In this article I will explain the best solution for passionate and conscious entrepreneurs, such as coaches, healers, and other facilitators, to consistently grow their business online. Why social media marketing alone is not the best solution. How social media marketing often leads to lost time and money, overwhelm, burnout, even self-doubt, or worse, giving up.
Conscious entrepreneurs are entrepreneurs who put people and purpose before profits.
We will discuss the main benefits of social media marketing, the main types of people that are on social media and the alternative solutions.
This article is for you if you consider yourself an ethical or conscious entrepreneur and you want to establish your business permanently on the internet and have a growing impact for the next 10 years or more.
Why are you using social media to market your business?
Do you find social media fun and effective?
Is it really the best way to find new leads and clients?
What’s your audience like?
Engaged, or distracted?
Are they lapping up your content, or just giving you vanity and sympathy comments?
Are they ready to work with you or are you having to convince them that you can solve a problem they are aware of but not actively looking to solve, YET!
Most people are on social media, specifically Facebook and Instagram, for 3 reasons.
- Distraction from themselves and a life they don’t like or believe they can change.
- To find clients, because they’ve been told that’s the best way and there’s 3 billion+ active daily users.
- To connect with family and friends to see what is going on.
Why is everyone’s telling you all you need is social media?
There are agencies from all over the world saying they’ll improve your social media presence, and don’t get me wrong, there are some potential clients on social media, but social media is a lot of work for little or no return.
Too many conversations per potential client and even then, was that client actively looking to solve a problem, or did you convince them?
Not to mention, the second you stop actively sharing and commenting on social media, it stops working for you.
How can you scale your business working that hard on something you’re not even trained to do?
You started your business to serve people, not to be a servant to social media.
It’s time to take your power back.
Truthfully, it’s hard, near impossible to grow a business on social media without the hustle.
You need a better plan if you’re serious about still having your business in 5 years.
What’s wrong with the potential clients on social media?
I did mention earlier there are three groups of regular social media users who could be potential clients that may want to work with you, right?
Most of the time, no!
Why are these people not ready to work with you, yet?
The main reason is they are not looking to solve a problem on social media. They are socialising, digesting content, attention looking for, or all the above.
- The first group, people who are distracting themselves from their problems are not actively trying to solve their problems. They are often in victim mode, poor me mode. That makes working with them hard. They are not ideal clients, they will need convincing, and at least a gentle push along the way. They’ll often say yes just to get attention or expecting a quick fix. Expecting you to wave your magic wand. They will use more of your energy than people actively looking to solve their problems.
- The second group will not doubt join you in a meeting, listen to everything you have to say, and then try and reverse the meeting into a sale for them, showing their manipulative sales techniques, but you’re probably so desperate to make sales by now that their confidence impresses you. They will either sell you appointment setting, social media marketing training or tactics. They have big promises and half the time have know nothing about you yet.
- The third group may also join you in a meeting as they are polite. They may even start working with you. In fact, they are probably the best people to work with, but were they actively trying to solve their problem? Did they even know they had a problem before they spoke to you? Or did you distract them from catching up with friends and family with the promise of something better?
When you convince someone to solve a problem before they are actively trying you are creating more work for yourself. This is another recipe for overwhelm, burnout, and poor results.
There are millions of people on the internet actively trying to solve their problems, you need to get in front of them. They don’t need convincing. They’re ready.
Why do people say social media marketing is internet marketing?
Internet marketing combines multiple methods and locations to give you more reach. It’s all about establishing a permanent presence that can be found easily. To do this you need to be consistently active, and yes, some of that activity needs to be on social media, but not as much time as you’re most likely spending on there.
Internet marketing can take less time and yield better results, which are long term. It’s the only way to get true organic clients, clients who are actively looking for support and guidance. It’s what every successful business and conscious entrepreneur in your niche is doing even if they’re a local business.
Being on social media gives you a social presence, not an internet presence. You are a little fish in a big pond when you only use social media.
When you create a website, and an internet presence you become a bigger fish.
I mean should you really have all your eggs in one basket? Can you really grow a business just on social? Is it really the easiest way?
Often people mistake easy to use, for the easiest way. That is not the case with internet marketing. Sometimes internet marketing can seem overwhelming, but it is much easier in the long-term than social media marketing. Most internet marketing strategies grow with your business and allow you to reap the rewards for years to come.
The reason people mislead others into believing social media marketing is internet marketing is because that is all they know. That is as far as their ability goes.
What’s social media marketing good for?
- Market research. Finding out who your audience are, and what they want and need.
- Growing an audience of potential clients. Potential clients need more work than warm leads. They need to hear from you. You are planting seeds in their minds. You must wait for those seeds to sprout.
- Creating and hosting communities. Most people are on social and so it’s great for communities. Communities are the best way to grow your audience on social. If you’re selective about the members, treat each of them as an individual and provide value.
- Running ads to your audience. This only works if you know who your audience are. You must be specific. It can cost a lot of money if you are too general.
- Creating back links to rank a website. This shows search engines that you are a relevant and important expert. The more back links you have the faster you will get found.
Social media is just a part of establishing, growing, and scaling your business online. It is important but should not be your only method. It’s particularly hard to do when you’re busy. And it can be challenging to get someone else to do for you. Especially if you’re audience are used to your voice and face.
What’s social media marketing not good for?
