#10: 5 Ways to Promote a Yourself Without Feeling Like a Narcissist

A common struggle in the life of a lifestyle entrepreneur is how to promote and showcase your knowledge, brand or message without coming off too salesy or self obsessed.

You want to be able to show or tell the audience how amazing your product or service is and how much you can help them, but how to do so without shoving it in their face and making them run for the hills?

What you need is a strategy that allows you to authentically engage with your audience, add value, and pave the way for organic growth.

Here’s how to promote yourself, grow your brand and network and sell your products and services, all while having fun and helping a lot of people along the way;

1. Focus On Your Customer

To instantly shift attention away from you and onto your brand message, focus on solving your customers’ problems.

A great business is all about providing a solution to a problem or enhancing someone else’s life in some way, so no matter what business you’re in, talk to and about your customers rather than yourself!

This way you’re promoting your knowledge, experience and product or service without overtly promoting it.

How to apply this today; Make a list of all your customer questions. Answer one a day and post on your social media platform of choice. Continue asking for more questions and you’ll never run out of ideas.

2. Know Your Stuff

The more confident you feel about your knowledge of your business or niche, the more comfortable you’ll be sharing information about it.

There’s nothing worse than trying to be something you’re not, so make sure you know what you’re talking about and can back yourself up.

Even if you’re just starting out and using the ‘follow along as I learn’ model (very effective by the way), immerse yourself in your subject matter and share everything you’re learning.

How to apply this today; Sign up to competitor newsletters, listen to podcasts, watch YouTube videos, read blogs or books and ask ChatGPT! Learn to share.

3. Build Your Network

‘Build the well before you’re thirsty’ is a quote I heard on the Jordan Harbinger podcast many years ago. 

One of the most effective paths to fast growth is to be promoted by others. Word of mouth is probably the most powerful marketing asset there is. And if another influencer with a large and loyal following recommends you, even better.

But reaching out to influencers is scary and 99% of the time fruitless as you likely have nothing of much value to offer them, especially in your early days. 

So, don’t wait until you think you need a network, actively start to build one from day one, by being a natural giver, creating relationships with people organically and making friends with people long before you think you may ever need their help.

How to apply this today; Actively promote others by sharing their stories, things you’ve learned from them and any great content they publish that you feel is relevant to your audience.

Create a system for commenting on other people’s posts; send people you want to get to know a DM every now and again to say Hi; attend relevant conferences; and just reach out with good intentions and low expectations.

Also, add so much value to your audience, that over time you become too good to be ignored!

4. Share Your Scars Not Your Wounds

Following Brene Brown’s influential TED Talk on vulnerability and her subsequent books on the same subject, there has been a surge of people openly sharing their struggles online. 

While I commend the bravery of those who choose to share some of their innermost challenges with the world, it’s the journey from struggle to strength that resonates and creates true connection.

Sharing your scars, ie, how you tackled and overcame your problem shows resilience and growth, whereas sharing open wounds, in other words a problem that you have yet to resolve screams “Help me!” and can sometimes be too much for your audience.

Remember, when promoting yourself, your brand and your message, you’re not conducting a therapy session, you’re connecting through shared experiences and wisdom earned.

How to apply this today; Think of a challenge you’ve faced and overcome. How did it make you feel before you resolved it? What did you have to do to resolve it? What’s been the outcome?

If you’ve faced it, it’s likely others have, and they will first want to hear how you’re just as human as they are, and secondly be inspired by how you overcame the issue.

5. Add Abundant Value

Zig Ziglar once said “You will get all you want in life if you help enough other people get what they want.”

What do your audience want and need the most? 

Ask yourself every single day, how can I add more value? Listen to feedback, monitor comments and questions, read emails, and truly hear what it is your audience is asking.

If you’re truly listening, responding, and giving, you won’t need to ‘promote’.

How to apply this today; Publish often. The more content you create, the faster you’ll get feedback from your audience and know what resonates. Then, listen to feedback, engage with your audience and tweak/improve your content or products to better meet their needs.

Always be striving to over deliver. Wow your audience and customers and they’ll reward you by telling everyone else about you!

Self promotion doesn’t have to be narcissistic. Make your brand and business less about you and more about your customer and you won’t go far wrong.

Your Challenge

Make a list of all the main questions your audience/customers want and need answering. (Start with Quora if you’re stuck for inspiration, just search up your niche and you’ll find a plethora of questions you can answer)

Now create a plan of how you can answer a question a day and publish on your blog, podcast or social platform of choice,

Have a fab week! As always Make It Happen!

Jo 🙂