5 Proven Ways To Become An Authority
Let’s just be brutally honest for a moment.
It’s a heckuva lot easier to…
- Generate leads
- Sell products
- Attract new clients/customers
… when people already know who you are because you’ve become an authority.
This is why knowing how to become an authority on your chosen topic is essential for your online business success.
The fact is, when you first start out building a business online it can be hard to generate any buzz.
And even though you’re working hard and trying to get your name out there…
… your marketing efforts might feel like they have little impact.
However, when your audience begins to see you as an authority, everything starts to get a little easier.
People return your calls.
Your blog posts or content get more views, Likes, comments, and shares.
And before you know it… you’re getting more leads, customers, and sales!
So, if you want to maximize your business’s potential…
…you need to establish yourself as an authority in your field.
As you keep reading you’re going to discover 5 powerful ways to build and enhance your authority.
These tips will not only help to build your personal brand, but they’ll also make the uphill battle of building a business much easier.
Sound good?
Then let’s dive in!
So You Want To Become An Authority, Huh?
As Eric Cartman once said…
“You will respect my authority!!”
Okay, okay…
It’s probably not the best idea to go around shouting at people that they need to “respect your authoritah!”
However, you need to do some work to start getting the authoritative recognition that you and your business deserve.
The good news is I’ve listed below 5 proven ways to become an authority online.
These 5 strategies will help build the Know, Like, Trust factor that is required to…
- Build an audience of loyal fans
- Easily sell them your products or offers
Here are 5 ways to build your online authority…
1.) Create High-Quality Informative Content
The best way to become an authority in your field is to share your knowledge and expertise.
A great way to do this is to create high-quality content on a regular basis.
This means you not only need to know what you’re talking about…
… you also have to create killer content that is…
- Easy to read and consume
- Easy to find
- Stands out from the rest of the stuff out there
Listen, everyone and their brother has a blog these days, so it’s simply not enough to blog a little about your favorite topic and think you’ll stand out.
You need to take your knowledge and turn it into highly compelling and informative content that educates your audience and solves their pains.
It’s all about providing massive value.
You can adopt a simple system for generating high-quality content and making the best use of the content that you create.
First, you should write detailed blog posts like this one.
You can use excerpts of these posts for your social media posts.
Once you have enough articles on a similar topic, you can compile them into an eBook to create Lead Magnets.
You can also film video versions of your blog posts to release on YouTube.
This allows you to stretch the use of your content.
Instead of simply writing a blog post, you’re using the same knowledge and expertise for multiple forms of content.
2.) Create Your Own Personal Brand
In order to become an authority in your industry, people need to know who you are.
That means creating your own Personal Brand.
(I discuss this in much greater depth HERE )
But to start with, you need to use your own name as your brand.
Often times I see people make the mistake of trying to be clever at the risk of missing out on critical branding opportunities.
They’ll give themselves a tag line or a knick name, but then leave out the most critical part…
THEIR ACTUAL NAME!
“The Mompreneur” or “Lifestyle By Design” only works if people also know who you actually are.
That means they need to know you…
- Name
- Face
- Story
Fact is… most people would have a hard time buying something online from “Digital Lifestyle Freedompreneur” if they have no idea who the person is behind the tagline.
(Come to think of it, they’d probably still have a hard time buying something from “Digital Lifestyle Fredompreneur” even if they knew who was behind that tagline)
A strong personal brand and is considered an authority go hand in hand.
By all means, feel free to give a name to your business at some point.
However, you should focus your marketing on your own personal brand.
Bottom line: whether you’re…
- writing blog posts
- creating videos
- writing eBooks
- distributing other content…
… you should always use your own name, instead of a business or company name.
Make sense?
3.) Keep Learning
If you want to be perceived as an authority…
… you can’t assume that you already know everything.
(Besides… who likes a know-it-all?)
If you want to build online authority you must remain open to learning the latest and greatest info regarding your specific niche.
This may seem a bit obvious.
