Becky Robinson's Blog, page 33

Three New Websites to Inspire Your Leadership Journey

It has been an exciting few months for the Web Team at Weaving Influence. From sparkles and innovative service, to Millennials and Sawubona, to great questions and meaningful conversations, the websites are as different as the business leaders that we had the privilege to work with.

We are pleased to share with you our three latest sites: ChipBell.com, SusanInouye.com, LeadingwithQuestions.com.

CHIP BELL

Dr. Chip R. Bell is a customer service keynote speaker and world-renowned authority on customer loyalty and service innovation. His highly popular keynotes reveal the best practices from the successful organizations leading the customer loyalty charge, giving audiences powerful cutting-edge ideas and unique strategies they can put into practice the minute they leave. For four of the last five years, Global Gurus ranked him in the top three best speakers in the world on customer service–two years in the top slot.

Dr. Bell has authored numerous national best-selling books, appeared live on many nationally know channels, and written more than 700 columns for many business journals, magazines, and top blogs. In addition, his training programs have won numerous awards. He is a speaker that meeting planners call awe-inspiring!

CHIPBELL.COM

This is a website that truly sparkles and beautifully showcases Chip Bell’s unique approach to customer service, creating those unexpected, simple but inventive ways to take a customers’ breath away! This bold website provides the tools, tips and techniques for leading and delivering innovative service that sparkles.

Explore the blog for weekly wisdom on innovative service.
Learn more about Chip’s profoundly remarkable speaking engagements that actually inspire and instruct the audience.
Browse numerous award winning and bestselling books .

SUSAN INOUYE

Susan’s proven track record in transformational change over the past two decades has positively impacted the personal experience and bottom-line results for leaders of over 600 companies in forty industries. She is a recognized expert in working with millennials; and she has helped executives and managers increase levels of creativity and productivity by understanding and knowing how to engage and motivate this generation of unique talents.

Susan is deeply commitmented to community, and has raised funds and actively supports the work of many not-for-profit organizations. Her congressperson presented Susan with the Congressional Award for her outstanding participation and contribution to the community and her unselfish and untiring devotion for a better society. Coaching is the ultimate expression of Susan’s purpose in life. This passion for her work brings an integrity that helps unite communities and make the world a better place.

SOUSANINOUYE.COM

In a fast-paced world, where what’s new today is outdated tomorrow, companies stay ahead of the curve not by being on the cutting edge but by redefining the edge. Great leaders know they can’t do it alone. This website encourages leaders to discover the talents of a new generation of employees on a journey to solve the challenges of the twenty-first century.

Explore Sawubona Leadership and Susan’s simple yet profoundly impactful way of engaging others.
Inspire and motivate your group with the tools, strategies, and practices found here .
Learn more about Susan Inouye’s new book, Leadership’s Perfect Storm .

BOB TIEDE

Bob Tiede is passionate about helping leaders shift their paradigm from the pressure of having to have all the right answers to simply having a few of the right questions. He has been on the staff of Cru for 47 years, and currently serves on the U.S. Leadership Development Team.

The ideas in Leading With Questions, by Michael Marquart, changed forever how he looked at leadership, and provided the vision for this website.

LEADINGWITHQUESTIONS.COM

On Leading With Questions, you are invited to join the growing league of leaders who are shifting their focus from having all the answers to asking the right questions.

The blog is a collection of wisdom from leaders around the globe.
Enjoy a selection of podcasts & interviews that will help you take your leadership journey to the next level.
Increase your leadership effectiveness with these resources .

A website is only a small glimpse into the lives of these amazing and inspiring business leaders. We encourage you to continue exploring these sites and the unique approaches that each of these individuals has taken to leading in the ever-changing world.

Interested in a new website for your own book or business? Contact the WI web team web@weavinginfluence.com.

How to Stand Out from the Crowd

Black Friday and Cyber Monday are just around the corner and marketers everywhere are making last-minute adjustments to their holiday campaigns, attempting to grab the attention of their preferred audience and garner the sales that they need to end the year in the black.

