HOW TO BUILD AND RUN A SUCCESSFUL BUSINESS AND BRAND ONLINE: MY TOP 5 TIPS.
Hi, everybody. I’m back with another article, and as always, I hope that you find value in what I am about to share with you today, and that you will become inspired and take away something that you can implement in your own lives and your own businesses to create and achieve the greatness that you desire and deserve.
So, I became inspired by a pretty awesome guy a while ago, when he asked me the following question:
“What 5 tips would you give anybody who wants to build a successful business that plants roots all over the world?” His question really got me thinking, because I DO possess a lot of information that relates to this subject. I’ve been LIVING it and doing it for the past several years. So when he asked me, it really struck me because it’s such a good question. So what I’m going to do now is go ahead and summarize from my standpoint, what I think are the 5 important things needed to build an awesome business in this era in 2020, and I’m listing them in sequential order for any of you guys who are inspired to take action, and I hope that you will. Okay, so here we go!
STEP 1: YOU HAVE TO FIGURE OUT HOW YOU ARE GOING TO CHANGE THE WORLD.
I know this may sound kind of “corny” or even like a cliche’ because it has been said over and over from different people, but the fact is that this is the reality. Every single one of us has an area of expertise. We each have information. Each individual knows a lot about something. We ALL do. That’s the truth. In my case, I know a lot about the marketing world. If you ask somebody else like my long-time photographer/videographer Scott, he knows a lot about photography and videography. If you ask my wife, she knows a lot about business and business structuring. If you ask a gardener, he knows a lot about gardening. We all have tons of information and all too often for the majority of us, we usually take our wealth of knowledge for granted. (I know that I sure did for quite some time.) So, whatever it is that you have, you have to figure out how you’re able to use that to make a difference in someone else’s life. How are you going to help other people, using what you have expertise and experience in? Now I’m not going to paint “delusions of grandeur”, because the truth is that not everybody is going to be interested in what you have to offer, or EVEN be interested in what you have to say, for that matter, but the fact is that with 7.7 billion people on this planet, TRUST ME, there is a big, big niche market that IS going to be interested in what you have to say. Whatever that number is, it’s probably in the millions of people, and you can be of great service to them. So now, once you have step Number 1 figured out, you now move to step number 2.
STEP 2: FIGURE OUT HOW YOU’RE GOING TO GET YOUR MESSAGES TO THE WORLD.
Step number 2 is figuring out, REALLY CLEARLY, how are you going to distribute the information that you have. How you’re going to put it out there, ON SOCIAL MEDIA. As we already KNOW, Social Media is where people’s attention is at. People are addicted to…and even OBSESSED WITH their smart devices (mainly their phones), and you’ve got to meet the people where they’re at. Their attention is FIXATED on social media, therefore this is where you’ve GOT to put your message, so that you’ll get it in front of as many eyeballs as possible. So now that we’ve established that most people are OBSESSED with their phones and Social Media…it’s time to get clear on how you’re going to distribute the content that you will be creating. Are you going to go ahead and put out one video a day? Perhaps MORE than one video daily? Are you going to post images with corresponding text? Or perhaps an article, an ebook? Pictures? (There are graphic images that you can use to show people how to do stuff.) Tutorials? Live Videos? Stories on Facebook and/or Instagram? There are so many different things, the combination of possibilities are seemingly endless!
So, as far as the different forms of content go, there are mainly FOUR of them. There are videos, there are images, there’s written content, which includes articles, textbooks, ebooks, etc., and then there’s audio content, which would be podcast, radio, etc. That’s pretty much it. So whatever information you have, you’ll need to figure out how to put it out there. There’s Facebook Pages, there’s Instagram Channels and IGTV, there’s Youtube Channels, there’s Messenger (and THOSE are THE BIG 4), and there are a number of others as well. My point is, there all these platforms and channels that you can use FOR FREE to put your information and messages out there. Do you realize that? You probably know it, but haven’t really considered how VAST the opportunities are to gain exposure. A lot people don’t.
People complain about all kinds of things like, “Oh, Facebook changed the algorithm”, “Oh, Facebook is different now”, “Oh, YouTube is too impossible now”. Guys, the point that so many people are missing is the fact that it’s free!!!!!. You’ve been given access to these incredible GIANT platforms that allow you to communicate to millions of people, and they don’t charge you anything for that.Zero. So if you realize that, You’ve got to just put yourself out there. Imagine yourself in 1960 having television stations handed over to you like: “Here, here you go. You can broadcast to the world…FOR FREE.” You would be like, “Whoa… I won the lotto!” Well, that’s pretty much the case;
that’s what’s going on right now. Through our mobile devices, through the internet world, this incredible world of communication that can send messages out like crazy in an unlimited fashion, We’ve been granted the keys to the kingdom. These stations have been handed over to us. We’ve hit the jackpot!
The question “How much content should you create and share?” should be answered with “How badly do you want to achieve success?” If you want it really bad, you’ll do a lot of content. If you are okay with just growing little by little, then you do a little bit of content. It depends on your intensity. But the thing to remember is that it is already a long game, so the more intense you are about sharing your content consistently (ideally DAILY), the more people will see it, the more you’re being seen, and once they get used to seeing you, then you’re creating recognition, and that’s how you get the ball rolling…so MY advice is ALWAYS going to be “GO HEAVY.”
The next thing you’ve got to do is figure this out, and it’s a really important point: How are you going to monetize that attention that you are getting now? This is huge. I see businesses failing non-stop when it comes to this particular point, because they actually go out there and they capture attention. For example, not long ago, I was on the phone with a well-known YouTube “Star”. A lot of subscribers, a lot of attention, but yet, NOT able to monetize that. They (and I mean SO MANY of them) have no idea how to turn that into money. This is important, because once you have an exact idea as to how are you going to be of service and change the world, and you’ve figured out the type of content that you are going to be providing, and how is that CONSISTENTLY going to happen (remember, consistency is KEY), and now perhaps you’re going to do a podcast and/or whatever else it is, I want you to work really hard on developing the department of your company that is going to actually be able to grab that attention and monetize it. TURN IT INTO DOLLARS.