“Thanks, Captain Obvious. So you’re saying I have to know stuff in order to talk with people about it, duh!”
So here’s the thing… if you want to become known as an authority, you can’t just be a part of the conversation…
… you’ve got to start the conversation!
You’ve got to stand out!
According to Statista – there are over 332 million blogs online today.
What does this mean to you?
It means that average content, or even decent content… will get completely lost out in the blogosphere.
Therefore, building online credibility is about being on the forefront…
… not mixed somewhere in the middle.
Provided that you have a strong determination to improve your knowledge and skills at every opportunity, you’ll soon start to position yourself as an authority in the eyes of your audience.
4.) Share Your Knowledge
Any time that you have the opportunity to share your opinion on a topic, you should.
This includes…
- Interviews
- Podcasts
- Guest blogging
- Contributing to online forums
These are all great opportunities for getting your name out there and reaching a larger audience.
A few of these options may take a while to achieve.
Before you can establish a name for yourself, you may not get very many invitations to be interviewed or to be a guest blogger.
However, as you build up your experience and credibility you should always remain on the lookout for any opportunity to get in front of a new audience.
One way to speed up the chances of you being interviewed…
… is to interview other authorities first.
By interviewing that authority and giving that person free exposure to your audience…
… they may be more inclined to reciprocate the gesture and offer to interview you.
5.) Go “Deep”… Not “Wide”
Quick story on what I mean by go “deep” and not “wide”.
I remember a few years back I was looking on YouTube for videos about prospecting.
I came across a particular video that was titled…
“4 Tips For Effective Prospecting”
So I gave it a look.
The video was going along well enough but when the person got to their 2nd tip I knew something was a bit off.
The second tip went like this:
“The 2nd tip for effective prospecting is… ask more questions.
The 3rd tip is…”
Whoa… what???
That’s it?
Literally their 2nd tip was “ask more questions”.
Now don’t get me wrong…
… “ask more questions” is a great tip.
But you just leave it at that?!?
No suggestions about what kind of questions to ask?
No examples of questions YOU ask when YOU’RE prospecting??
Nope!
Just the very generic… “ask more questions”.
I immediately knew that this person was NOT an authority on this topic because they couldn’t go deep.
If this person was an authority they would’ve said something like this instead…
The 2nd tip for effective prospecting is to Ask More Questions.
The reason why you should ask more questions is so you can extract more information from your prospect.
Kinda like peeling layers off an onion. You want to peel away the layers to find out what their pain is underneath. That way you can provide them the best possible solution for their pain.
For example: whenever I’m talking to a prospect I”ll first ask…
“So, tell me a bit about your business and why you got involved with it?”
Then I would ask…. “What are two or three of the biggest challenges you’re facing right now with your business?”
Additionally, I might also ask… “If there was one issue you could solve today as a result of this conversation… what might that be?”
By asking open ended questions like the three I just gave you… you’ll have a clear understanding of the problems your prospect is dealing with… and how you can best help them out.
So who would you consider to be the greater authority…
The person who said, “just ask more questions”?
Or…
The person who responded the way I did above?
Going deep means you can talk in-depth on a topic and dive deep into the nuances.
Furthermore, “going deep” is when you can articulate your point by giving specific examples from your own experience.
However, on the other hand, “going wide” is when you merely skim the surface of several topics.
It’s kind of like being a “jack of all trades – but a master of none”.
If you can only “go wide”, you’re in essence exposing the fact that you only have a small amount of knowledge or experience on that particular topic.
So clearly, if you want to become an authority online…
… you’ve got to start “going deep” in your conversations and your content to show people that you truly are an authority on that topic.
Final Thoughts: Become An Authority Online
Combining these 5 proven steps will help you to become an authority online within your specified niche.
There’s no doubt it will take hard work and commitment.
But, the reward is great.
When your audience looks to you for advice and answers on a specific topic…
… they’ll also feel much more comfortable purchasing from you as well.
Use these suggestions in your marketing and watch as you rise up and become a leader in your field.
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