Whether we’re trying to grow our online platforms, market our speaking availability, or sell a record number of books, we all know that if we don’t hit just the right tone, we’ll miss our target. But how do we hit the bullseye when there is so much competition in the world?

What Makes You Unique?

The first thing to accept is that people have a choice about who to follow and what to buy, so if you want to be the standout, you need to present your offering in a way that makes people think they are missing out if they DON’T buy what you’re selling. If they have a choice, then you have to give them a reason to choose you over everyone else.

Start by answering these five questions, and then ask your friends, family, colleagues, and clients the same questions and compare answers:

What makes me/my book/speaking subject unique?
Why should people listen to me over another expert?
Who would benefit the most from what I have to share?
How can my book/talk/service help people change the status quo?
What makes me so excited I could think/talk/write about it for hours?

Capitalize on It

Once you have an idea of what makes you stand out from the crowd, then you need to capitalize on it. Keep in mind that it may have absolutely nothing to do with what you’re trying to sell, but it could be the key to finding that connection point with your audience.

Here are three examples that might help trigger something for you:

Do you have a sense of humor that helps you communicate and connect with your audience? Let that shine through in your social posts. Share the meme that made you snort this morning — people like to know you’re human, too.
Do you have a secret hobby that might surprise people — performing magic or doing imitations? Post a video of you doing something completely out of the ordinary from what folks might expect to see.
Did you just read an amazing book that really impressed you? Talk about it! Contact the author and ask them if they would like to be a guest on your blog or podcast. Don’t be afraid of promoting your competition from time to time — there’s room for everyone, and it shows that you’re not afraid to share the stage with others.

There is a quote that you’ve probably heard before, often attributed to Oscar Wilde, which says, “Be yourself, everyone else is already taken.” When it comes to figuring out your online persona and sales tactics, this is good advice to keep in mind. People who follow you on Facebook or Instagram want to know that the person they see on your accounts is a real person, someone they can identify with and connect to. Your platform will grow more authentically when you, yourself, are authentic in what you share, say, and do.

Only when what you have to say genuinely makes a noticeable difference in their lives, will people begin to choose and recommend you over others.

So, want to know the answer for how to stand out from the crowd? Be Yourself!

5 Reasons You Should Consider Unplugging from Social Media

I’ve been on Facebook since 2007 and personally blogging since 2010, but the first time I heard the term “unplugging” was just a few weeks after I began working with Weaving Influence in 2012. I had been involved in the launch of Whitney Johnson’s first book, Dare, Dream, Do, and when she decided to pause her online presence while on a post-launch break, she requested that I create an image that would represent her “unplugged” status. She even wrote a blog post about it before taking off.

I was intrigued with the whole idea of voicing your online pause to the world. At the time, I was blogging five days a week and struggling to find an active audience. Wouldn’t people stop visiting my blog or social accounts if they didn’t hear from me daily? Based on Whitney’s continued success (three books and a thriving speaking career), it’s obvious that her choice to unplug in no way affected the building of her platform. In fact, it probably helped, because her audience saw her practicing what she preached — temporarily stepping away in order to give herself space to dream.

Keeping Whitney’s unplugged idea in mind, I would occasionally use a version of the unplugged image on my blog and social sites when I felt like I needed a break from the drama that (far too often) ensued as a result of a mistimed comment or thoughtless response — mine or other’s. When the drama became too much, I made a conscious decision to go “unplugged” for everything outside of work, and for the majority of 2014 I flew under the radar on Facebook. I stopped posting, stopped commenting, and even removed all of my photos. Here’s what I learned as a result of that time.

