“Self esteem can’t win you a race if you’re not in shape.”

~ Louis Zamperini

Choices

The Pandemic has created some tough choices for all business owners, but this is not the first time such choices have confronted us.

One of the big choices every business needs to face is whether they will take responsibility for their own outcomes or turn to the government for help. On the one hand, the government’s restrictions on opening puts many business owners in positions where they cannot function at all…. Or, equally dangerously, they cannot function profitably given the restrictions. On the other hand, all of these government payments (no matter how necessary or well-deserved) are creating chains that will hold us hostage in the not-to-distant future.

I believe that every business owner needs to ask themselves (because, let’s face it, no one else is listening) what we can do to adapt and improvise so that we can function. The alternative is that not only ourselves, but our children and grandchildren will have a rapidly diminishing slate of options. I don’t know about you, but I’d like to think that I’m leaving future generations more choices rather than fewer. 

Forgotten Stories or… The Power of Marketing

In 1994, Oldsmobile shut its factory and ended its record-setting journey. Few people remember, but the first mass-produced automobiles were made by Oldsmobile around ten years before Henry Ford started producing his Model-Ts.

The combination of skilled marketing, innovative engineering, and careful management meant that Ford survived and Oldsmobile went under, but it didn’t have to be that way. Back in the 1920s Bruce Barton also warned Andrew Carnegie that if he didn’t tell the story about his steel mills the way he wanted to tell it, someone else would tell it in ways that were embarrassing and detrimental to his interests.

The Lesson: Skillful narratives attract attention. Attention shapes popular behaviour. Behaviour (aka buying habits) ensure survival.

These are not just historical events, they are directly relevant to your choices today. Will you create the narrative that empowers and promotes your business, or will you let someone else tell it their way?

Even the British Royal family is facing this dilemma and considering whether to abandon their historical silence in the face of Harry and Meghan’s constant whinging. I hope they don’t, I believe that the Sussex’s celebrity power will wear itself out and the Royal family can afford to maintain their silence, but for the rest of us… This is almost certainly not the path to survival.

Celebrity Power

Like it or not, creating celebrity status (in your niche, at least) is the best way to ensure your survival by giving you more choices and greater freedom.

You don’t need to become a global celebrity or even a national one, but if you can create a position for yourself as the ‘gold standard’ in your local market or niche you will create your own opportunity and longevity. The thing that I love about this approach is that you can create your own celebrity power while staying true to your beliefs, processes, and values. When you choose the path you are going to walk, you don’t need to bend down before other peoples ‘gods’.

One of my clients in the healthcare niche was able to use their authority book and coaching app to attract ideal clients and grow during the pandemic without violating any of the AHPRA advertising laws. They had previously used a different book which had not delivered the kind of prospects they were looking for, but the revised version did attract their ideal clients.

Creating Niche Celebrity

Grieving what you’ve lost is important and I understand that. But, unless you want to become dependent on the government it’s equally important to think about what you can do.

One of my friends whose beauty salon has been shut for more than 60% of the past year confronted her plight early. She started by offering ‘remote’ coaching and talking clients through their treatments, mailing out custom treatments or offering them for pick-up and using similar strategies. It turned out that she was able to make a decent living and feel as though she was helping her clients connect with each other as well as herself, but she had extra time so she used it to monetise her craft hobby.

When you’re starting out to create celebrity your best strategy is to focus on making yourself visible in a carefully chosen market and getting known for one thing. Later you can branch out on the back of that. Books, courses, and videos give people a chance to get to know you and to sample your philosophy and approach, so they’re a good first step to celebrity on a wider scale.

I followed the same path with my ghostwriting career. It wasn’t until I had written several books that I was approached by well-known celebrities to be the behind-the-scenes ghostwriter for their New York Times bestsellers, but those opportunities would not have presented themselves if I had not already had some degree of celebrity. In order to ‘win the race’, I needed to get in shape first.