How to Go from Unknown to Unforgettable

Good morning everybody, how are you? Welcome to another Monday Morning Mentor. I am Chad Thibodeaux, and today what I'm gonna do is I wanna talk with you guys about how to become known for just one thing. In other words, how do you go from unknown to unforgettable? So a couple things I want you to understand is that first, nobody becomes known just because people have seen your name before. In fact, you don't want to become known just for your name. What you want to do is you become known when people can connect your name to one specific problem or one specific result or one specific idea. When you can become known for a specific problem you solve or result you get or an idea you bring to the table, when you can become known for that, then it's much easier for people to do what's called association. And when you have association, then the rememberers, so to speak, make more sense in the minds of people. So when somebody sees you, they may not be able to remember your name, but that they can associate you with that problem, that result, or that idea. It just reminds me of like the other day I was in a grocery store and somebody walked up to me and said, "Chad." And I looked at this person and I knew I knew this person, I recognized this person, I could not think of this particular person's name. And then she told me her name and I still had a blank, like, oh my gosh, like why should I know this person? And then this person brought up, you know, I used to go to your church, blah, blah, blah. And then once I was able to associate the location or the proximity to where I knew her, then everything came back. Well, the same thing is true in the online coaching world, in the online business world, is you want to be able to not just be known for your name, but for the proximity of the result of the problem you solve or the idea that you bring to the table. And most people stay unknown because what happens is they keep trying to show the market everything they can do. And so they'll talk about leadership one day, they'll talk about mindset the next day, they'll talk about sales the next day, and then they wonder why nobody knows what to hire them for. Or worse yet, they'll talk about politics one day and, and, you know, they get a big following around that, and then they'll talk about something else another day and they get a big following around that, and they never get a following around the one thing that they want to become known for. And what I've learned is that the market does not need to know everything that you can do, okay? We're all pretty gifted people, we're all pretty talented people, and we can do all kinds of things. And so they don't need to know everything that you can do. The market needs one clear reason to remember you. And you, you can have several skills, okay? There's nothing wrong with having a lot of skills, and you can offer a lot of services. You could eventually even build multiple streams of revenue. But if you want to become known, you need one front door into your world. So here's what I want you to remember: you can do many things, but you cannot become known for many things. Did you hear me? You can do many things, but you cannot become known for many things. So what I want to do is, is I want to help you figure out like why is it that perhaps you're not becoming known, or why is it that talented people sort of stay unknown. Well, there are thousands and thousands and thousands of talented coaches and consultants and speakers and creators and service providers who are better than the people getting all of the attention. The problem is never talent. It's that nobody knows what to remember them for. When somebody sees your name or they hear your voice or they, let's say they watch you speak on stage or they visit your website or they look at your content. What they're trying to do is they're trying to place you into a category. And here's the questions they're asking. They're asking, "What's this person an expert in?" "What problem do they solve?" "What should I introduce them to?" "When would I need them?" "Why should I keep paying attention?" If the answer to any of those questions is unclear, what happens is your audience just moves on. This is why being visible is not the same as being known. And so one of the mistakes I see so many people is, is they just try to go live every day or they try to produce content every day or whatever, and they're trying to get visibility. And what I want to encourage you to remember is that visibility is not the same as being known. In fact, you can be known for something and have a little visibility and still make tons of impact and tons of income. You could become visible but not be known for something, and you can be broke as a joke. This is, this is what a lot of influencers that I know, they have millions and millions and millions of followers, But they make no money. And so, you can have millions of followers and still not be known for anything. You may post every day and still not be known for anything. You may attend every event, appear on every podcast, and shake every hand in the room. But if people can't explain what you do, your visibility is not becoming a reputation. Being seen creates creates awareness. Being associated with one valuable thing creates a reputation, and that's what you're trying to do, is you're trying to build a reputation. So what I would venture to say is if you're trying to go from unknown to unforgettable, that I would encourage you to build a reputation. By the way, guys, I've got a ton of notes here that I'm not going to get to. I've got— oh, what is that? Oh, 12, 14 pages of notes. I'm not going to get to any of these, but if you guys want to know How to become known for just one thing, just simply comment notes inside of the chat here, and I'll be sure to have my assistant get these to you as soon as we're done. Okay, but let's, let's do a little reputation test. Okay. If you're going to try to become known for something, then you have to build a reputation around something. Okay. So visibility is not what we're looking for. Awareness is not what we're looking for. Reputation is what we're looking for. So here's the reputation test. You need to ask yourself this: when my name comes up in a room that I am not in, what do I want somebody to say I am the person for? Okay, let me say that again. When your name comes up in a room that you're not in, what do you want someone to say that you are the person for? You know, you don't want them to say, "Oh, he's a really good guy," or, "Oh man, she's awesome," "Oh my gosh, I know her, she's so cool," right? You don't want to hear things like, "Oh yeah, you know, she does a ton of things." Okay, you don't want to hear, "You should follow him, he posts some really good stuff." Because those are compliments, but they're not positioning. What you really want someone to say is, "You know, she's the person to call when your marriage is in trouble." Or, "He's the person who helps experts turn their knowledge into a profitable event." You know, she's the person who helps high performers improve the quality of their sleep, or he's the person who can take your expertise and put it in a keynote that ultimately sells. This is what it means to become known. Your name becomes connected to a specific need. Write that down. Your name becomes connected to a specific need, and when the need appears, your name appears with it. With it. And so, so what you're trying to do, if you're trying to become, um, if you're trying to move from, from becoming unknown to unforgettable, remember you have to build a reputation. And the way you build a reputation is when your name appears and is connected to a specific need, like a result, a problem you solve, or a specific idea. Okay, so You also have to know that your one thing is not everything, okay? The one thing you're going to become known for is not necessarily everything that you do. And one of the biggest reasons people resist choosing one thing is that they're afraid of being limited. They're afraid of being put in a box. And what they think is, "Well, what about all the other things I know how to do?" Or what if somebody needs something else? