Well doesn’t that feel like a totally yawnsome title for an article 😴 I pinky swear it isn’t.  We are going to be looking at 4 elements of your business that might just need your time, effort, energy & attention right now AND they are the elements that you need to have top of mind on an ongoing basis.  

Let’s dive in….

This is all about getting the right people around your business.  The people that LOVE 😍what you do and the people that are truly invested in hearing from you.  

Your initial thoughts here might be about getting more likes on your Facebook Page or followers on Instagram but the reality is that it’s much more than that.   Yes, the amount of people around you is a consideration but looking after those people is ridiculously important too.  

Let’s look at some of the practical things you can think about when it comes to this one….

CLARITY 

I’m not going to go all “Ideal Client” on your ass here.  Ideal client is one that I find keeps so many people super stuck.  I’ve done a little video about my take on Ideal Client here….

So it terms of Ideal Client I think that it’s so much easier for you to have a muse over what your audience has in common rather the specificity that is so often encouraged.

Then there’s a couple of extra things to muse over;

➡️ What problem do you solve?

➡️ What’s the impact of the work you do?

➡️What lights you up?

Instead of being on the constant quest and second guessing what your crowd need to hear from you instead switch it, based on the answers to the questions above what do you want to share with them.  What would you like them to know?  What are your frustrations about your industry and how do you wanna create impact with your crowd?

In terms of crowd building;

1️⃣Are you inviting the people who interact with your Facebook Posts to like your Facebook Page?

2️⃣ Is it easy for people to get in touch with you and sign up to your mailing list?

3️⃣ Can you cross pollinate your platforms i.e. encourage your Facebook followers to follow you on Instagram etc.

4️⃣ How can you get in front of other people’s audiences and leverage that to create new followers?

5️⃣ Have you considered an advertising campaign to attract more people to your audience

6️⃣ On appropriate platforms are you using hashtags to help you get found

7️⃣ have you considered the key words and phrases on your website so that the search engines are finding you

If any of these feel like I’m talking a totally different language then don’t hesitate to dive into the comments and ask more, there’s no such thing as a silly question OR drop me an email.

Let’s go on to serving the pants off your audience…

➡️  Show the fuck up!!  You can’t expect people to be connected with you if you’re not willing to create that connection.  Where are you?  Share your message in different ways.  Be relatable, be real. The little mantra I use is “real, raw & nothing more.” 

➡️ Make it easy for them.  Is it easy to find out who you are?  Is it easy to find out what you’re all about?  Is it easy to connect with you? 

➡️ Sorry worrying so much about “how much you give away.”  The magic is in the direct impact it has on the individual and the ability to actually action it and make it relatable to them.  You don’t have to give away the farm but you do need to give them a tour of the stables.  

➡️ Show them “what next.”  So often people read stuff or get involved with things and they love it but they don’t know what to do next, where to go next or even what they can purchase (more of that in the sales stuff). 

➡️  Keep in touch, whether that’s replying to comments, getting involved in conversations or sending emails – keep in touch (we will talk about that more engagement too) 

➡️  Be consistent.  Consistency isn’t about frequency and it’s not about set times and days.  It’s about lots of elements including look & feel, messaging, language, content types, visuals/colours/fonts/imagery, tone and so much more.  

➡️  meet them where they are! This might be about thinking about which platforms they are on, their habits and behaviours (for example are your crowd more likely to be on mobile or desktop?  Are they likely to be around more or less on an evening?  Are they likely to change their habits and their expectations from social media on a weekend <<  This stuff is gold for your strategy).  

Now, let’s move on….

Email marketing is dead 🙄 People don’t open or act on emails anymore 🙄 People have millions of emails sat in their inbox 🙄.  Let’s get this straight.  People don’t open or act on SHIT 💩 emails. 

Moral of the story?  Make sure your email isn’t shit 💩 (I have another article about that – shout up if you want a read).  

It’s still important to collect your crowds email addresses.  It’s still important for you to be able to drop into their inbox and offer them support and lots of value.  

Let’s just hit the boring 😴 bit quickly for a moment.  Make sure you are complying with the direct marketing and data protection legislation for the country you are in.  Make sure you are using a email marketing provider.  In the UK you need to be registered as a Data Controller to comply with GDPR legislation, people must be able to unsubscribe (mailing software will be able to deal with this) and you must keep people’s data safe.  

Anyhaps, back to the good stuff.  

Building your mailing list in important,  Here’s some things that you might just be missing to build that list; 

1️⃣ some people get so caught up in having a free resource that they forget to simply invite people to be part of their subscriber community to receive their awesome email each week. 

2️⃣ If you have a freebie it needs marketing bandwidth.  You need to be talking about it.  You need to tell people the benefits of it and you need to be directing people to sign up to it.  Simply sat on your website is no good.  

