This is a short post, because what I want to get to is your comments. My question to you is what if I could teach you how to do what I’ve done, what would you say?
In case you’re not sure what I’ve done and why you might want to do it, what I’m referring to is becoming an influencer. Three years ago nobody knew who I was other than my friends. Since then, I have:
- Published 200+ articles in or have been mentioned in outlets like Inc., Forbes, Time, Entrepreneur, Mashable, TechCrunch, VentureBeat, and Fast Company.
- Been featured on national radio and TV.
- Given a TEDx talk.
- Become a paid speaker, receiving travel, accommodation, and speaking fees.
- Gotten a book deal with an established publisher and an advance.
As a result of this, my business grew its revenues by 1,000% in a 12-month period, and is more successful than its ever been in the 15 years I’ve been running it.
What would happen to your career, your business, your life, if you could write for or be mentioned as an expert in the publications I listed above? What would getting a book deal do for you? What if I told you I could teach you exactly how I did it, and how you can do it much faster and easier than I did it? What would you say?
Not a rhetorical question, I really want to know. I look forward to your comments!
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Online course?
Thinking about it.
Depends on what you want to achieve and if being an influencer and having a strong personal brands aligns with your overall goals.
As you know it still takes hard work to accomplish all the things you do. For some companies it can create a great deal flow and trust, but for others it matters a little less, because there are different, perhaps better acquisition channels and a strong personal brand may dillute the product/corporate brand.
Anyways, if you are in business development and your audience also aligns well with your work then I’d say it’s incredible. You can see this with a number of personalities like Noah Kagan, Tim Ferris, Gary Vee, etc. Other big & small company CEOs like Jack Welch and Richard Branson also have used their brand effectively to both attract talent and customers. Then you also have those that quietly try to optimize their time spent on getting things done for their company. Like Tim Cook for instance, who doesn’t like to stand in the lime light only if he has to.
For me, I’m not sure. It can have strong benefits later on as fitness is heavily influenced by influencers (Instagrammers and… celebrities as well as athletes alike), so it might be interesting to put in more work later.
So that’s my take on this. 🙂
Martin
P.S. Are you looking to start like a program or something? Might be a good idea.
Been considering it.
Being a writer myself and having high aspirations to take my skills and ambition as far as I can, as quick as I can, it would be super beneficial to hear what you would have to say/advise as I head further into my career.
It sounds intriguing. Does it matter what you are an expert in, though? Or, do you have to be an expert at all, if you have something folks are interested in?
I would say, show me how…I’m all ears!
Certainly interested. A book deal, getting media attention & business growth are all of interest. The challenge I have with this area is determining specific tactics that work. I have had some success (been on 2 podcasts with a 3rd in the works, been quoted in Monster.com etc). Some of the advice I have read in this arena amounts to a vague recommendation to “be awesome and good things will happen.” Details are needed. Thoughts?
The “be awesome and good things will happen” is a viable strategy, but as they say, the devil is in the details. While there are some great resources out there like Michael Hyatt’s book Platform and all sorts of podcasts, blogs, etc. it’s hard to find one source that puts it all together for someone like me (and perhaps yourself) and say “Here’s the roadmap, here are the steps, just follow them and 1-2-3 you’ll get a-b-c results.”
The result of this post is that I’m going to write Influencer Inc which puts it all together. It will be 10% my own experiences, and 90% taking the wisdom of all the personal brand building experts out there like Gary Vaynerchuk, Michael Hyatt, Bryan Harris, Grant Baldwin, Michael Port and other marketing and growth hacking experts like Joe Pulizzi, Jay Baer, Ryan Holiday, Andrew Chen, and Sean Ellis plus some lean startup stuff ala Eric Ries and Steve Blank and put it all together. That way you don’t have to read 100+ books, read thousands of articles, and listen to thousands of podcast episodes, as I’ve done and continue to do, to get to the stuff you really need.
When is your projected date of release for Influencer Inc?
Mid to late 2017. Can’t wait to get it out there but it’s going to be packed with case studies and detailed instructions and that means a bunch of work 🙂
(Further to today’s like on Twitter) You forgot to mention your inspiring but rigorous approach to work-life balance. Managing time to place family on an equal footing with work may be an equal if not greater achievement. Also you might take credit for moving to a strategic crossroads of world commerce (HKG/Shenzhen), which is also probably more conducive to networking and gaining street smarts than staying (e,g,) in the Midwest. In terms of experts in your reply to Bruce, I would add James Altucher. (He might suggest a different title to the post and frame it as a call to action, i.e. not “What would you say”, but “What will you do now?”)