5 Things I Learned from Going Unplugged

If you leave and then come back (as I did), people will still be there. I didn’t lose friends, and I didn’t lose followers. They were all there, ready to engage, and completely understanding of my need for a break.
Commenting is not a requirement. During my year under the radar, I learned how to read friend’s posts and move on, realizing that my quickly typed opinion wasn’t the best way for me to influence anyone, and could even turn them off from ever listening to me.
Taking a step back provided clarity. Being unplugged gave me a better sense of what I wanted to share, and how I wanted to use my platform when I returned. I began to use my private account to log what #iamthankful for, and my professional pages to share things that are relevant to my various endeavours and interests. (For more on balancing private vs. professional, read this.)
No one expects an explanation. I used to feel guilty when I didn’t show up, like I was letting people down if I wasn’t around. As my vision for how I wanted to use my platform changed, I realized that everyone is so busy, they really aren’t paying attention when I choose to unplug.
Don’t be a slave to the schedule. Professionally, I am all for having a plan in place, especially for those times when you are feeling uninspired, but there’s room to be flexible. I have personally found that I get far more engagement when I share something that’s exciting me in the moment (even if it’s not the ideal posting time or day), rather than blogging or sharing because it’s on the calendar.

It took me a few years, but I have finally grasped what Whitney understood when she originally unplugged: platform isn’t built because of how often you show up, but what you bring to it when you do. My own experience has taught me that making a plan to unplug is healthy, because engaging in the real world on a regular basis fills me up and provides me with more to share when I show up online.

The holidays are coming — why not give it a try this year? Feel free to use the images below on your social accounts, and let people know that you’re stepping away to recharge and come back to them with even more to share.

Right-click and ‘Save As’ then share on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram!

How to Balance Public and Private Social Media

Social media has become a way of life — how we get our news, stay in touch with Grandma, and find fun things to do. When it also becomes a tool to market our personal brands, the line between personal and professional can become very blurry.

We don’t believe there must be a line — at least not everywhere.

Successful personal brands are just that: personal. People want to feel that they are making an authentic connection, even if you are trying to sell them a book or course. You make it feel authentic by being authentic. Sharing who you are, what your life is like, in addition to promoting your thought leadership. However, that does not mean sharing your vacation photos with strangers.

Here’s the approach we recommend

Keep the platform you use to connect with family and close friends private. This is where you let your hair down and roll out those vacation pics. For many people, Facebook is the real-life relationship platform. You can occasionally share your work here, but this is where you are primarily connecting with the people who mean the most to you.

If Facebook is your family place, you can create a public Facebook page to connect with readers and fans. This page is where you share your thought leadership, with occasional glimpses of other aspects of your life. It’s authentic because it’s you, with content shaped and directed by your thought leadership. For example, say you snap a cute photo of a squirrel in your bird feeder. It’s content you can share with your friends and family with a personal message, then share it on your page with a message referencing your thought leadership. You give your readers a glimpse of your life and personality, without getting into anything too private.

Instagram is another platform where you can keep two accounts, so your private life is private and your public brand has a rich and interesting outlet. Some of the content will overlap, but the messaging should be written with the specific audience in mind — friends or fans.

We recommend keeping both Twitter and LinkedIn brand-focused, while still showing personality. No need to have private and public accounts on these platforms. They are both very much public spaces.

Here are some ways you can balance your public and private social media.

Share something about your children or grandchildren without sharing names or their photos.
Share about your travels without revealing exact location.
Reveal who you are by sharing memes, articles, videos, and your thoughts on them.
Ask friends and family to support your work when you have a new project, but don’t make your personal posts ‘asks’ all the time.

When in doubt, follow Brené Brown on social. She does a great job of being personal and authentic, but keeping a definition between her public and private life… and you can, too!

How to Save Time & Energy with a Content Library

Generating quality, engaging content is taxing. We’re often racing against the clock, strapped with deadlines, or simply lacking creative energy. But in the world of digital marketing, keeping your personal or company’s online persona ever-present is imperative.

The first step to saving time and energy with content marketing is to create a content library — an organized list of topics you’ve covered and blogs/articles you’ve written. You can re-purpose legacy content into something fresh and imaginative to share. Content library creation is divided into three key steps: capture, organize, and re-purpose.

