How do you sell yourself? Tricky question, you would say! Especially for most people, who have nothing to do with the marketing or the sales ring (and who even they don’t want to)! But, marketing is not just for marketing or sale people. Today to know how to market, how to sell, and more importantly, to know how to sell yourself is an essential skill for every person who he/she is active at our modern personal, business and social environment.
You may think, marketing or selling is not necessary when you know exactly what you want to do in your life! You might want to write for instance, or meet new people, or travel, or build something new without a commercial value, or just do some interesting stuff! So why you should bother with marketing? And if you don’t have to sell anything, you do not need to focus on sales!
Right? Wrong!
In today’s highly connected and virtual interacting ecosystem, you constantly “transact”, either physically or virtually with many more people than you have done at earlier times. Think about it. Once upon a time you casually strolling the main street of your town or village to meet your friend to shop, to entertain yourself, to have a good time, to associate with like-minded people, etc.
At that time, the maximum number of people you possibly have to meet and associate with were not that large at any ordinary day. Let’s say approximately 25-30 people on a normal day, if you had a highly profiled job and many associates, or if you were invited to a large meeting or party. But the actual number of people you would really have the chance to associate with was even less. Not more than 5-8 people. You could also use the telephone for communication, but it was not the same! If you were of a little introvert nature, your chances of socialized with many people or joining a high prestige group in your town were seriously diminishing!
Today internet has changed all this! Today you have more than ever the chance to meet virtually, as many people you like and interact with them! That means you have to establish a friendly “Face” (a concrete virtual present), which would convince other people that you are sincere and a worthy person to attend to and spend some time with! As easier as it gets today for you to connect with anyone, so more difficult it becomes for you to maintain such connections. That’s why you have to “sell” your self properly, in a sense, that would make people want to spend time with you (even virtually).
This interaction, if cultivated properly, would provide you the initial base for providing value to the other people and eventually gain their trust. Your constant presence and your fame as “a-keeping-your-word-guy” (or gal for that matter) would forge authority in your field, and would make the people reference you or use you as a mentor, assistance of a valuable partner in business!
Gradually you start forming a tribe, a community, mind-alike followers, who want to interact with you and contribute or propagate your message, your feelings, your emotions, your thoughts, your ideas, your items of value, your artifacts, your products, your services, etc. As much as you interact with them, you empower them and you involve them in what you do, as more as you start and continue to mentor small groups according to your expertise and provide good results, you will continue to grow your network and yourself.
Marketing is about transformation. You aim at transforming the lives of people via a product, a service, an idea, a cause or a dream.
So marketing may do not be a bad thing after all! What you would say! How would you better sell yourself?