We’re all obsessed with shortcuts to “shorten the curve.” We want to execute tactics that everyone else is doing because it’s working (or trending) or the newest strategy that scales or reaches the target audience better. And if we fail to change or try any of what’s “proven to be working,” we’re doomed.
Sometimes I get the feeling that we’re living in an age where hard work is looked upon as stupid and unproductive. Copying others, on the other hand, is intelligent and productive. Yeah, I know, I’m oversimplifying what’s going on there, but am I?
What makes content marketing essential to stand out in the crowd? What makes my effort to be “present” on LinkedIn (or any other social platform) any different from half a billion other folks with the same plan? What makes us believe that distracting people in their feeds is a better, faster, and cheaper way to get them into our funnels?
These are all hard questions. And I so wish I had the answers, but I don’t. But it made me ponder the type of marketing I should be doing — good old permission marketing. It’s authentic, respectful, and doesn’t focus on a million people but a chosen few who want to engage with you.
I don’t think there’s any harm in doing something nobody else is doing or have gone out of fashion. Yes, it’s hard work, but what’s stopping us from working hard towards our goals? The false promise of finding our clients faster and cheaper? Or the premise that reinventing the wheel is grossly inefficient?
In my experience, it takes a whole lot of courage, humility, and discipline to go against the tide and invest one’s time and energy to do something from scratch. That might mean you have to choose one social media platform over half-a-dozen popular options out there. Or it is creating content that’s authentically you, like a plain text message when everyone’s quoting everyone else in fancy, glossy, colourful digital posters.
That might mean you’re doing the arduous tasks of creating content that’s valuable enough for people to shell out a cool $97, but you choose to give it away for free. Not even in exchange for an email address!
Heck, do the opposite of what the marketing gurus tell you. Don’t have a call to action at the end of every such email that you send out. And you don’t have to send an email every single day. Let your audience and folks in the email list breathe. Choose to give them value instead of asking them to take action.
Am I indicating that people should never ask for a sale? No, I’m not. What I’m suggesting is an alternative to the conventional approach to the new-age marketing practices. Ask for a sale but focus on building a more meaningful bond first. You can achieve that by giving them value over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over x 1000 and then ask.
This isn’t “jab, jab, jab, right hook,” but “jab, jab, jab, jab, jab, jab x 1,000 and then, “would you like to learn how I do that?” The big question is this — do you have the patience to last that long or have the courage to reinvent the wheel?