If you want to stand out online, bring in followers and ultimately land clients then there is one thing you need to be doing and that is that you always need to be providing value. Thats why I like to call providing value the golden rule of content creation.
prefer to listen to the podcast? listen below
There are 3 main ways that you can provide value on social media. These are sometimes called content types or content pillars, but essentially it’s the value they’re taking away. After they consume your content they need to feel either inspired, entertained or educated.
Let’s say you’re creating a post, you use an image of your avocado toast and caption it *morning vibes*. That on it’s own isn’t providing enough value to encourage people to consume more, follow or purchase from you.
So using the same idea, let’s add value:
- If you wanted to educate, you could share the recipe, share a fact about breakfast or teach us the benefits of avocados etc.
- If you wanted to entertain, you could share a story about how you used to hate avocados and now it’s your favourite, instead of a photo, you could share a vlog of you making it, create an ASMR video of just the sounds of your breakfast, etc.
- And if you wanted to inspire, you could share a story that relates to how much your health or fitness goals have improved since you started eating breakfast, you could show how your cooking skills have improved etc.
Now pieces of content, don’t just have to hit one of these content types. Sometimes they’re a mixture of all three. But what’s most important is that your ideal client is walking away feeling like their time was well spent because they have received some sort of value in exchange.
So when it comes to creating content, a lot of my students and people I speak to who are online service providers are scared to give too much information away for free because they feared that if they were to give away too much, then people wouldn’t need to or want to invest in their services.
And when I stared my business, this was a thought that I had too.
So if you’re a coach, virtual assistant, social media manager or online service provider who feels like you might be holding back information. I want you to know that I completely understand, you are in this industry because you want to make an impact, you want to help people and you want to be paid for your knowledge and expertise
You’ve probably spent so much time, energy and even money to have the knowledge and skills you have, so if you’ve had to pay for that, why would you give it away for free on social media? and If you do, thoughts like “why did I invest in this in the first place” might be coming up for you.
Let me know if you can relate to this, because I certainly can. When I started my business, I invested in a program and the coach – it was more of a course but the creator of it, said in there that you should never post any educational content.
They said you should be creating problem awareness content and show them what they’re doing wrong, tell them what they should be doing instead and leave the how – or the educational part – for your paid programs. And so I listened to this. I stopped posting educational content and I started calling people out all the time. I was telling everyone what they were doing wrong and all of a sudden i’d driven everyone away and I had no clients left. I’d followed every rule she said, so why was it that I had no clients
And I think it came down to a combination of things. I’d misinterpreted what she meant by problem awareness and so rather than inspiring people and calling ideal clients in through the fact that I had gone through the same struggles as my clients and that I was able to help them get through it. I was literally just telling everyone what they were doing wrong and it was so negative.
Now what happens when someone is telling you so many negative things. You feel bad about yourself, you feel resentful towards the person criticising you and odds are you switch off or move on before they can go any further.
Now i’m not saying theres not any credit towards problem awareness content. I still use it a lot now, but rather than harping on about their pain points, I dive into theirs dreams and desires instead.
The second problem was that I had stopped doing educational content, so I had no tangible advice to help these people, I was calling them out and then expecting them to pay me to find out what to do instead. Sounds so crazy when you put it out in the open, but this was what I and so many other people do online as a content strategy.
Because here’s the thing. If you’re holding back all your knowledge and information they want access to, how do they know that you are credible, that you are able to help them, how do they know what its like to be inside your program or what its like to work with you and become a client of yours.
You have to be able to give away free value, for the sake of free value. Not giving it away because you want a sale, or “if I do this, then it’ll help them and then they’ll come to me” mentality.
You have to share abundantly. You need to be comfortable talking to a brick wall and give away so freely regardless because deep down you know that there is at least one person out there who is listening and who is going to benefit from it.
And when you can do that, naturally people will start to think of you as that expert. So often I have people come into my sphere wanting to work with me who are completely enrolled already without me needing to talk to them and warm them up and that’s because they’ve been stalking my page for weeks and months beforehand.
That’s why it’s so important to overdeliver, because when you keep showing up, naturally it will keep building up over time.
But when you’re withholding that information, you’re doing a huge disservice to yourself and your clients. Becuase if you are worried about giving away all your information, you’re actually adding a ceiling on top of you. If you look deep down into your deep routed beliefs, you’re saying I don’t want to give away all this, because I don’t believe I have any more information to give and so if i give it all away, then why are they even paying me. But I want you to ask yourself is this actually true?
Of course not! You can’t actually cap your knowledge, you’ll never be able to share everything you know because you’re always learning and you’re always growing and your clients or students will always grow with you. They’re supposed to.
So by you showing up and sharing freely, you’re opening up that space and giving them that support, you’re impacting them and naturally enrolling them because you’re providing the value they’re searching for.
If you can build out that, then they will come to you because you’ve shown them through your content that you know your shit, that you are super credible and that you have the knowledge to back it up and because you’re doing that it’s going to be way more inviting and way more encouraging to get them inside your program or working with you in your services.
Let’s pretend you are in the shoes of your ideal client. You are looking for support. Who are you more likely to go to….
Someone who is posting fluff content, touching on surface level stuff who you can feel is being restrictive with what information and content they share, (because lets be honest – everyone can tell) and it comes across as feeling conflicted, you feel unsure whether to sign up, and there’s always going to be that hesitation because they’re hesitating about posting. They want you to come to the party before they are willing too.
On the other hand, if you’ve got someone who is completely open and who doesn’t mind sharing everything because they know they’ll always have more to share. They know that they have people coming to them because the transformation they provide is so valuable. They’re so honest and open and you feel more confident in investing in them, because they’re confident in the way they show up.
People aren’t investing in your program or your service because of the tips and tricks you are giving away anyway. Theres so much more that comes into play. They’re coming to you because of your energy, your personality, and because they see parts of themselves in you. So it doesn’t matter how much education you give away, because being in a paid program of yours will always have a bigger impact anyway. So as long as its valuable and relates to your ideal client you’re always going to be building that connection and that will be enough for them.
If this is something you feel like you could benefit from some support and strategy around, I have Instagram Accelerator Content Audit calls available so click here to claim yours and we’ll do a deep dive into your content strategy, your content itself and give you some tips on how you can use social media to skyrocket your success.
DROP SOME LOVE oN spotify and apple podcasts:
If you enjoyed this episode, go ahead and hit SUBSCRIBE. There is a new episode every Tuesday and I would hate for you to miss a thing. Click here to subscribe on Spotify and Click here to subscribe on Apple Podcasts. AND if you are feeling extra generous, take a few seconds to leave Create With Confidence a review on Apple Podcasts. Or post a screenshot on your Stories with some feedback. Hearing what you think about this episode and the podcast as a whole means the WORLD to me. After all, this is all for you. More reviews = more listeners = better guests & content. So all you gotta do is click here to review, click “Ratings and Reviews” and “Write a Review.” I’ll love you forever!
