So you’re an Expert eh?

This is the information age, have you noticed how information hungry people are these days? Everyone wants to bleed you dry of what you know, so to avoid the endless phone calls about everything and anything why not put yourself out there as an expert in your field, after all – you are, aren’t you?

No one knows your business like you, no one comes to the exact same conclusions you do and so that combined with your experience and qualifications makes you an expert.

So why bother with all that writing and posting of comments? What’s the point?

The point:

Fact: The internet is the way people search for products and services these days.

Fact: There is far too much information on the internet to make decisions easy.

Fact: People buy from people they trust, trust breeds loyalty and loyal customers are 15 times easier and cheaper to sell to than attracting new ones every time.

Concept: If you make the decision making process easier by answering common questions online in e-books, on forums, on your blog, on your website, via social media you will elevate yourself as a solution provider.

If your competition is not doing this (or not doing it well) you have a niche way to market your business.

Ok so how do you do it?

1.    Think of 1 topic that you are an expert on.

2.    Write One Blog about the topic you are an expert on – use Wordpress to create this initially (having a separate URL means you have more links going to your main website - which makes you rise up the Google Index).

3.    Post the Blog in the blog section of your website.

4.    Take 5 extracts from that blog and turn them into 140 character comments for Facebook, Twitter and Linked In. Post them with the Blog link.

5.    Go onto some industry related Forums – read the questions and answer them – make sure you are not selling your business, just being helpful, but always leave your website address – it helps to create those all important links (which makes you rise up the Google Index).

6.    Whilst you are on these forums start discussions and use the blog post to give them something to feed off of.

7.    Set up your weekly / monthly email campaign and post your blog (1st Paragraph only) then add a Read More button that links to the blog on your website (not the word press blog – you want people to browse your website as well as your blog).

•    Tip: Use professional email marketing software to create good looking email campaigns that are branded and have a statistics package attached to it so you can see who opened the email, when and what they clicked on (great for target marketing).

8.    Collate all of the blogs you write – once you have 6 blogs on one topic – turn it into an E Book – put a nice cover on it and post it on your website as a FREE REPORT on your topic of expertise. It then acts as a Lead Magnet and people will find your website because of it. You will obviously need to post comments about it and links out on social media, email and through the blog about it – but you can see it will be seen as a resource.

This means that you are writing one document and sending is (or parts of it out by).
•    Wordpress Blog Links
•    Social media
•    Forum posts
•    Email Marketing
•    Direct on your website blog
•    Through your E Book

Repeat steps 1 - 8 weekly, fortnightly or monthly - whatever you have time to do - but be consistent and keep to the same schedule, people like patterns.

How long does this take?
Your blog needs to be 1or 2 pages MAX, less is better – add links for relevancy if you need to elaborate or have a tendency to over explain. The keep it simple rule is best, people really only absorb a small amount of info at a time, so don’t over load them. Make the topic poignant, relevant, interesting and thought provoking. You will be surprised at how many conversations you can start on social media and on forums by providing the topic for people to talk about.

You should use Hootsuite to schedule your social media comments.
You should already know which forums discuss things on your area of expertise – if you don’t – find out and use these forums regularly.

So remember – you are an expert and only you can tell people what you know. People will listen because they want to.

I think its key to remember “that you don’t know what you don’t know”. Non one knows everything so believe in yourself, make sure your information is correct, compelling and succinct and you are onto a winner.

Happy Blogging!