Kimanzi Constable's Blog, page 46

The Tools I Use To Run My Online Business

*Special announcement* A couple of posts ago I had a really popular post about the numbers that really matter for your online business. The post was viewed over 10,000 times. In the post I talked about your email list but didn’t go into strategy…..until now. I’m doing a webinar on 3 Killer Ways To Grow Your Email List. June 10 at 8 pm CST. You will walk away with three ideas to help grow your email list. If you can’t make it Sign up here to get the replay link emailed to you. If you’re already on my email list you’re all good

When I was delivering bread for twelve years I never dreamed I could make a living from the Internet. It was surreal the first time I made a couple of dollars from something I created.

As I got further into this journey I learned, created, and made more dollars. Three years after I started I now have a business that supports my family. The cool part about my online business is that it doesn’t take much to operate.

When I had my bread business there were a ton of moving parts including five employees at the height of the business. My online business is smooth for the most part and the best part is being location-independent.

Let me tell you upfront NONE of the links in this post are affiliate links. I’m not a fan of affiliate stuff. I want to give you a behind-the-scenes look at what it takes to run a location-independent online business.

The Hardware

One tool that I couldn’t live without and use to run my business everyday is my 13” MacBook Pro. I love this thing so much that I defended it against two people who tried to jump me here in Maui.

I used to use a PC but switched because of how user-friendly Mac’s are. Even if you knew nothing you could pick it up and use it. It’s also loaded with software that helps grow my business. I’ll get more into that later.

I use my MacBook Pro to create all my content, to keep my schedule, and to stay connected to the Internet where my business lives.

The other piece of hardware is my iPhone 4s. I use it on coaching calls. I use it to shoot video when I’m on location. I use the apps on it to help run my business. I’ll get more into what apps I use in the software portion.

The last piece of hardware is my iPad mini. I had debated what size iPad to get and I’m super glad I got the mini. I absolutely love it. I use it for reading. I love reading books on it.

I mainly use it at my speaking events. I got the Square credit card reader that hooks into the top to process credit cards for product sales at the events. I usually ask for a table to set up somewhere at the conference to sell my book.

The iPad and Square combination has been amazing since most people want to pay with credit cards. I guess technically the Square Reader is another piece of hardware I use

The Software

On my MacBook I use Office for Mac. It has Windows and Powerpoint. I use Windows to write my books and I use Powerpoint for speaking sometimes. I also use the Apple suite of products: Keynote and Pages.

I write my blog posts and pretty much any word content I create on pages. I’ve really loved doing my presentations through Keynote, it’s more interactive than Powerpoint. On the Mac I also use the calendar app to schedule all my appointments. I also use iMovies to edit videos and Garage band to make the music for the videos.

On my iPhone I use the notes app for notes and ideas for my book and blog posts. I use the calendar app for appointments. I use the reminders app for my to-do list. I use the camera app for pictures and videos.

On my iPad I use the Kindle reader app to read books that help my business. The iPad mini also has all of my social media apps which I use to keep up with friends and fans on social media.

The Online Stuff

To process payments and sell my products and services I use a service from e-junkie.com. For a flat rate of $5 a month it processes payments, sets up affiliates, and creates discount codes. It’s pretty versatile and handles everything you need online.

To send out emails and keep in touch with people who like the site I use mailchimp.com. It costs $10 a month and works great.

This website is hosted on wordpress.org. In my opinion it’s the best online platform for websites. I use godaddy.com to host the site online.

I’ve been racking my brain trying to think what else but I think that’s it. It really doesn’t take much to run an online business and that’s why I love it. I hope this helps as you build your online business.

My biggest piece of advice: Keep it simple! What are some cool tools you use to run your online business?

Don’t Let The Haters Win

The day that my first book came out was an exciting day indeed. I finally beat my doubts and fears and took one giant step towards my dream. I was on cloud nine!

I promoted the book on my blog and wrote about topics to help the everyday working person. I wanted to help them, I wanted to be their voice. Can you imagine the shock when I got a negative comment?

