So what happened after Taylor’s announcement?

Every brand with a social media manager scrambled to slap mint green on their logos. Quote her lyrics. Pretend they’d been Swifties all along.

You probably thought it was brilliant marketing. Quick! Clever! On-trend!

I thought it was gross.

Because while everyone was applauding their “genius,” I saw what they really were: vultures circling.

They saw an army of loyal people with their wallets open, and they wanted in. They wanted to siphon off some of that unwavering devotion without doing any of the work to earn it.

It’s the same energy as that friend who only calls when they need something. The same energy as sliding into someone’s DMs with “Hey girl! I have an amazing opportunity for you!”

It’s transactional. It’s hollow. It’s everything that’s wrong with how we’ve been taught to build businesses.

But here’s where it gets really messed up

This isn’t just happening with Taylor Swift trends. This is the entire foundation of the marketing industry you’ve been swimming in.

The gurus who sell you courses on “leveraging viral moments” are using the exact same playbook. They see your desperation for connection, for community, for that feeling of mattering—and they package it up and sell it back to you as a “strategy.”

They tell you to “jump on trends early” and “leverage the hype” because they know you’re hungry for what Taylor has. That feeling of being seen. Of mattering. Of having people who actually care about what you have to say.

But they’re selling you the costume, not the character.

They’re teaching you to be a vulture when what you really want is to be the artist.

And the saddest part?

You keep buying it because you think the problem is that you’re not doing it right. That you’re not consistent enough, not strategic enough, not whatever-enough.

But what if the problem isn’t you?

What if the problem is that you’re trying to build a Taylor Swift-level connection using tactics designed by people who’ve never built anything real in their lives?

What if the reason you feel like you’re shouting into the void isn’t because you’re doing it wrong, but because you’re using the wrong map?

The real enemy isn’t the algorithm. It’s the system that convinced you to distrust your own instincts.