3️⃣ Think about creating little campaigns for the freebies you already have.  Print out any printables and take photos of them, show people around anything that’s perhaps a mini programme or a masterclass.  Give people a sneaky peek.  Thinking of different ways to talk about your freebie is impactful AND giving it space in your marketing bandwidth is important. 

4️⃣ Think about real time free resources.  Can you run something limited availability (for a certain period of time) or that’s a live (like a Masterclass, challenge or mini programme).  Having an urgency to the sign up and fear of missing out can help you grow your subscriber list.  

A quick word on your subscriber list before we move on! 

SEND YOUR EMAILS PEEPS!!!  Perhaps you’re procrastinating over writing a little love note out to your audience.  Perhaps it’s something you’ve avoided for a while. Maybe, you do write to your lovely subscribers but you’re simply going through the motions because you’re told it’s what you ought to do.  Whenever I sit down to write this it’s a love note from my heart.  I want to feel the connection and I want to create something that’s worth your while to open and read.  I want it to be useful, supportive, give you a little spark of inspiration or a huge virtual hug.  IMPACT  is something I’ve been talking about and musing over a lot this week.  It’s something that’s so important to me and something that I have front & central in my mind when I do my work.  Again, why tell you this?  I want you to know that it’s ok to want to create an awesome note to your lovely subscribers each week but it’s not something to procrastinate over, it’s not something to get stuck on and it’s not something to over think.  Talk about what you’ve been doing, talk about the kinds of discussions you’ve been having, talk about what you’re musing over but whatever you do please communicate with those who’ve asked for you to communicate with them.  You’d never invite someone for lunch, they accept the invite and you proceed to not say a single word now would you??? Invite them to your mailing list, they accept, you say nothing – the same thing, right?!? 

One of my favs!!  Engagement.  Being involved with your audience.  This one is so important.  Like I said in the list building bit – there’s no point inviting someone for lunch and then not talking to them.  Your audience and your connection with them and the engagement that they have with you is pivotal to fast tracking sales.  

Engagement comes in all sorts of ways and inviting engagement is super important.  

Here’s somethings you need to know about engagement; 

1️⃣  Make it super easy for people to engage.  Ask them things that are really easy for them to answer.  Making the questions easy to answer can be done by considering the question, don’t expect them to bare their soul on your social media pages.  Have options, an a, b, c, d option list makes it easy for people to select their choice.  Do a “this or that” as they are really easy for people to get involved with.  

2️⃣ Invite people to hit reply to your newsletter and answer a little question or give their thoughts on something 

3️⃣ Reply to comments people leave on your posts or on your blog. 

4️⃣  Facebook frowns on what they refer to as “forced engagement” and that means that the algorithm creates to certain languaging within posts.  FB never tell us what that looks like but think about being clever with how you ask people to get involved.  Think about using phrases like “I’d love to know your thoughts” or “shout up if you’d like more deets” or “yell up with your answer” or “dive in” etc rather than “like” “comment” “click” etc.   Being more creative with your language whilst also making it clear what you want people to do will mean your post preforms better.

5️⃣ give people a list of blogs you’re going to write and ask them which they want you to do first 

6️⃣  Have a clinic/questions posts where people can get their questions answered 

7️⃣ Let people know it’s ok to drop into your inbox or emails if they have a question to ask 

8️⃣ let them into a little more about you and to see behind the scenes.  

A small engaged crowd is much more beneficial to your business (and to your mission and soul) than a large ambivalent crowd.  

And then another….

What’s for sale?!? 

So often I have no idea what someone sells because they hide it so damn well.  What have you got for sale? What can people purchase from you?  Are you even telling your audience?  

Think about; 

➡️  Sales Periods – having a dedicated period of time when you’re going to be promoting a certain product or service will allow you to focus your mind during that promotion period.  

➡️  You have to post a shit tonne more than you think you do about the thing you have for sale.  It takes people between 5-27 times of seeing your message to make that commitment to purchase from you. 

➡️  You not offering for sale the stuff you have available means that you are stealing the opportunity for help and support from your audience 

➡️  Stop hiding your sales message deep inside a social media post 

➡️ Review your sales pages and consider how they could be more impactful (I have a sales page checklist you can have if you’d like it, just yell in the comments or send a little message).  

➡️  Think about having impactful sales posts.  What problems does this product solve?  How will people feel when they’ve bought/used/got the product? 

Lots to think about and keep your eye on for sure.  Why not pop some of the things from this post into your diary for the coming weeks so that you can start to tweak and refine and get your eyes on the stuff that’s going to be ridiculously beneficial for the growth of your business?

You can also book a 15 minute Complimentary Curiosity Call with me to work through where you are right now..