But if you’ve been blogging for years, capturing this content can take hours! Well, our team has created a tool called the Content Library Automator. The tool will generate a Google Spreadsheet containing an organized catalog of every blog post from your WordPress blog, including title, author, category, and link. You can easily sort this information to quickly get a snapshot of the breadth of content you’ve created. The tool also creates five templated social media posts for each blog post to highlight your archived content and quarterly updates to your library.

From there, you can sort the spreadsheet according to key themes you’ve written about, easily find posts on relevant topics, and reshape your content into new media articles, videos, graphics, and more. If you are looking for content for a new ebook, ideas for an upcoming newsletter, or topics for a keynote or webinar – your content library will store all the inspiration you need.

Streamline your efforts by effectively repurposing the valuable content you’ve already created.

Here are 3 ways a content library will benefit you:

You’ll use your marketing time to creatively infuse new life into your previously created content.
You’ll expose your audience to content with a fresh spin that’s been virtually hidden in your blog archives.
You’ll be inspired to explore sharing content through new social media features, like IG TV or Facebook live.

Are you making the most of your legacy blogs and articles? Explore the Content Library Automator to jumpstart your legacy content into new, innovative resources for your audience.

4 Benefits of Using an Editorial Calendar in Social Media

Think about some of your favorite social media accounts or top influencers to follow…what about their presence intrigues you? I’d imagine that their message is the priority, followed closely by the seemingly effortless way they share relevant, meaningful content at every turn!

Here’s the secret: This doesn’t occur by happenstance. Successful social media users have a method to their madness, which involves a well-thought-out plan for consistently showing up online every day. If you are eager to make social media a priority, exploring an editorial calendar is a great tool to build your presence.

An editorial calendar is a digital sheet (such as a Google Sheet) where you identify the dates to post, which social media channels to utilize, and outline the copy for each post.

Below are four ways that an editorial calendar can maximize your digital presence:

Plan ahead to avoid missteps.

After a long day (or week) of answering phone calls, shuffling to meetings, and thumbing through emails, you realize that you haven’t invested any time on social media. To counteract this, you quickly pop in to respond to comments and mentions. Social media isn’t a purely reactive effort – you need to be proactive. And, that starts with planning content 2-3 weeks in advance. You can still incorporate creativity for “real-time” posts but planning ahead ensures you don’t miss a beat in regular posting.

Create consistency across your channels.

Although posting the same content on each social platform is frowned upon, you DO want to create the same tone in branding across your social media. An editorial calendar allows you to compare each channel in the same spreadsheet. You’ll be able to evaluate if your messaging is consistent across each platform.

Identify common themes and content for repurposing.

In an editorial calendar spreadsheet, you have an organized reference point of past posts and a log of evergreen content. You can take planning a step further by identifying what themes are present in the content you’re sharing and brainstorming approaches to reuse them. Start asking yourself – Can this topic be explored further? How can I repurpose some of my content into new innovative approaches? What content is resonating well with my audience?

Team members can post in your absence.

Using an editorial calendar can give you margin to breathe in times of travel, unforeseen personal matters, vacation, and so on. You can rest at ease knowing that your online voice is remaining consistent because you made the effort to plan ahead.

Aren’t sure what to include in an editorial calendar or how to start one? Explore our Content Library Automator tool to jumpstart your planning.

Clarity First: How to Achieve Outstanding Performance

Realizing the myriad benefits that come with organizational clarity requires that leaders be 100 percent clear on the most important, foundational question: what is their organization’s purpose? Organizations that take the time to ensure team members have a strong connection to purpose, create enthusiastic brand ambassadors who are deeply committed to helping the organization succeed.

This week, we’re honored to launch a book by award-winning author Karen Martin that provides methods and insights for achieving clarity to unleash potential, innovate at higher levels, and solve the problems that matter to deliver outstanding business results.

Clarity First

Lack of clarity collectively costs companies, educational institutions, government agencies, and nongovernmental organizations billions of dollars per year. Ambiguity is the corporate default state, a condition so prevalent that “tolerance for ambiguity” has become a clichéd job requirement. But it doesn’t have to be that way.