I was there to help, why was someone attacking my message? That person commented about how I didn’t have training or a degree. They went on to say a bunch of things to make me look bad. I ignored them and just hoped it would go away.

That same person followed me to my guest posts. They attacked everything I did. This went far beyond just disagreeing with me. They crossed into the line of becoming a hater.

What makes a hater? 

Let’s get something straight. There are people who disagree with you. That doesn’t make them haters. They might think your point of view on a certain subject is off and they express their disagreement in a non pushy way.

It can be a comment on your blog where they say this is why I disagree. It could be a comment on a social media post. The point is they can disagree with the point without attacking you personally. That person is not a hater.

A hater is that person that goes beyond just disagreeing. They make it their mission to attack your message, attack you personally and can’t leave you alone. They want to see you suffer.

You will have haters

No matter how positive your message is get ready for the haters, they’re coming. Understand that haters are miserable in their life. They’re existing in life and aren’t happy so they want to drag those that are happy down to their level.

They’re happy when they can get a rise out of you. They’re happy anyway they can derail your message.

Remember this: We have the power. We decide whether or not to listen to them or ignore them and keep serving our audience. Let them ramble on while we ignore them and spread a message of hope.

You’re an expert

If you have experienced something in your life or if you have done research about something you’re passionate about you can speak about that subject with some authority.

Life experience triumphs anything you can learn in any classroom. Research and the power of the Internet can give you the knowledge you need. What’s the first thing you do when you want to do something around the house? You check YouTube.

Don’t let the haters win. Ignore them and move on. Focus on who you’re doing this for and why! What has been your experience with haters?

P.S. Don’t miss a webinar I’m doing on 3 Killer Ways To Grow Your Email List. June 10 at 8 pm CST.

Sign up here

The Best Way To Chase Your Dream

One thing that I’ve come to love is running. Getting out there in the fresh Maui air, hitting the pavement and moving forward is amazing.

To keep track of my miles I use the Nike Running app. The app is pretty cool and has a lot of functionality. One cool thing is that you can friend people. This can be a blessing or a curse.

You can see what your friends ran and get motivated or you can see their miles and feel miserable because you didn’t run as many.

Early on I saw their miles and felt like I needed to run as many as them and as fast as them. Trying to keep up only lead to injury, anger and failure. It lead to me hating running for a period of time.

Want to know the best way to chase your dream? Do it at your own pace. 

This is your journey

I found that when I ran at my own pace I could run for long distances and for days. I’m not the fastest runner but I can run some distance.

Your journey has to be your journey. Just because someone you know published a book that sold well or spoke at a cool conference or got to interview an A-Lister doesn’t mean you have to do the same thing.

That’s where they’re at in their journey.  You might not be there yet and you shouldn’t try to keep up. 

Right now your journey may be finding your own voice in your writing or you may be creating your foundation. Be comfortable where you’re at. Do all of this dream chasing stuff at your own pace and at a pace that doesn’t make your family hate your dream.

It’s not a race, it’s a marathon

I know how it is.  When I started on this journey I wanted my dream to be supporting me and my family yesterday. I wasn’t patient and I would constantly try to keep up with those doing the things I eventually wanted to do.

It took three years to build this business up to where it could support my family and everyday is a challenge to keep growing it. It didn’t happen overnight and it probably won’t for you either.

It takes time to build a solid foundation. It takes times to understand the needs of those who you’re serving. It takes time to create things that will help solve a problem they’re facing and it takes time to learn how to communicate and show the value of your thing.

If you need some step by step help I do offer coaching. If the cost seems high, I do offer a payment plan that suits your needs. There are also many great podcasts, blogs, and videos to help you through this journey.

Give yourself a little grace and realize that by taking action you’re doing what it takes to make your dream a reality. You’ve taken the first steps, now take a few more steps and before you know it you’ll be running.

Bravo to you and here’s to you and your dream! Have you been guilty of not chasing your dream at your own pace? 

