Top of Mind: Use Content to Unleash Your Influence and Engage Those Who Matter To You – John Hall
When helping others becomes the framework through which you interact with the world, you’ll find yourself at the top of many minds.
What Being Top Of Mind Means
Being authentic, honest, and truthful is your best promotion, because if your customers trust you, then you will be the first thing that comes to their minds in case they need your goods or services.
Focus On Building Trust
Since today’s customers are not passive; they are even more suspicious of salespeople who don’t ask for permission to invade their privacy; a salesperson’s job isn’t anymore that of a marketing rep, but the far more humble and noble of being a friend.
Don’t Trick People
Customers today don’t like to buy from people who are intrusive. You can trick them once or twice, but the minute they find out, you’ll lose them for eternity. They and about a million other people will find out about it on social media. So instead of tricking them – earn their trust.
Authenticity is the foundation of your relationship with your audience. But for the relationship to flourish, it’s not enough to simply be authentic; you also have to deliver tangible value.
Selling 101 has morphed into Altruism 101
To get on your customers’ “top of mind,” you need to earn their approval. This is done by: expressing genuine concern about their likes and dislikes, and by establishing a type of communication between you two that’s based on mutual trust and commitment.
Most importantly, help your customers from time to time without seeking any compensation.
Share Your Knowledge, Experiences And Resources With Your Audience
Staying in touch with the needs of your audience and sharing information they can use is one of the best ways to give to and help them.
The most scalable way to help them is through creating and publishing content. You can exponentially expand the number of ways you can help people and the number of lives you can affect through content.
Create A Writing Ritual
Creating written content is a daunting task for many of us, from solopreneurs to CEOs. Lack of time and inspiration keeps us procrastinating and pushing this critical activity further down our to-do lists. Fear of being a bad writer also sabotages our efforts.
Try the practice of “morning pages”. Rather than waiting for inspiration to strike, it’s easier and more helpful to adhere to a habit of daily writing. Writing every morning encourages and allows for more creativity, and it will also help dispel the fear of writing.
Like helpfulness, authentic likability is a practice. It can’t be forced, but it can be developed through everyday thoughts and actions.
Brand And Thought Leadership
If you treat your brand as an afterthought, you’re simply fortifying the barriers between yourself and opportunity creation. A vibrant, flourishing brand is one of your most powerful tools for creating trust and opportunity.
Have you ever read an article that felt like it was written especially for you? Maybe it answers a specific question you’ve had on your mind for a while, or it gives you some piece of advice that seems tailor-made to your life situation.
When this happens, it creates a sense of connection to the author that makes you want to read everything he or she is writing.
Education is the most important trust point
Knowledge is power. When you educate people, you are empowering them.
One of the most effective and easily scalable ways to unify these practices is through high-quality digital content.
Content’s potential as an educational tool is limitless. Use it to share whatever knowledge you have that others will find valuable—industry insight, best practices, experiential learnings—and they will reward you with trust.
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