Every business owner is anxiously awaiting the day that Oprah calls and says she wants to feature you or your book on the next episode of Oprah’s Next Chapter, Prime, Life Class, Super Soul Sunday or the next amazing show she’s got up her sleeve.
And the reason you’re waiting for that call? Mass exposure and becoming widely recognized as a thought leader, expert and/or specialist.
Sadly, for most entrepreneurs and business owners, that call will never come.
While the call may never come, it’s still possible for you to gain mass exposure, become widely known and leverage media to grow your business. But, the amount of work you’ll have to do may be a little discouraging and force you to ask yourself how badly do you really want to become widely known in your industry for solving a major problem and changing the lives of those you serve.
Sherrie, whom we are featuring in this episode of Incredible Factor TV, has been asking herself how she can make sure her business has mass media appeal.
“Hi Darnyelle. How do I get my business widely recognized, observe a considerable profit each week, grow progressively over the year and build a solid clientele with women begging to work with me?”
Check out my response to Sherrie’s question in this week’s episode of Incredible Factor TV.
Whichever methods you decide to leverage in your business to become known and found, do them with consistency – whether you want to or not. Whether it’s raining or snowing – if you decide to add it in to your marketing mix, do it consistently or don’t do it at all.
I teach my clients that in order to grow your business, you need to focus on two types of activity: revenue generation and awareness generation. To add more value to Sherrie’s question, let’s talk about awareness generation. Awareness generation is about identifying activities that you enjoy and can commit to completing with consistency to build awareness. If you’ve been following me for any amount of time, you’ve likely heard me say that branding/messaging is how you get known, marketing is how you get found, sales are how you get paid and operations are how you build a business.
Awareness generation is how you get known in the marketplace. Generating awareness is about getting the attention of those who can either use your products and services now or know people who can use your products and services now. Before you can generate awareness, however, you have to have a clear brand message. And, only with a clear brand message shared with consistency will you get known by others. Here are some of my favorite ways to generate awareness:
Public Relations – PR often gets a bad name but the fact is, in order to get results from it, you need an effective PR campaign and full-blown strategy. What I find that hinders most business owners is that they are inconsistent, sending a press release willy-nilly versus creating relationships and a clear strategy that includes more than just sending the release to get media attention and exposure.
Social Media – with the power to help you go “viral” faster than any media that’s come before it, learning how to effectively leverage social media can greatly increase your exposure. As an example, one of my clients has used social media to build massive influence and relationships and today she is a paid speaker and contributor because of how she’s used social media to become widely known.
Speaking – whenever you can get in front of your ideal clients and demonstrate your expertise through speaking, you will increase your exposure and likely attract your next clients. Personally, speaking is the tool I use to gain exposure and fill my sales funnel.
Guest Blogging – By identifying blogs that are highly visible and get lots of traffic and becoming a contributor for them, you will expand your reach quickly, especially if you leverage magnetic marketing (education-based content that solves a problem while connecting to the reader’s emotional intelligence.)
Video – with YouTube being the 2nd most searched search engine, there’s a great probability that you can gain massive exposure by posting your content-based videos there. As an example, I have been offering weekly video content for more than 4 years… and from the exposure on YouTube, I’ve gotten clients, speaking opportunities, sponsorships and more.
Now I want to hear from you, what’s your two cents?: Which ways are you currently gaining exposure that aren’t on my list? What other advice would you offer to Sherrie to help her become widely known, grow her profits and have clients waiting anxiously to work with her?
See you next week. Take care.
©2014 by Darnyelle A. Jervey. All Rights Reserved. Darnyelle A. Jervey, MBA, The Incredible Factor Business Optimization Coach and Mentor, is the founder of Incredible One Enterprises®, Incredible Factor University® and the Leverage Your Incredible Factor System®, a proven step-by-step program so you experience financial and spiritual abundance in your life because of your business. For more information and a FREE audio CD “7 Critical Mistakes Even Smart Entrepreneurs Must Avoid for Clients, Connection and Cash Flow!” just fill out the form below.