Self-Publishing Without a Huge Audience With Author James W. Lewis

The stats say that most authors will only sell 100-150 copies of their book. When my first book sold five copies in the first six months I certainly believed those stats.

Let’s face it, selling books these days is hard. There was a huge boom for self-published authors in 2011 when self-publishing first became popular. These days there are over 13 million books on Amazon and thousands being added each day.

With a combined online presence of 4,000 people James W. Lewis’ debut novel sold over 10,000 copies. He partnered with his wife and a friend and they started a publishing company. Combined they’ve sold over 30,000 books.

I was SO honored to sit down with him and get some killer self-publishing tips. In this 29 minute interview you’ll learn:

How to get your book traditionally published.
The difference between self-publishing and traditional publishing.
How to sell books when you don’t have a huge audience.
The best way to think about your self-publishing journey.
How to deal with one-star reviews and haters.

Didn’t James rock it? I do have to apologize about all the background people. That’s what I get for doing this interview outdoors

James has killed it by combining his network with two other people. With 4,000 people they’ve rocked it and so can you. This backs up what I was saying a couple of posts ago. Partner with the third tier and build a better network.

You can do this and I’m excited to see you rock this year! What can you do to help your book sales? 

The Numbers That Really Matter For Your Online Business

This will be a longer than normal post. 

In 2012 I really started to figure out all this online business stuff and made real money. My two self-published books had sold over 40,000 copies by mid 2012 at a profit of $3.78 a book. I wish we could have saved the money but every dollar was used to pay off debt.

After our debts were paid we were back to square one and I had to figure out how to generate income outside of the self-published books. I hit the Internet hard again trying to figure out the “missing piece” of the puzzle.

The Internet can be a blessing and a curse because there’s plenty of information but it’s hard to know what is relevant. When I researched I saw a ton of different things I should do to make money and the numbers I should focus on.

I was told to focus on your social media following because that’s where people are at. I was told to focus on your analytics because they will tell you what people want. I was told to focus on a lot of numbers but at the end of the day there were only two numbers that really mattered and helped me build a business that now supports our family of five.

The reach of social media

Facebook is now a publicly traded company and because of that they have to generate income where they can. Facebook made the announcement that your organic reach is decreasing even more and if you want to reach more people you’re going to have to pay.

The average life of a Tweet is 10 seconds. Yes, you can schedule multiple tweets throughout the day using something like the Buffer App. A twitter stream goes fast and if someone is following a lot of people your tweet will likely get lost in the mix.

The truth is people don’t buy directly from social media. Especially when you’re not well-known or have a smaller following. The truth is you don’t need a huge social media following if you want to reach people on social media. You just have to pay for it or engage people enough to share your content.

I have 275 likes on my Facebook fan page but this year running Facebook ads and people sharing the page has helped me reach over 100,000 people. Think about that, I don’t have that many likes but that many people have seen my content.

The engagement and ads have helped me generate $10,000 in income. Even though I’ve seen these numbers people didn’t buy from that page. All social media did was lead people back to my website and that’s where the sale happened.

Could you argue that I needed social media to generate that income? Sure but social media shouldn’t have been my focus as I was building. These results are AFTER I already have something established. My number goal is to help you figure out where to spend the limited time you have as you build.

More and more each social media platform will head to a pay for reach model which means your organic reach will be less and less. If that’s where your entire focus is you’ll be scratching your head later figuring out what to do.

There was a great interview on the Smart Passive Income podcast with a couple that had a Facebook fan page of 1.4 million people. They depended on that page for income and reach. When Facebook changed their algorithm it affected their bottom line.

Remember all the people who focused on Google AdWords and “lost it all” when Google changed its algorithm? You don’t want to be in that boat, especially where your income is considered. P.S. Michael Hyatt released a post that backs up what I’m saying. He calls social media numbers, comments on your blog, and analytics “vanity metrics.”