- Organic growth. It’s terrible for potential clients to find you when they’re actively looking to solve a problem without your effort. The social media search is poor. Only friends of friends will find you usually, and that is if you’re lucky. There are too many people with similar names and ideas.
- Free time in your day. How many hours does it take to do it effectively? Quite a lot. Creating content, then responding to comments and messages.
- Long-term growth. When you stop, it stops. It’s a bit like traditional marketing. I magazines and newspapers, but worse. At least people can keep a magazine or newspaper. Social media posts disappear within 3-5 days.
- Representing your brand. You are limited by their design constraints? Cover photos, round logos, less than 20% text on an image and other things.
- Freedom of speech. It’s getting harder to say what you want these days. Unsubstantiated claims can get you in Facebook jail, as can sharing strong opinions.
- Always having a pleasant day. There are bored and troubled people on social media. They have been labelled “Trolls”. They are people who think they no better or are just looking for an argument, or worse. They often comment on your posts or send you direct messages that are not constructive or unfriendly.
Social media has become great for B2B marketers and coaches.
B2B is business to business in case you need to know.
Why is social media great for these marketers and coaches?
Because there are so many business owners like you on social media NOT getting the results they want, and thus paying these marketers and coaches for guidance.
The illusion is that these marketers and coaches have an amazing presence because of the number of reactions and comments they have and so they can do the same for you.
Yet, the reality is their audience is not your audience.
Why is their social media audience wrong for you?
They have an audience full of people like you, people who want more clients from social media because they were told social media was the easiest and the best way to grow their business. The other half of the reactions and comments are from their marketer and coach colleagues all doing the same thing. All singing each other’s praises and commenting to boost each other’s posts.
A lot of these people are unethical and won’t need your help until their unethical ways stop working.
They are not ideal clients for you.
Where are the clients you need to grow your business?
The clients you need are not looking on social media to solve their problems. They are on Google, YouTube, Pinterest, and even TikTok. These websites have much better searches and more useful content. On these platforms they can search for answers to their problems. They can actively look to solve a problem with less distraction.
The solution to the social media hustle is internet marketing
It takes a similar amount of effort to do conscious internet marketing and create a good expert internet presence as it does to create a good social presence. In fact, when you do internet marketing correctly you also create a social presence, but on multiple networks, not just one.
Most people feel overwhelmed or doubt this works because they’ve tried to do it all themselves without proper guidance, or because they’re struggling on one social media network, and so the thought of being on multiple social media networks is daunting.
It does take a little knowledge, but so does “good” social media marketing. How many hours have you invested already into social media marketing, and what’s your hourly rate?
That’s how much you could have invested in creating a permanent internet presence.
But wait!
All is not lost. You can repurpose your social media content, written and video into your internet presence.
How do you create an expert internet presence as a conscious entrepreneur?
First thing is you need to be sure about what you do. You need to know it inside out.
Then you need to identify who you are doing it for and what they will be searching to find you.
Then you repurpose and create conscious expert content that will offer them value and answer their questions.
The you distribute it well.
There are things you need to know to do this well, but I promise you it’s not as hard as social media marketing and it works for much longer.
Just to reiterate, conscious expert content offers value and is not all about sales.
It puts people and purpose before profit.
How do you establish yourself as a conscious expert on the internet?
Social media is a good step one
When you start your business, it is good to start on social media. It is low investment in the beginning. Before you have clients. That way you get to understand who your potential clients are, what language they use, what their biggest problems are, and what they want and need.
This is called market research. Conscious entrepreneurs do not start businesses on a hunch, or an assumption.
When you have clarity about who you serve and how it is time to become known as an expert in your niche.
How do you become known as an expert I your niche?
Becoming known as an expert in your niche takes an internet presence. Creating an internet presence reduces the hours you spend social media marketing and increases your opportunities of getting found by clients who are ready to work with you, when they are ready.
An internet presence is created using multiple internet marketing tactics. Internet marketing is also known as digital marketing. If you are an expert, or becoming an expert, at what you do, using multiple internet marketing tactics is easier and more effective than social media marketing alone. I guarantee that.
You will want to create a simple content strategy with valuable conscious expert content. Then you distribute it. Then you just repeat what works, making little tweaks as you evolve. This makes you consistent and understood. That makes you appealing to more people. This gets you known as an expert in your niche.
Internet marketing strategies last longer and work for you. They attract potential clients who are ready to work with you. Using these methods means you own your expertise. Every word you write or speak belongs to you in the eyes of the internet. This makes your word, your expert content, yours for life and it works for you for life when done correctly.
It reduces the hours you work and “the social media hustle” and leads to “real” organic traffic.
This frees you up to serve your clients as best you can, without stress, overwhelm, fear or doubt.
It is what I call “Internet Omnipresence” being everywhere like a true expert. When implemented correctly you have a true expert internet presence, not just an amateur social media presence or an ineffective website and email list.
You become visible, valuable, and trusted.
It’s time for you to stop the social hustle and create an internet bustle.
Lay the foundations for your conscious expert legacy with internet Omnipresence.
If you’d like to reduce your daily hustle and lay the foundations of your expert legacy in 2023, book a complimentary, no obligation, and satisfaction guaranteed clarity and connection call with me to find out more.
Thanks for reading.
Have an amazing rest of your day