Clarity First provides methods and insights for achieving clarity to unleash potential, innovate at higher levels, and solve the problems that matter to deliver outstanding business results. Both a visionary road map and practical guide, this book will help leaders:

Identify and communicate the organization’s true purpose
Set achievable priorities
Deliver greater customer value through more efficient processes
Provide greater transparency about true versus assumed performance
Build strong problem-solving and critical thinking capabilities throughout the organization
Develop personal clarity to be a more direct, purposeful, and successful leader.

Drawing on the author’s work with thousands of leaders, this book identifies 5 specific areas of focus that dramatically improve organizational performance — purpose, priorities, process, performance, and problem-solving. It enables leaders to eliminate ambiguity, the first step for achieving strategic goals, and gain the clarity needed to make better decisions, lead more effectively, and boost organizational performance.

In today’s rapidly changing business environments clarity has never been more important and yet more overlooked.  Business conditions may be volatile, uncertain, and complex, but leaders can confront those realities more effectively when their strategy is focused on Clarity First.

Meet the Author

Karen Martin, president of the global consulting firm TKMG, Inc., is a leading authority on business performance and lean management. Known for her keen diagnostic skills and rapid-results approach, Karen and her team have worked with dozens of international clients to develop more efficient work systems, grow market share, solve business problems, and accelerate performance. A skilled change agent, Karen builds energy within work teams by helping them focus an organization’s key performance goals—faster delivery of higher quality products and services at lower cost—while simultaneously building organization-wide problem-solving capabilities and boosting employee engagement.

As a thought leader and skilled teacher, Karen has shaped how leaders and improvement professionals approach business performance in over 45 countries. She informs her audiences with insights on how best to improve organizational performance and inspires them to create work environments that enable the entire workforce to excel. Audiences leave Karen’s sessions armed with practical how-to’s and motivated to carry out the urgent missions that Karen lays forth.

Karen’s broad understanding of work system design and business management stems from her experience building and managing operations for several rapid-growth organizations that each grew into multi-billion-dollar companies. She developed a keen understanding of customer value while serving in sales and marketing roles, and has extensive experience mitigating legal and compliance constraints. While she has worked with clients in nearly every sector, her healthcare-rich background includes clinical, administrative, and regulatory work in hospitals, post-acute care settings, payer services, medical research, clinical laboratories, physician practices, integrative medicine and behavioral healthcare.

Praise from Readers Like You

“Karen Martin has written a wonderful “tough love” guide for leaders to systematically clear away chaos and confusion and bring their organizations to operational excellence. She bravely discusses the feelings involved in this kind of work. The feeling that prevents people from seeking clarity – fear – and the feelings that grab your heart – excitement and pride in serving others. She’s even got a great addendum on how to meditate. Such a refreshing voice in a field that often lacks passion.”

— E. Swan, 5-star Amazon review

“The book is filled with a good mix of practical examples as well as as well as concepts that can be easily implemented. I liked that the examples come from in and out of business. You will find that the book is a powerful book that offers extensive insight into how you can change your own processes. The other thing that is important with this is that the ideas presented are ones that can be used in many different industries, which makes this very versatile. “

— Dad of Divas, 5-star Amazon review

“The author of this book gave some great ideas and examples, which made it very understandable and clear. It’s a well-researched and principled look at how to make the message clear and concise.”

— Jane Rosenthal, 5-star Amazon review

Learn More

Visit the website to learn more and download a free chapter.
Buy a copy of the book, or leave a short review of it, on Amazon.
Take the free quiz to discover how you (or your organization) rate.

How to Maximize Your Content for a Stronger Platform

Although necessary, we know that the idea of creating a library of promotional content can quickly become overwhelming, which is why today we’re talking about ways to work smarter, not harder. Whether you have a website with a blog (our best practice), a page on Facebook, an active Instagram feed, or you regularly post articles on LinkedIn, you should view everything you write or create as a part of a greater content library, for use across multiple platforms.