 

The numbers that helped bring in real money

At the end of the day and after three years of building these are the two numbers that mattered the most as I built my online business:

1. Email subscribers. These days it’s irritating to get a lot of email so when someone can look past that and sign up for your email list they’re really interested in what you have to say. They’re giving you permission to speak to them about what you have going on. Seth Godin calls it permission marketing and has written an incredible book on the topic. Derek Halpern has also written an excellent post about this topic.

No matter what friends or followers you lose on social media or how much reach you have you can still communicate with your email list and send them your content. When you start selling something the people on your email list are the ones most likely to buy it.

Think about it logically: one of your Facebook friends that you know well or just loosely seeing your new course or book and decides to click on the link you share and buy? Or that person that’s been reading your blog for a year and loves your free content, they see you’re offering something that goes more in-depth and since you’ve given them value they buy. Which scenario seems more likely? 

The people on your email list will outsell any other platform two to one (my own tested numbers). You can send your email list deals and exclusive offers and they will most likely be repeat customers. I can vouch for this from personal experience. The coaching clients I have right now all started as people who read my blog, bought my book, took the free coaching consultation call and then ended up buying the highest thing I sell on my website.

When you’re building, and if your goal is to build something online that supports you, focus the limited amount of time and resources you have on your email list. Building it and nurturing it.

If you have 20 people on your email list you should know all 20 of those people by name. You should be there and help them on a one on one basis. When you give them that level of attention they tell the whole world about you because no one else online approaches building that way. That’s how you will stand out from the 250 million other blogs out there.

2. Income. Look, you’re trying to build something that supports your family and you’re trying to replace your current income with this thing. How will it ever do that if you don’t focus on generating income?

I’m not telling you that money should be your sole focus because it shouldn’t be but too often we lean too far to the other direction and don’t think about it at all. When I say focus on income I mean how well can you convert with what you already have and what can you create that would help your target audience?

Instead of spending a bunch of time on building social media which might help you at some point, focus on how to generate income now.

The right focus makes this thing support you

Look, it all works hand in hand. Yes you need to build your social media presence. Yes you should do all the other things it takes to build your online business. However, when you’re starting out or when you don’t have a huge online presence, you need to have the right focus. Especially when you have a limited amount of time as you build on the side.

When you focus on the email list which leads to the income, real money starts coming in. As I always say, test out my theory and see if it’s a right fit for what you’re building. At the end of the day you have to decide what’s right for you.

There’s a ton of advice out there but most of it is only relevant if you have a large following. My goal is always to help those that are building and give you what has worked for me.

Right now as we speak I have 275 Facebook likes, 1,328 Twitter followers, 258 Linkedin friends, 218 followers on Google Plus and 4,568 email subscribers. Compared to the A-listers these numbers are really small.

With an online presence this size I have an online business that generates $7,000 a month consistently. Look at the numbers again, look where my focus is and look at what that focus does for our family’s bottom line. Social media is great but nothing beats the email list!

Practical application 

I want to give you something practical that you can use. For the next week look at the amount of time you’ll be using to build your dream on the side. When you think about that time, plan on using 60% of that time on things to build and nurture your email list. The rest of that time can be spent on everything else. Log the results and play around with the percentages, see what it does for your bottom line. I think the results will surprise you!

Where do you spend your time and what results have you gotten? 

The Most Important Hour of Your Day

The alarm clock goes off interrupting a perfectly good dream. Time to wake up already? It feels like you just went to bed, what the heck? You’ve got a busy day so you get up anyway.

You sit on the edge of your bed thinking about everything you have to do and it makes you want to go back to sleep. You get ready and go downstairs. There’s no time for breakfast and you’ll grab some fast-food on the way to work.

While you’re eating your breakfast burrito when you have to stop suddenly in traffic and now the burrito is all over your lap. JUST GREAT!

You know how it goes; the day didn’t start well which means it can only go downhill. The rest of the day is filled with irritating people and situations. Why didn’t you just go back to bed?

