I tried not to think about it and attempted to distract myself as much as I could. When I looked back at my social media, all I got were encouraging, heart-felt comments. The image I had in my mind was far worse than I thought and was completely off. People were super helpful and kind to me for having the courage to publicize my content.
I am here to remind you that you are not alone. There are plenty of people in the same boat as you. It’s all about having the right support, encouragement and most importantly, the courage to take that first step out of your comfort zone. It took a lot for me to decide to go public but now that I’ve done it, I feel absolutely freaking amazing! And that is saying a lot for someone whose been hiding in her shell her entire life.
So without further ado, here are some tips & tricks that will allow you to breakthrough, be confidently visible (even if you’re an introvert like myself) and improve your online presence.
Be Yourself and Display Authenticity
It’s really not as bad as you make it out to be.
Be you and show it to the world. It really isn’t all that bad once you try putting yourself out there. Sure, not everyone is nice and maybe some people will criticize you but so far, I haven’t had a single mean response. You don’t have to live your life trying to impress everyone. You will never be able to get on top if you do and it’ll be an endless, exhausting battle between you and the world.
“Love me or hate me there’s no money in the middle.”
In the end, it’s all about confidence and being genuine. People love authenticity especially today, in a world where there are so many companies and brands out there only looking to take your money. They will lie and do anything just to get their hands in your wallet.
Well, one thing I’ve learned over the past week or two is that as you slowly break out of your shell, it only gets easier with time. You’ll be surprised at how many people will encourage and support you as long as you are genuine in your story. People like authenticity and if you want to succeed with your brand, you need to be aware of this at all times.
Your brand’s story is your story and it is one of the most crucial aspects of your business that you cannot afford to leave slip your mind.
Deliver Enough Value To Make Your Audience Trust You
“You can have everything in life you want, if you will just help other people get what they want.” – Zig Ziglar
Develop a trust with your audience by constantly providing value so that they are the ones chasing you and not you chasing them. It’s a lot more efficient if you focus your energy on creating and growing rather than chasing your audience. Sure at the beginning you need to build your business and gain as much exposure as possible. But do it slowly and don’t blaze through it. Rushing to build a business is like rushing to cook a meal; it turns out sloppy. It’s very easy for your vision to get impaired when you’re moving fast. Do not distort your brand’s story by rushing through it.
Show how much you truly want to help them. Your audience will naturally gravitate towards you the more you deliver value and cater to their needs. The more you open up and show people how much you want to help them, the more they will want to trust you.
Just think of it as this: the more you give, the more they will take and the more they take, the more they will feel that sense of guilt and start to want to give back if they are genuinely interested in what you have to offer.
Gain brand awareness, credibility and build that like, know and trust factor by giving out freebies. Everyone loves free stuff and providing free content is crucial especially at the early stages when you are trying to develop your brand and show credibility to your audience. Freebies can involve downloadable digital art prints, worksheets, planners, calendars, content for an email opt-in, free services in exchange for testimonials, the number of freebies you can create for your audience are endless! Depending on what you are trying to promote for your business, be creative and have fun with it.
The important idea here is to give people enough free, valuable content or resources to give them room to like and trust you. Show them you know your stuff to build your credibility and that you are the expert in your field.
Remember, your goal is to deliver as much value as you can so that in return, you can attract and develop a loyal, valuable fan base for your business.
Involve Yourself With Social Support Groups
“Focus on how to be social, not on how to do social.” – Jay Baer
Leverage your social media and learn to be more social to find other like minded people. You already know that social media is a great marketing tool as well as a wonderful place to meet new people and get feedback on any idea. One thing I’ve noticed to help boost my confidence and helped to greatly improve my online presence was to get involved in a bunch of Facebook support groups. That’s right, there are actually social support groups out there with an engaging community that will help you get a head start on your blog, social media, business or if you want to simply get noticed. These are the best groups to join especially if you’re still new, need support, feedback or just want to get more followers on social media. Most of these people are there for the same reason as you are; they want to build a following, self-promote and connect with people who have the same goals as them.
This is what helped me the most when I first started. Especially for those who do know me, I am a huge introvert and will gladly email or message you over talking on the phone or engage with you in person any day (however that’s slowly changing as I continue to seek constant opportunities to step outside my comfort zone). Therefore knowing I was behind the comfort of my own computer screen, this gave me a huge confidence boost and allowed me to express myself a lot more freely to people who didn’t know me.
From there on, I simply got involved with as many support groups as I could that catered the most to my niche and engaged with the members in it. I posted about my projects on every platform of social media I had (Twitter, Pinterest, Instagram, Facebook) to gain as much exposure as possible.
This is especially important at the beginning stages of your business. You need to spread your brand awareness and the best way to do that is to use social media as your leverage tool.
If People Don’t Answer To You, Don’t Give Up!
“The struggle you feel today will offer the strength you need tomorrow.”
Those of you who have been following me for some time now know about the Hustle Nation community I started a while back but never really gave any attention to until this year. An acquaintance of mine who I haven’t spoken to in years reached out to me recently and asked if he can help me to revive the group together. I agreed and now we are currently working to build the group and attract more engaged members. So far, we’ve amassed a total of 91 members but only a mere 5% of those members are actively engaging in the group.
I constantly make an effort to post articles, graphics, polls, quotes and pose questions to the group in an attempt to foster engagement and get some answers. However, every day I get no response back and feel completely discouraged. I post to make myself accountable to my daily readings and to keep myself motivated but without any feedback from my audience, it starts to get a bit lonely.
Needless to say, I’m not willing to give up! My goal is to inspire the ones who are in the group and who actually do see my posts even if they don’t respond via a like or a comment. I know it’s not all useless because a few people actually did mention to me that they feel inspired from my posts (my mom and at least 5 or 6 other friends). I know it’s not a lot but I do intend to continuously improve the group over time. By doing so, it has prompted me to join other various Facebook groups to observe the strategies they implement and see how they foster engagement with their community so I may apply it to my own group. I am not the one to give up easily and I don’t want you to either.
Stop Thinking and Start Doing
“While you were debating if the glass was empty or full… I SOLD IT.”
Just do it. You won’t get very far in life if you sit there and ponder all day long. I went ahead and I attempted to create a community of hustlers not knowing at all how it would turn out. I ventured into the unknown. I know with time, I will only get better as long as I am determined and willing to overcome any challenges that come my way. The important thing is; I didn’t sit on my ass and do nothing, I stirred up a movement. You can read all day and acquire all the knowledge in the world to prepare yourself but if you don’t take action, what good will that do? Go ahead and take that first step. Like I said, it’s really not as bad as you think it is.
You will always struggle in the beginning. People will ignore you. You will get discouraged. No one will get sold. But guess what? That’s completely normal! People won’t respond to you until they are able to see themselves what it is you are capable of doing. It’s always about proving yourself; developing that know, like and trust factor that will allow you to win them as a customer. Once you’ve gotten over this and mustered up the courage to take no for an answer, only then will they respond.
These are the most impactful actions I took to be able to stand out confidently and improve my online presence. These are what gave me results. It takes guts to step out of your comfort zone but if you want to succeed, it’s absolutely critical to do so.
Just remember to be yourself, deliver enough value to your audience to get them hooked and wanting more, involve yourself with social support groups, don’t give up, stop thinking and start doing. If you continue to take these steps, you will see dramatic results in both your life and your business!
Good luck you guys! Leave a comment down below on what you think about these tips, whether you agree or disagree with anything I mentioned above. I would love to get your feedback 🙂
Inspire to be more
X.O.X.O.
– Fifster
