By now you should know I am delivering my second CreativeLive course later this month, Building Your Authority Platform. The FREE live broadcast will take place April 20-22 from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. PST. You can RSVP at CreativeLive to watch the live broadcast. But I want to be honest with you… I highly recommend you get your copy of the Authority Platform Workbook, my 80-page step-by-step guide to building your reputation and growing your business today.

I designed Building Your Authority Platform around one question: What do you need to know to attract people to you and your business? I assure you, I took a comprehensive approach. If you are looking for a quick fix then you can stop reading here. It’s not coming.

Most business owners I’ve met have been looking for the magic bean—that quick, simple, one-time marketing strategy that generates huge demand for their services. Preferably overnight.

Does this sound familiar? You bought a contact list from Bikini List or Agency Access, added some of your most popular images and hopefully remembered to include something about yourself (“I have loved taking photos since I was a child… I always deliver my best work on time…”). You hit Send. A week or two later, you pick up the phone to call everyone on the list starting at A. Surprise, surprise, not very many were keen to talk to you -if they even remember that you sent them an email.

Blindly emailing strangers does not work and here is why: it’s incredibly annoying for those people on the contact list. If you think this first impression is doing anything other than making you look old fashioned and outdated, you are kidding yourself. Your unsolicited email is SPAM and, more often than not, a colossal waste of time.

Here’s the reality: there is no magic bean. Finding more clients is a strategic series of small, medium, and large actions. The hardest thing to wrap your head around is that the goal is NOT to make sales. Instead, the goal is to position yourself as an authority in your field. When you are the one with the answers, sales will follow.

If you’re feeling lost, I’m here to help. These are some of the topics I will be teaching in Building Your Authority Platform:

1. Use your story to design a strongly-branded message. Your story is like a handshake with potential customers. This is your opportunity to show them you’ve been through their problems and you have the answers they need. Your potential clients have concerns, hopes, and dreams just like you do. Connect with them as a person, not as a business.

2. Decide which online tools to include in your platform. It is going to take a little research to know where your customers hang out. Facebook? Instagram? Twitter? Wherever they are is where you want to be.

3. Follow an amplification strategy for blogging and social media. You can write the most brilliant piece, but it counts for naught if your target audience never sees it. You need to ensure your blog posts will be read and shared, and that won’t happen using a rented contact list.

4. Use your website to attract the RIGHT clients. Your website is not where you sell, it’s where you tell. Consider it as a book. The homepage is the front cover that visitors will judge your business on. Beyond the cover are certain “must have” pages that tell your story and provide valuable information.

5. Generate leads with white papers. This is another step in building relationships with your followers. Give away free advice and resources that only someone in the know would have. Potential customers appreciate your unbiased information and will think of you first when they need the type of service you offer.

6. Get free media and publicity exposure. When other people talk about how great you are, your clout goes way up. I’ll show you the right way to approach journalists and media outlets so they will want to tell your story for you.

You must be of service. Just think about how much free stuff I do that costs me serious money and time. Why do you think I am doing this? All the free stuff, the blog, the strong community we’ve built under the PhotoBizCoach brand… it’s all part of a larger strategy. The power I have is in the number of people I can reach and with whom I have built relationships through the quality and reliability of my content. First you must serve, then you get the work. It doesn’t go the other way around.

There are no shortcuts to finding clients. It is an ongoing, deliberate plan based on your secret sauce.

If you want to know what I do, why I do it, and how I do it, then JOIN ME at CreativeLive on April 20-22. I am so excited to have you there!

Pin It on Pinterest

Share This