Your morning may not have exactly gone like this but you know how it goes when you don’t get a good start to the day. Whether or not you realize it, how you spend that first hour of the day will affect the rest of your day. The first hour is vitally important.

I wrote a guest post for Michael Hyatt about this subject but I want to refresh what it said and hopefully this will help you plan a better first hour of your day. Here are a few tips for a good first hour:

What you should do

1. Start with a glass of water. Normally all we’re thinking about is what we have to do that day. What we fail to realize is that if we want to get things done we have to have energy and peak performance from our bodies. A glass of water right away in the morning kick-starts your body and flushes out toxins. It’s a small boost to your metabolism. It also fills your stomach and gives you energy!

2. Exercise if you can. The second best thing you can do for your body is get the blood flowing through exercise. There are so many benefits and many great articles that will tell you why. Exercise in the morning gives you energy. It teaches you discipline if you do it regularly. It will give you something to look forward to in the morning versus rolling out of bed. That quiet time where you can work out the stress, plan out the day, and meditate will do wonders for your day.

3. Stay away from email and social media. Tell me if this sounds familiar: You wake up, roll over, and get your phone. You start checking email and social media notifications. Is that how you start your day? You need your brain to wake up and having it jump all over the place right away isn’t good. There will be plenty of time during the day for email and social media. That time right away in the morning should be peaceful, quiet, and soothing. Bright lights and the craziness of the Internet isn’t soothing.

To have an even better start

There are two things you can do to make your first hour even better:

1. Get things prepared the night before. Right before you go to bed set yourself up for the next day. Get your clothes ready and put them in a spot where you can grab them in the morning and move. If you make your own lunch have it ready in the fridge. Do as much prep work as possible to eliminate a hectic morning routine.

2. Get enough sleep. You have to get a good amount of rest, you know this. What that amount is—that’s up to you. For the twelve years while I delivered bread I was waking up as early as nine p.m. and three a.m. at the latest. I would get between two to four hours of sleep. Do I need to tell you how rough the first hour of the day was for me? When I got home I wouldn’t make it if I didn’t take a nap. The problem was the nap would cut into whatever time I wanted to write, do activities with my family, or any projects I wanted to do. Your body needs enough sleep for you to function properly all day. It’s just not natural to not get enough sleep.

More than likely you have a day job and are chasing a dream on the side. If that’s the case you need as much energy and time as possible. You have to get home from work and hustle for your dream. You’ll never do that if you don’t have a good day.

This week be sure to start your day off right. Take it one day at a time and create habits that will help your dream become a reality.

How do you normally start your day?

Staying Productive With The Craziness of Life

She home school’s her kids, runs a daycare and still finds time to write 3,000 words a day! She’s self-published 11 books since November of 2012 despite the craziness of life.

Today I’m honored to sit down with author Stacy Claffin and find out how the heck she gets it all done. In this 24 minute interview you’ll learn:

How she finds time to write.
Her writing routine that’s helped her released 11 books in the last two years.
How she markets her books.
How she’s doing all of this without a huge online presence.
The tools she uses to self-publish.

Stacy has definitely inspired me to cut out the distractions and get more done! I know you took away some good nuggets from Stacy and I hope you’ll apply them to your writing and online building efforts. Stacy has written a killer post about turning pro as a writer and how to get more writing done, it’s a must read post.

How do you stay productive with the craziness of life? Are you good at tuning out the distractions? 

How To Build a Better Network For Your Online Business

When I started this business I wanted to make connections with the top people online. There was and still is a ton of advice out there about how to connect with the first-tier people in your topic.

You’re told to be persistent. You’re told you have to stand out and offer to help an A-Lister in some way. The only problem with that advice is everyone else is seeing the same advice and trying to do the same thing.

Think about how many emails an A-Lister gets a day? I’m not an A-Lister and I still average over 100 emails a day. They’re getting hundreds and a lot of those are people trying to connect with them.