Did you write something on Facebook that struck a nerve? Work it into a longer post for your blog or LinkedIn article. Did you create a popular image on Instagram? Share it on Facebook and again on Twitter (tools like Pablo allow you to turn one image into the correct size for all three sites). Writing a 600 word blog post does more than just populate your blog, it also gives you ready-made content for Facebook shares, tweets, Instagram images, and even LinkedIn content.

Work Smarter, Not Harder

Let’s use this post as an example of how to get more content out of just one writing session. If this were your post, you might send out a tweet (or one could automatically go out using a tool like dlvr.it) that would say, “New Post! Taking Stock of Your Content” with the associated URL. That’s great, but if you want to get the most out of your work, you should take about 5 minutes and go through your post, creating tweets for your content library that would look something like this:

Look at everything you write or create as a part of a greater content library, for use across multiple channels. #SocialTips https://bit.ly/2QK652g
When you write a post, you’ve done more than just populate your blog, you’ve created content for Facebook shares, tweets, and Instagram images. https://bit.ly/2QK652g
Work smarter, not harder. Today’s post contains #SocialMediaTips on how to get the most out of your writing → https://bit.ly/2QK652g

Those took two minutes to create, and everything was pulled directly from the opening paragraphs of this blog post, with a few tweaks. One blog post = three instant tweets to share.

Now take the last tweet and, using a program like Canva, turn it into an image for Instagram that can also be shared on Facebook and used in the blog post. Or take this same post, trim it down to one idea, about 250 words, and use it as a new LinkedIn article that helps drive people back to the site. Don’t have time to write a new post? Use one from the archives and draft it back into service on all new channels. The possibilities are endless!

There’s one last thing to keep in mind when you’re reworking content. If you want clicks through to your blog or website, you must ensure you’re not only offering value in your original post, but also in your social media promotion. In the example tweets, people get an instant, useful takeaway that makes them want to click through to learn more — and that’s the key to being a platform builder.

Get the click. Land the new view. Score a share or retweet. Grow your audience. Build your platform — one post at a time.

What Are Your Blind Spots? Conquering Leadership Misconceptions

Many leaders are using outdated practices to engage and motivate their people — and they’re failing miserably! They are hindered by blind spots in various areas, unable to see the best way to lead their people and run their organizations. Are you one of them?

This week, we’re excited to launch a book that will help you uncover your blind spots and reset your leadership approach for long-lasting success in any business. It offers a proven framework for increasing organizational innovation, productivity, and creativity to help people find real purpose in their work.

What Are Your Blind Spots?

Far too many business leaders today are using outdated practices to engage and motivate their people — and they’re failing miserably. Truly resilient, thriving organizations are those that are purpose driven and focus on more than pure profits. Purpose, or an underlying company philosophy, not only drives strategic change, but also encourages customer loyalty and employee engagement. In order to succeed, leaders must be willing to discard old ways of thinking and detrimental business habits — and recognize their blind spots.

Authors Jim Haudan and Rich Berens identify the five most common leadership blind spots that hamper success: Purpose, Story, Engagement, Trust, and Truth. They take you straight into the boardroom of well-known leadership teams to illustrate how these blind spots play out and the impact they have on organizations. You’ll learn how to identify and overcome your own blind spots and embrace positive, forward-thinking new practices.

What Are Your Blind Spots? equips you with the tools needed for a personal leadership reset. You’ll discover how to increase engagement, productivity, and growth in your own organization. This is an invaluable guide for executives, managers, team leaders, and human resource professionals looking for an effective way to engage and motivate employees at every level of an organization.

Meet the Authors

Jim Haudan is Co-Founder and Chairman of Root Inc., a best-selling author, and a sought-after business presenter. For more than 20 years, he has been helping organizations unleash hidden potential by fully engaging their people to deliver on the strategies of the business. With his background as a coach, it’s not a stretch that the company Jim co-founded focuses on tapping employees’ discretionary efforts — the kind that produces winning results.

