Author: zarazhangrui
Compiled by: XinGPT
Editor's Note: Before coming to X, Zhang Zala was already a famous AI blogger on Xiaohongshu, positioning herself with her Harvard undergraduate background and Silicon Valley AI company experience, known for creating vibe coding and product-related content.
The following is the full translated text: "
Most people fail to grow on X because they have the wrong mental model. They see X as a stage, thinking they need to step onto it and deliver a speech to an audience.
The correct mental model is: X is a party. When you walk into a party, you don't go to a corner and talk to yourself. You find a group of people already gathered, listen to what they are talking about, and then join their conversation.
This mental model is the foundation of all my growth strategies:
1. Curate Your Feed
Think of this step as "figuring out which parties to attend and which crowd you want to hang out with." If your feed is full of junk content and clickbait, you won't have inspiration to post, and you'll end up participating in the wrong conversations.
Before I started posting regularly, I spent about two weeks deliberately curating my X algorithm. Specifically, whenever I saw clickbait or topics I didn't care about, I clicked the three dots in the top right -> "Not interested." Whenever I saw deep, valuable content, I engaged with it by liking, retweeting, replying, or bookmarking. Over time, the algorithm learns to push more high-quality content to you. My X feed is now full of content about AI, new product launches, and various in-depth discussions—all things I genuinely want to engage with, both inspiring and educational.
2. Reply Sincerely
Do not use AI bots to batch reply for you. Let me say it again, do not use AI bots to batch reply for you.
Replying just for the sake of replying is meaningless. When I see replies under my posts that are clearly AI-generated and just parroting what I said, I actually feel offended. It feels extremely perfunctory, insincere, and lazy.
Going back to the party analogy, replying is like leaning into a circle of people and participating in their existing conversation. You have to say something truly interesting so that people notice you and welcome you into their circle.
Suppose you are A, and you want to interact with B by replying under B's post—and B has many more followers than you. When you interact with sincerity and quality, B will respond to you—by liking your reply, replying to your reply, or following you back. This tells the algorithm: "These two people like each other, let me push more of A's content to B." Then the next time you say something on your own timeline, it's more likely to appear on B's timeline, and B might retweet it. This is how you grow.
3. Post Consistently, Make It a Reflex
This is the most important rule. If you don't follow this rule, nothing else matters. My goal for myself is to post 3 times a day.
This isn't about time management. Extremely busy founders, CEOs, and investors post 5 to 10 times a day. It's about lowering the barrier enough to make it a reflex. It needs to become a natural extension of what you already do every day. Don't overthink it.
What are those reflexes? Here are a few habits that have really helped me maintain consistent output:
1. Learn in Public
I often watch video podcasts and read newsletters about AI and startups. Whenever I see something that resonates, I take a screenshot and post that quote on X. Importantly, I make sure to @ the person who said it. This is both a friendly gesture of respect to the original creator and gets that person to notice you. They might retweet (people love hearing good things about themselves) or follow you. If you learn something new, share that knowledge with the world. I use X as a public notebook.
2. Give Public Feedback
As part of my work, I try out a lot of new AI products. Whenever I come across a product or feature that impresses me, I write a public post of praise or feedback on X, and make sure to @ their official account and the founder. Startup founders—especially early-stage ones—absolutely love product feedback. In my experience, if you share in-depth feedback as a user, 90% of the time the founder will reply to you, retweet you, or DM you.
3. Build in Public
This year I started playing with vibe coding, and many of my most popular posts are product demos I made with vibe coding. People on X absolutely love product demos. Developer relations leads at all the major AI labs are actively watching what people build with their technology (I had two projects retweeted and recommended by the official Google AI Developer X account). Use tools like Screen Studio to record your screen and yourself simultaneously, making 1 to 2 minute demo videos. It doesn't need to be polished. Especially when new models are released, quickly build something with it and share it, even if it's just a rough prototype.
Don't start by promoting your product or company. For all these habits, I am providing value to the community without expecting anything in return. People need to see you first as a sincere, value-providing individual before they will care about anything you might want to say or sell in the future.
4. Don't Use AI for Writing Until You've Developed Your Own Taste and Voice
Using AI to write isn't inherently bad. The danger is using AI to write before you've developed a taste for what good content is. If the AI produces garbage, you won't even realize it's garbage.
X values authenticity above all else. Rough edges beat polish. It's not about perfect grammar or fancy words. Write how you speak in real life.
Read a lot to figure out what good content looks like. Post a lot to know what your own voice sounds like. Only after that, use AI to assist your writing, but ensure the output genuinely sounds like you.
The ultimate goal is not growth on X itself, but growing while still being your authentic self."
A Few Growth Secrets Zhang Zala Didn't Tell You:
1. X's algorithm places very high weight on social relationships, and Zhang Zala's top AI network accumulated in Silicon Valley and her previous experience at major platforms gave her a very good mutual-follow network.
For example, her followers include very prominent AI corporate accounts like Tencent AI, Minimax, Kimi, and many AI entrepreneurs and big names. X's algorithm is essentially a monetization of network relationships. (So asking big names for mutual follows really works, and a big platform is also an advantage!)
2. Before she started operating on X, she was already a major AI influencer on Xiaohongshu, accumulating a batch of seed fans. When she started on X, she naturally had a group of already-followed fans as seed users.