Michael Hyatt just released a post that I think sums up how the first-tier is thinking . I’m not saying there’s something wrong with that approach, each of us has to decide what’s best for us. We have to spend our time the way we think is important to us.

What I am saying is that if your strategy is to try to get a top person in your industry to see your book, your product, or your service, and shout you out, it’s not a good strategy. It would bring a lot of exposure quickly but there’s a better way.

Does it happen? Once in a while but if you want this thing to support you there has to be a better strategy in place. If you read this blog, you know our goal is to be different from what everyone else does.

The Third Tier

Now I want to tell you upfront that this idea of the third tier isn’t mine. I first read about it from the guys at Fizzle. I’m telling you about it because it’s a killer idea.

The idea is instead of focusing on trying to get the attention of someone in the first tier, connect and make real relationships with someone in the third tier.

Think about Dave Ramsey, Michael Hyatt, and Dan Miller. They have been friends for over 20 years. They started out together and have helped promote each other throughout all these years.

They started in the third tier and built their own network throughout the years. I don’t know if they tried to reach out to any A-Listers back then, I do know their network is very strong now.

If you’re reading this blog you and I and others have the opportunity to create a network just like theirs. Now I know what some of you might be thinking: What is he going to sell us?

I have nothing to sell you. Thinking about this opportunity has had my brain hurting. We have SO much potential. If you can connect with other bloggers and people online in your industry and form a relationship that’s all about helping each, the sky’s the limit!

Reach out to those in your network, make real connections, and grow your online presence together. Even though you don’t have a huge network and they don’t have a huge network your combined networks can grow together.

What does this look like? Communicate, email a bunch of people who have a similar message to yours, and get to know each other. Ask them what they’re working on and see if you can help them promote that thing.

You can even form a mastermind group. I’m involved in an amazing mastermind group. I’ve learned so much and we’ve helped each other build our networks together. You can do the same with those speaking to your target audience.

When you come from a place of service you’ll reap huge rewards. Talk about that person and eventually a group of people on your website and on social media. They’ll talk about and promote you and that’s how you’ll grow.

A lot of us are here spreading a message of hope, let’s help each other out.  Are you willing to help build a strong network together? 

Stop Pricing Your Book At .99 Cents

I remember the first time I fell in love with books. It was magical. On the earliest birthday I can remember my grandfather gave me a book as my gift  I was five I think. He gave my brother and I books for every birthday from three years old until we were sixteen.

I would read those books and be transported to a magical place. When I was a teenager, I started reading those Readers Digest short story books.  Do you remember those? They would take a snippet of a novel and have about five snippets in one volume.

I read about ten of those Readers Digest short stories and it solidified my love of books. I knew one day I would be a writer. That day came in 2011 when I decided to stop listening to my doubts and fears, stop listening to the negative voices of others, and put my book out there to the world.

I self-published Tales of the Everyday Working Man and Woman in August of 2011. It was a dream come true. When I was setting everything up one thing I studied was how to price my book.

I read what all the big self-published authors had to say about pricing. Most of the advice said there are millions of books out there and if you wanted your book to sell you should price it at .99 cents and go for bulk buys.

I did that. I priced the book at .99 cents and thought I was good. The book didn’t sell and it wasn’t just because of the price. When the book did start selling I had a chance to play around with pricing.

I priced the book between .99 cents and $9.97. These were my personal results. What I should tell you upfront is to test your own pricing and see what gets you the best results.  You should always test things out for yourself.

After a lot of testing the book is now priced at $4.97 and sells about 50 copies a month. To be honest, I’ve kind of neglected the book since the release of my first published book. 

Why you shouldn’t price your book at .99 cents 

The point of this post is that a book has tremendous value and I firmly believe you shouldn’t price your book at .99 cents unless it’s a highly targeted promotion and you’re trying to get specific results.

First, let me bring up something related to pricing. When I was at Brendon Burchard’s Expert’s Academy he brought up a seven-year study Walmart did on pricing. What they found is anything ending in the number 7  people bought like crazy.

