Lessons

Lesson Info

Build Online Authority

the next top of recovering today is how to become an authority and get online press. So how many of you show your hands believe that you are an authority. Okay, half of you. So you're not gonna be able to get the sales that you want unless you believe that first, that's your authority. And I remember because the authorities in the industry make the most money can charge the most get in front of the biggest audiences get the most press. So you have to become known as authority. You have to believe within yourself that you are the authority. I remember when I was 25 and trying to jump into this space and talking about linkedin. I didn't believe I was an authority at first. I didn't think anyone would listen to me. I didn't have a degree. I was too young, didn't have experience. I made a lot of excuses for myself. But the more people really said, you know what I love what you're doing. I started to start believe that I was the authority. And there's some things that you can do to become k...

nown as authority. Even if you don't think you are an authority yourself, you can make it so others perceive you to be the authority. So we'll talk about that and how to get press to make you an even more of an authority so you can continue to charge more, get more customers. Get more traffic. We talked about be relevant. So we talked about some of these points yesterday. I want to cover that more in details. So first is find mentors that inspire you. So the reason why it's important to find mentors that inspire you, uh not just mentors but just influential people in general. You want to surround yourself with the biggest thought leaders and authorities in your industry or in other industries. Because do you think you're going to be an authority if you're hanging out with people who have no clue what they're doing, if you surround yourself with the circle of friends who are trying to figure it out just like you, are you gonna be known as an authority? No, but if you're hanging out with all the top authors in the world, they're going to think of you as the authority basically surround yourself with the most influential people in your industry and you're gonna become the authority figure out your unique opportunity. We've all been talking about what your business idea is so far, a lot of you have a business and some of you online are trying to figure out what your business is going to be um For me, I remember I was just like, okay, what am I gonna do? So this may not apply to all of you guys, but I remember thinking, what am I gonna do to make money and to build a business? I've got these ideas and these passions, I realized that my unique opportunity was linked in and teaching people this even though it wasn't what I wanted to do for the rest of my life was like this is an opportunity to come in and become an authority on a topic by teaching others how to grow their business using linkedin. And again I had a lot of fears and excuses. I'm not old enough. I don't have the experience, I don't have a college degree yet but I think if you can get past that and just take the action, you're gonna get somewhere. So what I started doing was really taking a lot of action. I create, I wrote a book about linkedin which I'll talk about in a second. I just started talking about it left and right guest posting everything so find your unique opportunity and really take action on it. Um remember remember the, I talked about yesterday the moment I did my first webinar with my business partner where we did $12,500 selling uh our products that we hadn't even created yet. And I remember my first webinar was actually six months prior to this, the first time I've ever done a webinar and I had the opportunity, another thought leader in this space. A guy named Joel calm. Has anyone ever heard of this named Joel calm big internet marketing name? He was doing a bootcamp at the time actually he sold a total boot camp and he had me come on and talk about linked in. I met him at one of the first conferences, I went to a affiliate marketing, I met him and I went up to him and said, you know, I know you have a book on twitter. However did you know Lincoln's 10 times more effective than Twitter for business professionals. He's like really he's like, who are you, you, you're young punk. You know, it's like how I prove it to me. Right? So right then I had like a 32nd pitch to him on why Lincoln was more effective than Twitter. He said, all right, cool. I like it. And then basically went off and did this other thing he was speaking, he was doing whatever. He emails me a few weeks later and says, you know what? No one is talking about linkedin, I know you got a book on this because you mentioned it. I'd love to have you comment, I'm doing a social media boot camp where you we talked about this. This is kind of my big break. Having someone like at this level, put me in front of their audience and think of me as a leader on the topic of my unique opportunity. This is what we've been talking about today. James has been talking about this. Derek talked about this yesterday. Uh, but you've got to have a hub. So James has a website. Derek has a website, I website, you guys all websites but for people are online. If you don't have a website yet you need to have your own place, it can't just be social media sites, you need your own place that you control, where you can put the content out there and it's got to be compelling. We've talked about the content can be written, it could be video, can be audio, it doesn't matter. But you got to have your own place and there's some reasons why you want to have your own place. Besides just having the content on there, which I'll talk about in a second. But this is this is do you know any thought leaders that don't have their own website? I don't know any or anyone who is an authority and the reason you're gonna get press because the press is going to find your website and there's some things you're gonna do to your website that's going to allow you to get that press. So guest posts on other niche blogs and news sites. And this is a way to again become more authority and to um get more press by guest posting. And again, we briefly talked about guest posting other day with Derek but a couple of years ago I said, okay, how can I get my name out there about being like the linkedin guy and I want to control the space because there's more people coming out there and talking about linked in. So I said, how can I dominate it? So no one else can touch what I know. And so I reached out to at these events, I would meet the writers for Mashable for pro blogger for social media examiner for all the popular sites in the social media space in my industry and I become friends with the owners of the sites or the writers for the sites. Let's say I love to do a guest post. I know you guys aren't writing that much about Lincoln yet. I love to give you my top 10 ways to use linkedin marketing to build your business or whatever the pitch would be. And uh I would already have the articles written and I would just give it to them. I would just send it to him. I