 Million Followers: Erin Loechner on Writing & Life with Less Tech

This post was adapted from Writing Off Social: The Podcast, Episode 60. You can listen in here!

Giving Up 1 Million Followers: Erin Loechner on Writing & Life with Less Tech

There’s a particular kind of pressure that creeps in when you’re a writer in this modern age. Even if you love your craft and feel called to your message, it can still feel like you’re being quietly forced into a life you didn’t choose. Be visible. Be online. Be consistent. Be everywhere. Build a platform.

And if you’re already tired, already stretched, already longing for a quieter way to create, it’s not a small thing to wonder: what happens if I don’t do that?

Erin Loechner’s story lands like a permission slip for anyone asking that question. She built a full-time living online, gained over a million followers, and lived inside the world many writers are told they must pursue. Then she walked away. Not by “taking a break.” Not by stepping back. She deleted everything.

And somehow, she kept writing. She kept publishing. She kept building a meaningful career and a rich life that didn’t require her to stay tethered to feeds, apps, and algorithms.

Before Social Media Became the Job

Erin’s internet life didn’t begin with Instagram. It began quietly, back when blogging was more noun than verb, and keeping a corner of the internet felt more like a creative experiment than a marketing strategy. Her early work lived in the overlap between art, design, and storytelling—cataloging a life that was thoughtful and observant, not performative.

That work eventually grew into a full-time career. Her blog opened doors to bigger opportunities, including hosting an HGTV.com renovation series before influencer culture existed as we know it. Even then, Erin was watching the media landscape shift. Traditional magazines were losing ground. Blogs were becoming powerful. Platforms were positioning themselves as the new gatekeepers.

When social media entered the picture, she heard the familiar refrain: you have to be there. People want more access. More content. More of you.

So she joined—but carefully.

Boundaries from the beginning

From the start, Erin and her husband were paying attention. With his background in advertising, they understood early what many people realize much later: these platforms are designed to extract attention. They set firm boundaries around what they shared, especially when it came to their children.

Still, the pressure crept in. Social media doesn’t just invite participation—it demands expansion. And when your livelihood is tied to visibility, it becomes easy to feel like you owe more than you want to give.

When Leaving Became a Parenting Decision

The moment Erin chose to step away wasn’t driven by burnout alone. It was driven by clarity.

She realized the direction social media was heading meant it would never be a place she would encourage her children to be. And if that was true, she couldn’t reconcile building her career inside a world she planned to warn them about. She didn’t want to parent with a phone in her hand. She didn’t want to make rules she wouldn’t keep herself.

So she walked away.

Not just from the apps—but from the idea that visibility was the price of legitimacy.

What she chose to gain

Erin doesn’t dwell on what she lost. She talks instead about what she gained: attention, presence, conviction. She knew she wasn’t replaceable in her role as a mother, even if she was replaceable as a voice online. That truth made the decision clearer than it might otherwise have been.

Publishing Without Platforms

Leaving social media didn’t mean Erin stopped writing. It meant she stopped outsourcing connection to platforms and started leaning into people.

When she told her publisher she had deleted everything, she didn’t come empty-handed. She came with a willingness to reach out directly—to email individuals and communities who cared about the topic of her work. She wasn’t offering metrics. She was offering relationship.

The power of one email

Erin describes her “secret” simply: she emails people.

Not with pitches. Not with expectations. Just gratitude. For years, she has made it a habit to send emails to people whose work has shaped her thinking. Most of the time, she never hears back. But sometimes, those emails grow into real relationships.

And those relationships, she says, are how work has always moved forward. People help people.

What Leaving Social Media Did to Her Writing

One of the unexpected benefits of stepping away was what happened to Erin’s voice.

As a ghostwriter, she began hearing consistent feedback from editors: her writing didn’t sound like social media. It wasn’t stitched together from captions or shaped by trending language. It felt more timeless.

Without the constant exposure to online phrasing and recycled maxims, her writing began to stand apart. Not because she was trying to be different—but because she was no longer absorbing the same inputs.

For publishers looking for work with longevity, that difference mattered.

Writing The Opt-Out Family

Erin’s book, The Opt-Out Family*, was born from curiosity more than certainty. She wasn’t interested in policing screen time or assigning moral weight to devices. She wanted to ask a deeper question: what is technology doing to us while we’re using it?

From that question came a family motto: be more engaging than the algorithm. Saying no to screens wasn’t enough. Families needed something better to say yes to.

She spent months interviewing people inside Silicon Valley—developers, designers, CEOs—learning how platforms create engagement and addiction. Then she asked whether families could create those same feelings of challenge, connection, and excitement without devices.

The result was a book that isn’t about fear or restriction, but about reclaiming agency and designing a richer family life on purpose.

A Marketing Strategy That Emerged Naturally

When Erin reflects on how the book reached readers without social media, she points to something that happened almost accidentally: inclusion.

Because she involved so many people in the research process, those same people became champions of the book. They wanted to share it. They were proud to be part of it. They invited her into their spaces.

It wasn’t transactional. It was collaborative. A rising tide, lifting everyone.

For the Writer Starting at Zero

Erin is quick to name what many listeners are thinking: her story can sound unattainable to writers without connections or an existing audience.

But she insists everyone starts in the same place—by showing up generously. By celebrating other people’s work. By responding with gratitude. By meeting people in real life when possible. By building trust slowly, one relationship at a time.

She rejects the idea that connection needs to be scalable. If it isn’t scalable to interact with human beings, she says, then maybe scaling isn’t the goal.

The only number that really matters is you and one other person.

A Word for Writers Who Feel Trapped

For writers afraid to leave social media because publishers demand platforms, Erin offers perspective: Ideas still matter. Craft still matters. Books still get acquired because the message is needed.

In fact, stepping away can sharpen your voice. Without absorbing the same online language every day, your writing may begin to sound more original, more grounded, more enduring.

Erin doesn’t prescribe deletion. She talks about seasons, Sabbaths, and conviction. But she’s clear about one thing: platforms are not neutral. They shape us. And choosing to step back—even temporarily—can bear real fruit.

Closing

Erin Loechner’s story doesn’t promise ease. But it does offer hope. It reminds writers that careers can be built through people, not platforms—and that deep work, clear conviction, and genuine connection still matter.

For writers longing to create work that lasts, her life is a quiet but powerful reminder: you don’t have to stay plugged in to stay relevant.

Continue the Conversation with Erin Loechner

If Erin’s story resonated with you and you’d like to explore her work more deeply, here are a few places to begin:

Each of these offers a different doorway into the same invitation Erin extends throughout her work: to slow down, to choose presence, and to build a life—and a writing practice—that isn’t dictated by algorithms.

*This is an affiliate link, meaning should you purchase something after clicking on this link, we will receive a small payment from that company- at no cost to you. Thank you for your support!

This post was reformatted from our original transcript by ChatGPT and edited for accuracy by Mary K.