Build and they will come (is a lie!)

Find Your Superpower newsletter 064

Read time: 5 minutes   

Topics covered: Storytelling, attraction marketing, entrepreneurship

“Are you Juliana?” said someone who walked up to say hello to me at Starbucks.

I was editing a print magazine for a client that was overdue (all thanks to my delays!).

What ensued was a lovely 30-min conversation with this individual who had formerly worked at a global organization.

I mean, you would not believe the stories this person shared with me. You would not believe the VIPs they worked with, or the delicate and complex situations they had to personally manage. All with such grace and little fanfare.

What a great connection I made that day thanks to LinkedIn, which is the gift that keeps on giving.

Build and they will come is a lie

There was just one small problem with this story: this individual had left said MNC, and had launched their own bespoke outfit providing similar services in the wild.

I quickly searched their LinkedIn account... no LinkedIn company page.

I quickly searched their LinkedIn personal profile... none of those stories were available to a casual reader or potential client searching for these services on LinkedIn.

I immediately replied to this person: “All of this sounds lovely, and you clearly have had an amazing career. But why is it that only I am hearing these stories, and nobody else on LinkedIn? How will your clients know where or how to find you?”

I think it is very disappointing to many people to find out that having hard skills and decades of experience do not necessarily translate to inbound leads and clients lining up to work with us.

For example, we may be an excellent editorial writer and we may think, oh, wouldn’t it be great if I could start a freelance copywriting service and YOLO from a beach bar in Bali? (Oops, my intrusive thoughts.)

It is a rude awakening for many experienced executives to find out that the success of their solopreneur business has got nothing to do with their past skills, but with brand-new skills such as branding, marketing and business pitching.

Here’s the evolution of someone posting on LinkedIn in search of clients for their business:

1/ It feels icky to promote myself on LinkedIn. It feels gross.

The above is what many of my clients tell me, verbatim.

Some of my clients have worked with extremely powerful and important people. It is truly very humbling to have to start from scratch and describe all of their achievements, one by one, to random people.

In some cases, their potential clients could be Millennials or Gen-Zs who are decades younger than them.

Unfortunately, my little mouse, you have left the safe protection of the Gruffalo. You must therefore learn to fend for yourself in this world.

You might wince if you hear someone say the following phrase to you: “Who are you? I’ve never heard of you before.”

But this is the precise moment that you need to swallow your pride and eat humble pie.

Let’s put our pride aside.

Everyone’s gotta start somewhere.

2/ Fine, you want me to go over to the dark side? Sure, I will be Luke Skywalker.

On occasion, the patient may decide to do everything the doctor prescribes, and then some.

You want me to turn into Darth Vader? Bring it on. Let’s do it.

Before you know it, ladies and gentlemen, a humble bragger is born.

You see this every day on LinkedIn, even in the headlines: “Remarkable leader”, “Well-loved coach” and “Experienced manager and team player” .. all forms of flattering adjectives, but bestowed upon themselves.

And their LinkedIn posts, which are supposed to foster trust with their target audience, go on and on about themselves being an excellent industry expert, with no trace of empathy for their reader or how they are here to serve their reader.

Unfollow!

3/ This is so frustrating. None of this is working.

I can easily spot a LinkedIn content creator who is frustrated.

Like really frustrated.

You can also see the evolution of their content, slowly going from positive to negative.

Here’s how the story goes: they read an email newsletter on a rainy Sunday morning by some LinkedIn coach in Singapore who tells them to post about themselves to find clients.

They listen and put their pride aside, and post about their accolades and experience. But it didn’t work! Nobody liked their humble bragger post. Some people even unfollowed them.

According to the law of attraction, the energy we give out is the same energy we receive. When we are fearful and resentful, we vibrate at a much lower frequency.

Their posts turn passive aggressive. They take jabs at their competitors. They write pity-me posts. For attention, they start posting on random topics, like a rant about some famous politician somewhere in the world.

Sadly, they are now in a worse position than if they had not posted at all.

Build authentically and generously and they will come... is the truth

All of the above scenarios are the opposite of what we desire for our fledgling business, which is to send out positive energy into the world in magnetic posts that attract our future clients and help them find us, while repelling those who are not right for us and our business.

This is the fundamental thesis of attraction marketing and inbound marketing. This is the same strategy that I have used to find clients on LinkedIn.

If you are a founder, what we would love to read instead are stories about the people you’ve helped, the lives you’ve touched, the lessons you’ve learnt, the mistakes you’ve made, and where you are today in your business journey. And if your stories resonate with us enough, we might just want to board your business bus and join you for the ride.

If you are a mid-career professional, what we would love to read about are stories about your team’s toughest projects, tips for newbies in your industry, wise words your mentors shared with you, how you work with your mentees, and the real-world outcomes that you have achieved for societal good.

These are the stories we really want to read.

Isn’t so hard, is it?

It just takes a shift in mindset to focusing on what we want to read, instead of what you want to say.

COHORT 3 OF MY LINKEDIN BOOTCAMP IS FULL!

Thank you for your overwhelming response to Cohort 3 of my six-week Find Your Superpower LinkedIn bootcamp, where highly curated groups of mid-career professionals level up on their LinkedIn game together.

We have now trained more than 80 individuals in past bootcamps and you can read many of their testimonials here.

I am glad to work with my dream team, consisting of my co-facilitator LinkedIn Top Voice and Forbes 30 Under 30 Asia 2024 recipient Amanda Cua; as well as two LinkedIn Top Voice guest speakers: James Cheo, CFA, CAIA, FRM and Chris Do.

Cohort 3 of the bootcamp will run from 3 August to 14 September, just right after the summer holidays.

PS: On that note, if anyone is still interested in joining the August 2024 bootcamp, please email us as I will put you on a special waiting list in case anyone has to defer to a future bootcamp.

PPS: Follow our new LinkedIn page: Find Your Superpower 🚀

Thanks for reading issue 064 of my weekly Find Your Superpower newsletter.

For those of you who are new to my newsletter, Find Your Superpower is subscribed to by 38,000+ people, and discusses the following three goals: (1) Making a career transition, (2) Professional branding on LinkedIn, and (3) Reinventing ourselves for the future of work.