When Walmart wants to blow something out they’ll stick it on an end cap and the price will end in seven. This study and other marketing strategies are covered in one of the best marketing books ever written: Blue Ocean Strategy.

If you look at anything on my website for sale it all ends in seven for that very reason. From my limited testing I’ve found the seven thing to be true. Again, test it out for yourself. Back to the discussion.

We assume our book should be priced based off of how long the book is: wrong, wrong, wrong! Your book should be priced based off the value it provides.

I’ll give you an example. My friend Abbie has a book that teaches those who want to be flight attendants how to get jobs. The book is about 31 pages. What we’re normally told is that since the book is short, it should be .99 cents.

That little book has helped 47 people land a job as flight attendants. Think about that, a $10 book that helps someone land a career job where they get to fly around the world? Would it make sense to price something with that much value at .99 cents? NO, NO, NO!

Whatever your book is  I’m sure it offers value that will help someone far beyond the price.  I would dare even say books should be priced even higher than they are now. You don’t want to be the Walmart of the book world, selling in bulk.

Instead you want to be mid-tier or high-end. That should be our goal: to provide high-end value to our audience. We have to eliminate old school thinking about book size. We’re in a new day and age from the old school book world.

Get feedback from your audience, see what they’re saying about the value of the book, and use that feedback to determine how to price. Price it higher and focus on building a solid foundation, not just getting quick sales.

What is your book priced at and how did you come up with that number? 

Stop Copying The A-Listers

When I started to build my online business, I studied every piece of material out there about online business. As you know, there’s no shortage of it. It’s a blessing and a curse. We can learn what it takes but there’s the danger of information overload.

For two years I tried every idea that I read that would work. I even looked at the A-listers in our industry and tried to copy what they were doing. To be completely honest all of this only yielded me a small amount of success.

I know exactly what someone thinks when they start off building this kind of business. You want to see success and results. Since others are already seeing that success it’s natural to want to do what they do.

The problem

The problem with trying to do exactly what they’re doing is that they’re already established. They’ve already built their platform and probably built it in a time with less competition or they were the first to market.

Let me give you an example: Entrepreneur On Fire. EO Fire is a seven-day-a-week podcast by my friend John Lee Dumas. When he started the podcast he had two big advantages: no one was doing a seven-day-a-week podcast and he had connections because he hired Jamie Tardy as his coach.

He was first to the market with that kind of podcast and his coach knows everyone in the industry. He was able to land some amazing interviews right away. It was fresh, it was original, and it took off.

There are many now that are using the same formula but unless they make one big tweak, they won’t get the same results. They can’t copy him exactly and expect to get the same results.

For us who are building platforms now things have to be different. We can’t look at where they’re at now. We have to look at where they were back then when they were in building mode. Research all aspects of their platform, then and now, and make this tweak.

The Tweak

You can look at what the A-listers are doing and learn but there has to be a twist: you have to infuse you in what you’re building. If you want to start a seven-day-a-week podcast that’s cool but how will you make it different and uniquely you?

John’s podcast is popular because he was first to the market but also because he has an amazing personality. People really like him and his message. People follow you because they like you. They want more of what you’re doing and the way you do it. Give it to them.

Use strategies that work but make them your own. Steve Jobs said he didn’t want to be better, he wanted to be different. That should be your goal online too.

There are over 900 million websites, 250 millions blogs, and 175,000 blogs being added every day. There are many websites that talk about your topic. If you’re going to make it in this world and build something that supports your family, you have to stand out.

You can do that by picking a specific target audience, figuring out what some of the pains are that they’re struggling with, and create content that helps them. Infuse your personality and what makes you uniquely you.

There are too many carbon copies of the A-Listers, websites that look exactly like the popular ones. It’s a terrible strategy to making it online. Make that tweak, be real and be you. The results will follow as you serve.

How are you making your online presence different? 

P.S. If you’ve read my book Are You Living or Existing? can you head to Amazon and leave review? Thank you SO much!