So how will you do that? Well, that could be building a brand, that could be becoming a media company and/or somewhat of an Influencer. For example, Facebook is a media company. If you develop a big enough podcast, or a large enough YouTube or Instagram following trust me, you’re going to have brands coming to you that are going to want to promote in there because you have a big crowd (That makes you an Influencer). Whatever it is, you have to figure that out and you have to have a structure for monetization. So, What does that mean? You can have an Amazon brand, you can have an e-commerce, you can have a brick and mortar shop. The one thing that sometimes gets confused is that your content and the way that you serve and change the world doesn’t even have to be directly connected with how you’re monetizing it, because at the end of the day, all you really need is attention. Once you have attention, you can monetize. And, you can monetize in many, many different ways.
It is important for you to figure this out fully. Once you’ve figured that out, you can then move on and advance to step number 3.
STEP 3: FIGURE OUT HOW YOU’LL DISTRIBUTE YOUR CONTENT (MESSAGES).
So, step number 3 and the third tip is based on this fact: No matter how much content you come up with, no matter how many posts you do every single day, no matter how much you create, if you don’t figure out DISTRIBUTION of that content, you are going to be broke for the rest of your life. That’s the reality. Distribution is going to be king, so you MUST learn how to distribute and disseminate your information, your messages, your CONTENT. What do I mean by distributing it? Running ads on Facebook, running ads on Instagram, using Google Adwords, using whatever social media that is dominating today…whatever means of communication is dominating, get your message out there!!!! If you don’t, then you’re simply not going to be able to make it.
If you really think about it, you probably have not met the greatest geniuses on this planet, and neither have I, quite frankly. We’ve all heard about Einstein and the incredible artist, Da Vinci, genius inventor Nikola Tesla and all of these guys. Those are all phenomenal beings who either somehow “got lucky” (not highly likely), or they figured it out – they figured out how to distribute and disseminate their messages (aka “content”). You have to figure that out for YOURSELF and YOUR BRAND, too, because no matter how smart you are, no matter how great your content is, if you don’t figure out how to use the most effective advertising platforms in existence today, and how to distribute your messages on them, then you will NOT to be able to make it, guys.
The great news is that there are courses on how to accomplish that. In fact, I have created a number of FREE mini-courses on EXACTLY how to do this. There are actually lots of things that you can do to learn how to distribute your content for next to nothing. It’s so affordable today to figure that out, that there are virtually NO acceptable EXCUSES out there today.
Ok, so Those first three tips are the most important out of the Five. If you get those figured out and actually get them done, you’re very likely to be successful. Of course, there are going to be some other barriers that will come into play later on as a growing pain of any business. Those are “par for the course”, you know, “part and parcel” when it comes to the world and the game of business. For example, I will tell you now move on with tip number 4…
STEP 4: FIGURE OUT HOW YOU’RE GOING TO SCALE IT FROM THERE.
Of course, step/tip number 4 would be how to SCALE – How to grab your ads and take them to the next level, without losing control. Let me tell you what I mean by that.
I have seen a lot of companies invest $10,000 in ads in a month and be really successful. And so THEN they figure and say, “Okay, forget about it. I’m going to do $100,000 now.” And the whole thing collapses . That’s not how you grow. There is (really when you think about it) an exact science, a routine and a system that needs to be put in place in order for you to be able to scale your business correctly. And that’s pretty much tip number 4 in a nutshell. You have to learn how to use it. Don’t grow too fast, don’t get desperate, keep on scaling your ads as you see results slowly. (Any of you who have been following me for a while on Facebook, Instagram and IGTV, on YouTube, listening to my podcasts and reading recent previous articles KNOW that I go over this in detail pretty often.) So let’s move on to the next one…
STEP 5: BUILD YOUR TEAM…TEAMWORK MAKES THE DREAM WORK!
Number 5 and the final tip of the day is going to be about hiring staff, about bringing in some all-stars and growing your team of like-minded individuals who are going to help you to grow your business. My advice is, even if you are seeing successful results for yourself and your business, Don’t start buying vacation packages, gold chains and expensive watches until you are really, TRULY on the next level.
For years in the beginning I would say that while you’re building a business that you want to survive and thrive for the long-term, you have to put money towards growing and scaling your business, and that of course would include at some point in time, acquiring valuable staff, the people who are going to HELP you get to the next level. They’re not “cheap”, (although many highly qualified freelancers and virtual assistants ARE affordable if you know where to look), but they’re WORTH IT, and it’s okay to invest in people because at the end of the day, it’s really all about people. A company is not “a company” or merely an entity. A company is really a group of awesome people, especially if it’s a company that’s growing and thriving. That’s the way it is, and people sometimes tend to forget about that fact. It’s not a bunch of like little individuals. It’s an awesome team of awesome people that are helping you get to the next level.
The great news about this is that in a day like today in 2020 it’s super easy to scale a team, even if it’s a PHENOMENAL team of virtual assistants. (This is how I began to grow my agency). You can get people to work with you and help you from all over the planet, no matter what. I still have members on my team from all over the world. And, because of the world of technology, it feels like they are all here together with me in the same building.
So there you have it. My Top 5 tips for building and running a successful business and brand online in 2020. I hope you liked it, and most of all, I really hope that you find this data valuable and begin to implement what I’ve shared here.
Here’s to your profound success. I’ll see you in the next one.