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Originally Posted by Jean-Paul
...and you're right, I would feel like I was selling out to really promote myself. I've gotten over that for the most part, really making some breakthroughs in the last year.
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Yes, there's this pervasive myth that becoming wealthy (or at least, more successful) creates an automatic jerk-status.
Certainly, my own father told me throughout my life that people who live in nice houses, drive nice cars and take expensive vacations are wasteful poseurs who don't appreciate what they have and measure their success only by their posessions.
Unfortunately, he went to the grave with that thought.
Promotion, to me at least, is vital. Especially if you truly want to make a lasting impact on the world and leave a legacy.
If you're a fantastic trainer or coach and yet, because you shun self promotion as something 'bad' you only ever get to impact upon the lives of a very small number of people then truly, are you REALLY using your talents and gifts as well as you could be?
Are you making the greatest impact?
I always think of it from the perspective of a doctor finding a cure for Cancer or AIDS. Could you imagine how ridiculous it would be for her NOT to promote this fact to the world for fear of being deemed self-centred and flashy?
She has a skill, right? She has information and education that can help millions upon millions of people and yet, because self-promotion is 'bad' she treats only her private patients at her clinic impacting upon40-50 people a week.
It would be ridiculous and, indeed, negligent of someone to do this don't you think?
What then of trainers and coaches?
Don't they posess knolwedge, skills and abilities that can and do make a huge impact upon the lives of those they serve?
Could promotion/marketing make an even greater impact?
So, the real question is; if you KNOW you have the knowledge, skills and abilities to truly help many, many people lead healthier, more vital lives, why aren't you?
Promotion isn't selling out. It's buying in... to being the greatest and most impactful coach you can be.
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There are those individuals who market themselves as one of these top trainers who just don't have the substance or experience. They haven't paid their dues, and they use some of these great marketing techniques to promote themselves, leaving those who buy their products feeling jaded about the entire industry. I think that we have seen a lot of backlash against that in the last year.
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A couple of thoughts here.
First, I agree that the current swathe of trainers who have more marketing skills than coaching skills has, at times, created an element of confusion and mistrust in the online marketplace but, well, no more so than in any other industry.
The internet simply propagates and fertilises marketing ideas faster than 'real world' marketing and so you see a lot of crap appear in a very condensed time period.
That said, you see a lot of good stuff too from guys who would never have gotten a book deal (myself included) in 'the real world' if it wasn't for creating such an online following.
So, it's not marketing knowledge or skill that is the problem, it's what is being marketed, right?
But here's the thing (my second point).
You can NEVER control WHAT is being marketed any more than you can control HOW it's marketed.
You as the purchaser have a simple 'buy/don't buy' decision to make in exactly the same way as if you walk into Barnes and Noble, Walmart or anywhere else.
What I'm getting at, is there is always choice and with that choice, there's always an element of risk too that the product won't live up to your expectations.
I think we tend to forget that.
And we also have a tendency to forget that unhappy customers won't return and that they won't spread word of mouth and so, as far as the 'crap' products we often hear trainers complaining about, we don't really have to worry.
If they're so poor then people won't buy them in the first place. : )
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