Note to Self: What's Inside Matters

Last week I read an ad on Instagram that said "viewers retain 95% of a message they watch on video..." which was odd, because the ad didn't use video. Yesterday, I received an email that said "Get Your Emails Opened ..." and it wouldn't share anything helpful unless I filled out a form. Well, it's true that I opened it. But then it's also true I clicked just one link -

The one marked Unsubscribe.

Some years ago, I worried about how I showed up in my industry. I didn't rank on the usual "top" lists each year and I was certainly not someone "disrupting" the norm. So I asked my mentor how I was going to attract attention, generate leads, and drive growth if I wasn't catching attention in my marketing like everyone else.

"By focusing on what's inside," he said.
"Of course," I said. "Generating content and giving it away."
"No," he answered firmly. "I'm not talking about what's inside the message. And certainly not whether it's free."
"I don't understand," I said. "What else is there in marketing?"
"Don't treat marketing as a kind of mask to hide behind," he said. "Your intention is to make sure people know what's real inside - "
Not the marketing, but inside of YOU.

Today there's a funny photo going around the web for Halloween. It's a costume for a real estate agent that says, "Top Producer" and it includes "a magazine that you paid to be in." Kind of funny, but also kind of true, in some ways. Too many people wear the costume of their career - whether in sales, service, management, or leadership. They even feel inauthentic as they appear in ads, blogs, videos and social media.

They're trying to be influencers, for show and tell, rather than be influential in the real world.

What's missing - and valued - is any hint of the content inside. The stories only you can tell. The insights that your experience provides. The advice beyond the headlines and the invitation beyond the lead-generation to connect and share and learn and grow. The kind of thing that you really can't "put on" like a costume, and can't be done by a 'bot or imposter.

Because doing YOU isn't "One Size Fits Most."

Over the years, I came to understand what my mentor meant when he said the "good content worth sharing is inside." What people wanted isn't "the" video, quotes or headlines. Whatever the medium - website, text, social media - what they want is the most important thing:

More time spent with you.

More insights from top of your game, not top production.

More assurance that they wouldn't want an imposter instead.

Today I thought about that conversation when I saw the funny costume picture. It reaffirmed that, if we really do want to be a "Top Producer"

We should be sure to produce more of that special something that makes others feel treated, not tricked, to be connected with

YOU!

#alwaysinspiring