I’m a huge Ben Settle fan. Though I haven’t bought any of his products, I sure do read each of his mails that he sends out daily.
I once popped this question:
Quick question: do you plan your content or just write what you feel like? Curious… My biggest hurdle is that I constantly worry about the value that I’ll provide to the audience. Any specific products that you recommend?
And here’s an excerpt from his response.
You’re too focused on “value” and not focusing on the relationship.
In my opinion (which, yes, makes it a *fact*) the whole point — the #1 thing to do over everything else — is build the relationship with your list. And (cue up the Empire’s Imperial March music…) next month’s December “Email Players” issue goes into many ways to do this. Specifically on pages 7 & 8 which talks about how A-list celebrity Johnny Carson (who was arguably more familiar to Americans than the president of the US during his 30 year run on The Tonight Show) bonded with his audience, and built an unbreakable relationship with them that resulted in hundreds of millions of dollars in revenue for the network and himself.
All without providing any “value” whatsoever.
(At least, the way most people think of value.)
Did you see what just happened? This wasn’t just a response to my query, but fodder for his email! Additionally, he posted this on his website too! (I think he posts all the emails to his website as well.)
That’s creating value!
This morning I heard Seth Godin say (paraphrasing), “just writing something daily! And soon you’ll change the way you think. Not just about the content you share, but think in general.” Isn’t that something?
Don’t create. Document!