As an organizational change expert, Jim believes that business results don’t come from creating a great strategy, but by meaningfully connecting it to all of the people in the company to bring it to life. He helps companies create leadership alignment, execute strategies and change successfully, build employee engagement, and transform businesses. He is a sought-after business presenter who has spoken at TEDx BGSU, Tampa TEDx, and The Conference Board events.

Rich Berens is CEO and Chief Client Fanatic of Root Inc., and a noted speaker on the issues of strategy and change. For over 10 years, Rich has had the opportunity to lead Root and its artists, designers, researchers, programmers, and MBAs in creating breakthrough approaches to change that have reached millions of people around the world. Under his leadership, Root has been listed among the Great Place to Work® Institute’s top 25 places to work, named to the Inc. 5000 fastest-growing companies list, and experienced 10 years of consecutive growth.

Rich is a frequent author, thought leader, and speaker on the subject of leadership, transformation, and how to create lasting change. He has personally worked with dozens of Global 2000 organizations, including Hilton, Verizon, Masco, Petco, Procter & Gamble, Daimler, and many others to help align leaders and drive strategic and cultural change at scale. He has also authored articles for numerous publications and blogs.

Praise from Readers Like You

“This book is brief and accessible for all readers who are eager to improve their effectiveness in leadership and performance. . . . [it] brings about awareness and insights and also can inspire simple changes that will be impactful to organizations.”

— Craig Stephans, 5-star Amazon review

“This book does a great job helping you see how you can identify and improve on them. Recommend for anyone at any level of leadership as it is never to early to start working on being a better you for your team. “

— Amy Dru, 5-star Amazon review

“The book is full of not only ideas but excellent examples of each blind spot in businesses the authors had worked with. The assessment and recap in the final chapter alone are worth the price of the book.”

— David Hackler, 5-star Amazon review

“The only people who won’t find something helpful here are those who don’t think they have any blind spots.”

— Joe Graham, 5-star Amazon review

Learn More

Visit the website to learn more and download a free chapter.
Buy a copy of the book, or leave a short review of it, on Amazon.
Watch the recent webinar to learn more from Jim and Rich.

How Do You Build A Platform, Anyway?

I’ve always bristled at the idea of a platform because the word invokes the idea of a person set-apart, on a stage — a sage with an audience of listeners, separated, even artificially. A platform is something that you earn or something that is gifted to you. You have a job that gives you the platform, or you’re invited to speak on someone else’s stage. A platform just IS; when you have one, you know it. If you don’t have one, you can’t manufacture it. If you have one, you must use it carefully and intentionally.

What if you don’t have a platform? Can you build it?

Forget a Platform – Build a Community

Authors, or aspiring authors, come to me and my company with the request that we help them build a platform, because their publisher requires a platform of a certain size or their agent told them they’ll need a platform before submitting book proposals. They are defining platform as connections, and they want to make as many as possible, quickly, so they can reach that bigger goal. So they have a platform. So they’ll get a book deal.

As far as building connections goes, I give people the same advice. I tell people that it’s a good idea to make as many connections as they can, as soon as they can, and I stand by that advice —  as long as people realize that your ability to influence others cannot be quantified solely by the number of connections you have. The quality of those connections and each individual’s interest in you and willingness to listen to or engage with you matters.

If you want to have positive influence in the world, you need to be connected to a growing community of people who are interested in listening to you .

The more people who want to listen to you, the more likely you are to make the positive difference you’d like to make. Why would people want to listen to you? How can you get more people to want to listen to you?

If people perceive that you have value to share, they will listen to you.

The most important step in building a growing community of people who want to listen to you is to share value. Keep sharing value. Connect authentically with people as you share value. Be a real person they can identify with as you share value. Keep sharing value. Keep connecting. Keep sharing value. Put this process on repeat.

Start doing this as soon as you know you want to make a difference in the world, and don’t stop ever. At some point, if your message resonates with enough people, you may realize you have a platform. When you have a platform, use it wisely. Care for the people listening to you by sharing as much value as you can.