Stop waiting to be picked if you want to succeed

In today’s article, I’d like to share with you some of the knowledge I got in the digital marketing niche that applies in most aspects of life.

If you’re a regular reader of my articles, you know I started doing internet marketing, quite empty-handed. I had no previous connections, no huge budget and almost no knowledge. Of course, I still knew a thing or two but only basic.

That’s not an unusual situation for most of the people nowadays. It doesn’t matter if you are an internet marketer like me, a photographer, a singer or an entrepreneur.

Your success is entirely in the hands of someone else?

Are you an artist waiting to be discovered, a musician waiting to be signed to a record label, a freelancer doing content writing or designing websites waiting to get hired by a big company or maybe an author waiting for a publishing deal?

All these examples of people with talent come to mind as examples. They are all waiting for someone to pick them, to say, “Your work is good enough.”

Well, the hard truth is that most people don’t get picked. That’s why the very idea of waiting can be so depressing. Everything is out of your control.

As an awkward kid whose friends were all older, I know what it’s like to be the last person picked for a game. It sucks.

That’s why I don’t wait to be picked.

If you are a writer, you may self-publish. That means you don’t have to wait for permission to start publishing your work and building an audience.

Sure, for a start, you have to do more work. Also, you don’t have the support of a team, but the bright side is that you don’t have to wait for someone to pick you.

That doesn’t mean you won’t ever work with a publisher, just that you don’t have to wait for someones approval to make your work available to the general public.

Social media is growing like mad these days, and every week I see on TV, or I read online about persons that are becoming famous after their work which is videos, pictures, songs etc., became viral.

You can take control, set a plan, and execute it to bring your own ideas to life.

Let me show you how.

Dream big but start small

Writing a book, for instance, seems like such a daunting task. When I heard about book authors who spent years, even decades, writing their books, I figured it was nearly impossible to finish a book. And it often is, for certain types of books.

But just because someone else spent thousands of hours on their life’s work, doesn’t mean you need to do that for your first book. You can start small with a very brief report or a collection of reports put together in a nice, easy to read form.

If you are blogging, then you can pick 15-20 of your previous written articles on your blog, edit and update them and pack them into an ebook, or video course.

Just sit down, do some research on what problems your audience needs to be solved and then create a plan of what your book should contain. As I said, some of the content is already written, and some other needs to be written.

You may sell your first book or e-book for $5 or $7, with a deluxe package that includes extended rights for $15 or more. That may not be the best way to make a lot of money. But the book can do very well and open up a ton of opportunities like getting in touch with influencers from your niche, or passionate people that may write reviews and spread the word about your book.

Also is your first step to becoming an appreciated expert with an opinion that matters in your niche.

How to reach an audience

It’s not very easy to market your product or service when you have little or no money. I watched a software company that makes project-management applications, release a new product and immediately gain thousands of customers, all without spending a single dime on expensive advertising like PPC ads, TV spots and so on.

This was something that intrigued me at the moment and took me a while to figure out how to do it.

Most people would look at this software company, and the first marketing thing they would notice is a blog with thousands of readers. Of course, they can do it; they have people coming to them. If you think like that, you are missing the point.

Well, the interesting part is that this software company built that audience step by step by teaching their readers. They’ve written hundreds of blog posts about building businesses, designing, writing HTML, and project management.

By constantly teaching, they built an audience that came back for more and more advice and tutorials. Then when they launched a product, their readers were eager to give it a try.

Why?

Because customers trusted them as they’ve released so many quality tutorials for free and on the other hand if an audience is getting enough value, they will happily pay you for more.

If you start teaching, people will listen. Then you never have to pay for advertising. Your audience comes to you.

Since then, I’ve used this method to make a ton of sales just in the last year. My only regret is that I didn’t learn this simple lesson earlier.

The key to success in 2020 and beyond

Many bloggers are struggling with getting traffic and monetize their blogs. If you are into affiliate marketing, especially in a very competitive niche, you see that now’s harder than ever to make sales.

For every successful blogger that makes a good income online, I think there are at least 50 others that are almost break even or losing time and money with their blogs.

And the main reason for their success is not the quality of the content, or how active they are. Is the connections they have.  Every day they get invitations to conferences, consulting requests and review proposals.

However, if you’re not yet a successful blogger, you have to step up and build connections. These people will help you promote your blog, will recommend your services to their friends and coworkers.

The most important thing when you’re doing influence marketing and building connection is to think about what you can offer first. No one likes to be used and don’t get anything from a deal. It may work once, but when you take too much and don’t offer anything back, people will not work with you in the future.

Check these articles on how to build great connections in your niche: Expert Roundup Creation guide and methods to get free content to your blog.

You may find it difficult to get in touch with people out of nowhere, but when you do it, you will find out that most of them want to help you to succeed because they know you will help them back or simply because they’ve been in your shoes, trying to make their way to the top and want to help you.

Conclusion

So don’t expect to be picked. Stand up, Start doing whatever you are good and passionate about, and success will come. It will not be easy, but at least you will not have to wait for someone to appreciate your work depressingly.

Share in few words, with your readers how’s your blogging journey and what advice or questions you have. I’d love to read them. We will all learn.