Don’t let the word “influencer” be defined as someone who showcases their makeup and clothes. Don’t miss out on becoming an influencer to those who are looking for someone like you.
The term “influencer” can mean different things to different people but for my purpose, it means someone who can share and give great knowledge and guidance. And as a single entrepreneur, you can do just that!
So how do you become an influencer? It takes and trust. You begin by building a small group of people who are looking for your unique expert wisdom, guidance, and panache. It takes time and error to find your own niche and build your skills, knowledge and grow into your brand.
Inc Magazine has shared 10 steps to becoming an Influencer:
1. Find Your Niche
2. Do Something Unique
3. Pick Your Social Media Channels and Groups
4. Create A Social Media Strategy: Plan out your content. Make a list of the content you want to create for the next month or pick a theme. Decide how often are you going to post. When will you post? Be consistent.
5. Create Great Content: Make sure you create the best content you can. It’s your brand.
6. Be Consistent: My favorite podcasts come out on the same day and time every week. Your content should be the same way. I post new articles on my blog every Tuesday at 5 PM. You need to give your audience a reason to subscribe. If you don’t create new content, on a consistent schedule, why would they need to subscribe? They’re not missing anything.
7. Promote: You spent all this time creating content, but what good is it if nobody sees it? Remember, it’s 20% content creation and 80% promotion.
8. Collab: The quickest and easiest way to grow your audience is by working with a bigger influencer than you. Remember, there’s more in it for you than the bigger influencer, so you’ve got to help them out to make it worth their while. I figured out this trick with my Forbes articles. If I interviewed big influencers, and let them promote what they wanted, they would share the article and it’d get a ton of views.
9. Engage With Your Audience: This will be easy at first because won’t have a big following. Respond to every comment, follow people back, etc.
10. Look At The Data: What content is working? Who is your audience? Look at the analytics. What does your audience look like? Create content that is true to you and that resonates with your audience. Finally, ask your audience what they want to see more of.
What do you think?
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Inspired by and partially curated from Forbes, “How To Become An Influencer”.
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Sabrina Espinal
Sabrina&Company
Image © Kelly Sekkima