say this is done. It's an exact format that you follow on your blog and I want to give it to you. I've already got another site who's interested, but I wanted you to have it first if you use that as a leverage point. So I'm gonna mashable and say, hey Mashable dot com. I've got this article, top ways to use linkedin to build your business. Um I've got social examiner who really wants this, but I wanted to come to you guys first. Are you interested? Of course, I'm gonna be interested if someone else wants it already. Right, But if you're just like yeah, I've got this article, we'll check it out there. Like maybe we'll check it out, maybe we won't use leverage on another site. Don't necessarily lie about it. Talk to both of them and say, yeah, I'm showing this to mashable, I'm showing this to whichever site. Uh, but the more I started guest posting on other sites, I start to get a lot of traffic, a lot of leads and then once they see you on another site, I would get picked up from other media because you know, the media is reading these popular industry sites as well. So it's important in my opinion to do guest posting for that reason. So this is an important uh, does everyone know the concept of social proof? Has everyone heard that concept basically? And this has talked a lot about in robert, Children's book influence is leveraging social proof. And this is probably the most powerful thing that I learned on getting media attention and becoming the authority and whatever you want to be. You can basically manufacturer becoming an authority and getting more press if you want to. Even if you're not an authority, you can have the perceived value that you are that authority. Obviously you don't want to do that. It's not that genuine, but you can do it and there's ways to do it. Even if you are the authority to ramp up this social proof. But just posting the social proof that you've already got on your site is going to allow you to leverage that to get more media and more attention and become the authority. If you can leverage someone else's authority, especially in news, then it's gonna make you an authority. It's very simple. A lot of people do this. I know a lot of you guys already have this on your sites, but it's important for everyone out there watching to do this and to add these logos to your site just to add to that because producers and writers and journalists, the easier you make their job the better. So if you just deliver to them a segment written piece as you said, it's just a matter of them saying yes and they will if you position it that way, so you want to do that. You want to promote that value. I think my next point is this is another way to kind of add dye to them is be the champion by making introductions and you can be, you can become a champion of anyone's network by simply making introductions. I feel like this is something again I'm bringing in James and derek because there's much smarter than me and specific topics I can talk about other things, but they really know it and they really get it. But the goal is to become the champion for all these influencers. So when you meet someone, they're like, you know what, I'm really looking for. Someone to help me who can do more video work. I've got the perfect guy. What I usually do is I get on the phone and I call them right there and connect them or I'll do a quick email on my phone and connect them. I'll do whatever I can to make sure that I'm connecting with the people that can help them solve their biggest problems. So like we did with your list the other day, you ask them, what's your biggest challenge when you ask your audience, what's your biggest challenge to do the same thing with influencers And when they say my biggest challenges, I can't find the right person to manage my business. I can't find the right person to do this. Then you have to be the champion, Make sure you're connecting with people so you can introduce them and if you solve their biggest problems, they're gonna make you rich, basically they're gonna do whatever it takes to help you out in return. Um, another way to become an authority and get more press is to speak at events and again, I was terrified of speaking and I took Toastmasters for a year and really practices every week. I was like James, I would, I was, I would be terrified not for the day before I had to speak, but for a week before it consumed my mind and all of my energy. I was so nervous. When I first started out, I started out and what I did is I went to five different Toastmasters clubs in one week and I visited them all and I said I need to find the best one with the best speakers if I want to be the best that I can be. And I went to one with all these guys who were like mid thirties, forties who were like professional speakers, who had one guy had a book on Oprah and they're like speaking over the world, making like professional money speaking and I'm just 24 25 year old punk with a cut off shirt in my cast and I walk up and I'm like behind a podium, like trembling, like they're all in suits and I'm like, my name is Lewis and I'm like looking down the whole time and I was terrified, but I remember thinking that in order to be an authority and get my message across, so people take action, I've got to be able to speak in front of an audience. Um so once I started to learn how to speak without trembling and able to look at people in the eye and I wrote off my first four speeches, I wrote a I typed um like five pages, word for word, exactly what was going to say. And when I would get behind the podium I would stand there, put it on the podium and I would never not look up once, I would look down and I read off my entire speech, just read it off and then I would go sit down, but for me, that was a big deal, it was a big first step and I at least did it and got in front of an audience and they were so supportive, Toastmasters is a great way to be around a supportive group of people who are not going to criticize you. Eventually, I got to the point where I was behind the podium, reading down behind the podium with just note cards behind the podium, with no notes in front of the podium, with note cards in front of the podium, no podium at all, no note cards. My tent speech, I got a standing ovation because I just practice little by little to get better and I focused on one thing each time so you can get better at this. And what I did after that is I started emailing and calling everyone who had a local business chamber event, a rotary club and said, I want to talk about how you can grow your business using linkedin. I've got a great 30 minute speech, I'd love to share with your audience. I spoke for free for the first year and a half on this topic, anywhere. I could go any one that offered, I would fly and do it for free, I would drive into it for free. It didn't matter where it was, I was there and again, it's this whole taking action in this hustle mentality is that if you want to become that authority, then you've got to do this, you've got to speak in front of people, you can also do this with webinars so you don't have to leave the home if you don't want to.