How to ask people to promote you even if you don’t have a big list to promote them?
How do you attract joint venture partners and CLIENTS with a tiny list?
How do you attract big names to share your message?
First, this doesn’t happen overnight.
The vision for your life and business didn’t happen overnight. Your business won’t succeed overnight either.
Your vision has been pieced together through years of experiences, yep even challenges, and something clicked for you to say “No more… I’m not living someone else’s vision anymore, it’s time to live my own!”
And then your business idea was born. It continues to shift and unfold doesn’t it?
That moment your business vision is born is the moment where most new entrepreneurs make their first big mistake: they look around and see what other folks are doing and think to themselves “Yeah, I can do that…that looks so glamorous.”
And they start their business in comparison.
A reminder: comparison is the root of all pain and it robs all joy.
Tip #1: Realize that this doesn’t happen overnight and you have to start where you are, which is ONE person at a time.
Lisa and I at my first Ignite Your Spark in 2010.
I remember seeing Lisa Nichols on stage for the first time. I was astounded with how damn amazing she was.
My soul was moved. After working with her for a couple of years I saw the behind-the-scenes activity and action. I saw the hard work. I saw who she was on and off stage and it was remarkable; she was the real deal. She was molded into that person her WHOLE LIFE.
Her ability to deliver such power on stage didn’t happen overnight. Every life experience and everything she learned poured out of her when she was on stage and that is why she was so amazing.
Tip #2: Every experience you have in your life can either be a reason to believe your vision or pretend you don’t have what it takes. CHOOSE to learn from every experience and bring that truth to every interaction you have on and off stage.
Lisa Nichols mesmerizing an audience of 600 in Salt Lake City, UT.
Having spoken on stages and hosted my own events that have hosted audiences from 5 to 600 people, I know one thing for sure: the finished product of the event, the speaker in the perfect outfit, the lighting, the stage, the signs, the flowers on the tables – it’s all an ILLUSION.
It may look easy but when you live it, breathe it, love it, hate it, cry over it, laugh about it, BE it, then you see that it’s a process.
We become the person on the stage by living the years of experiences before that moment. And then we DECIDE that we want to be on the stage so we do.
Tip #3: Show up over and over again.
On Sunday I had the honor of speaking to my dear friend’s Essence Immersion Tribe. Lauri Grimshaw-Cox has been building her email list since 2003. She was teaching art classes and filling her car and trailer with her art and hauling it all over the place so she could be in front of her tribe. It happened one art class and one sale at a time.
This compounded over years. She kept engaging with her tribe, even when she was tired and even when it looked like it wasn’t working. She still showed up. She kept her vision going. One step in front of the other.
Now her Essence Immersion Tribe has over 70 women who have paid to be in her presence and learn from her. She had glimpses of that tribe coming together for years and it took years to create the connection to make that vision happen.
Tip #4: Don’t take things personally.
As you build your email list to expand your reach, Lauri’s advice is to not take the unsubscribes personally. As people opt out it opens up the space for others to opt in. And sometimes people are not ready or are just complete with seeing what she had to say…They no longer resonate due to their own shifts and move on.
How do you get people to promote you or speak at your events?
People ask me how I got Lisa Nichols to speak at my first event. I asked her. I was connected with her company through a training company and I showed up, and while shaking in my boots, I asked her. I fulfilled a contract with her to let her know I was serious.
I was scared the entire time.
Tip #5: If you want to BE in a bigger game, you’ve got to PLAY a bigger game. (aka show up)
Another thing that has been so helpful for me to connect to partners including Suzanne Evans, David Neagle and Kendall Summerhawk is I have invested in high-level masterminds since 2010.
Playing in circles where people are continually upleveling makes a difference. It’s why I got my butt on a plane at least once a quarter from 2010 to 2013 to BE in the same room with other like-minded people who also got their butt on a plane to show up and play a bigger game.
Tip #6: Never say never. Just ask!
Too often people tell themselves that they aren’t “big” enough yet to ask the “big names” to speak on their stages or on their telesummits, or to promote them to their list.
You’ve got to ask.
I made my list of people I wanted on my stages and on my telesummits and then I asked people I knew if they would make an introduction. I would show up to events where they were speaking. I would introduce myself. I would reach out and I’d let them know what I’m creating and how it could benefit them.
Have I been turned down? Or even ignored? Absolutely. But I kept showing up and I kept asking.
Below is a powerful lineup I hosted in 2012. It started with asking Suzanne Evans to join the lineup, who was my coach at the time. She was connected to David Neagle so I connected with his team. I already had a relationship with Lisa and the others were either relationships I had already built or I was introduced to because I was showing up in places where I could connect with them.
Tip #7: Know your message and the value you bring.
I’ve had dozens and dozens of people send me speaker requests to speak at my events. Most of them were filled with things like “Here is what I need to speak at your event…I’ll only speak to groups of 100 or more…” It was all about them. (This is not a good way to get speaking gigs by the way.)
The speakers I hired, promoted and had on my stages were people who had a conviction of their message, why they were sharing it with the world and they knew the value they were bringing to the world.
The speakers I promote to this day are speakers who start the conversation with “How can I help you with the vision you have for your event?” “How can bring the most value to your audience and support your mission?”
BE THAT kind of person and people will want to promote you because they know their audience will benefit.
Yep, there are folks who are more concerned with how much affiliate commission they will get when you sell to their audience and personally, I don’t do business with those folks. I do business with folks who are about transformation FIRST and the BRING IT because the sale will always happen sooner or later when you bring value.
In a nutshell:
- Own your value and bring it. Be it. Embody it.
- Ask! Until you ask, the answer is always no.
- Start building now and know that one person at a time turns into email lists of thousands of people.
- This isn’t a race AND stop pretending that you have all of the time in the world to live your life’s work.
