Notting Hill, London, UK
I came across a blog post on Twitter yesterday.
Someone published a helpful piece of content long-form in nature that pretty much hit the mark.
He did something exceedingly well.
So well in fact that I decided to write a post about it.
The dude promoted his blogging eBook in seamless, clear and transparent fashion.
Almost all bloggers need to improve in this regard. Goodness knows that I do.
I rarely sounded like a douche bag promoting my blogging courses and blogging eBooks as some slippery, slimy, snake oil salesman trying to part people from their money without offering valuable, truly helpful and inspiring blog content along with it. Yet I erred in the opposite direction; I rarely mentioned that I actually sold blogging courses and blogging eBooks.
I had to dust off each recently because it had been so long since I effectively promoted each; never mind not blitzing my blogging course and blogging eBooks.
Here’s the deal: I spent a great deal of time publishing detailed content but little time promoting the business end of what I did, profits-wise. This would be similar to Amazon publishing helpful content about how to sell stuff online but not embedding sales pages.
Sounds funny, right?
Well…..this is what I mistakenly did for quite a bit.
However, I implore you not to make the same error I did for the longest time by stressing this need for improvement.
How About Yourself?
Scan your blog.
Do you need to improve how frequently and clearly you promote your:
- courses?
- eBooks?
- coaching?
- services?
Look at your blog as honestly as possible.
Hey; I know that we all put on blogging blinders from time to time. Guilty as charged. But the only way to begin profiting is by seeing your blog in the light of truth.
For example, I reassessed my blog earlier today by gazing at the blogging sidebar. Good news: I promote my blogging course. Bad news: I tended to distract viewers and slow down my blog (and perhaps lessen sales) by embedding a popular posts widget along the sidebar.
I decided to trash the widget for popular posts because even though traffic grew through the embed I also pulled reader attention away from the course embed widgets, slowed down my blog with a heavy widget and pretty much made boosting course sales a lesser priority through my sidebar and blog with the extraneous content.
I also realized that the sidebar drew spam comments 9 out of 10 times to these particular blog posts; seeing 1 legit comment out of 10 drew a bunch of horseshit traffic to these blog posts. Who needs that? Unless you desire manure?
Make the Changes
Make whatever changes you need to make right now in order to promote your premium offerings more clearly.
Make it easy for readers to buy what you have to offer.
Make it easy for readers to hire you.
Think as much as possible from the perspective of a client or customer, not someone selling stuff or not someone trying to publish detailed content to earn trust. Of course you want to publish detailed content to gain credibility, to boost exposure and to solidify your reputation. But if you ONLY see yourself as a free value provider you will tend to do a piss poor job actually promoting your business and connecting deeply with customers and clients.
Make It Look Kinda Like an Online Store
Does your blog look like a digital storefront in some regards, at least?
Publish thorough content but also make it easy to see that you:
- sell stuff
- offer services
- run a clear business
for customers and clients to take the next step.
Customers and clients who take the next step build your blogging business. Building your blogging business allows you to go pro. Going pro frees you to circle the globe or to chill in your home town as a full time, home based entrepreneur.
Do Not By Shy
Theoretically, referral business can build your professional blogging career.
However, most of us actually need to self-promote to overcome a series of fears in mind regarding:
- imposter syndrome
- feeling fraudulent
- annoying readers
- attracting critics
Self-promoting triggers fears one needs to face, feel and let go in order to boost blogging profits over the long haul.
Other strategies work for clearing these fears but promoting yourself business-wise brings ’em up quite quickly. I feel this is an efficient way to get rid of the fears to thrive.
Before you grow you need to let go fears causing a lack of growth.
Mentioning your products and services early and often brings up mental head stuff fostering a lack of blogging growth.
Reminder
Do not make each blog post a running commercial.
Publish long form content to help readers. Being helpful boosts exposure and credibility.
But do end each post with a clear cut call to action for buying your stuff and/or hiring you.
Do it. See how you feel. Observe what comes up.
Publish detailed blog posts designed to guide readers but end each post with self-promoting to get fully clear on what you offer.
Many bloggers struggle to make money for fearing this important self-promotional step.
Dropping links to blogging courses and blogging eBooks does a fine job triggering fears like:
- “Nobody will buy it anyway.”
- “Nobody bought it in the past so nobody will buy it now.”
- “Nobody will ever buy it.”
- “Why bother?”
- “I don’t want to annoy my readers.”
- “I don’t want to lose readers.”
This head trash lessens or even arrests blogging income.
How can you make money blogging if you believe these fears?
How can you profit if you believe that you will not profit?
The subconscious mind cannot take a joke; it literally does what you tell it to do.
If those annoying little voices unconsciously tell you to do these things then these things will come to pass 100% of the time.
This is why most bloggers struggle, fail and quit.
The unconscious keeps speaking these limiting beliefs which most bloggers seem completely unaware of. Being unaware of these failing tendencies creates blogging failure through silly self-sabotaging ways, including holding back completely on self-promotion.
Thank goodness you decided to improve in the self-promotional department today.
You just saved yourself time, headaches and flat out heartache with the simply, blanket decision to promote your products and services more freely and frequently.
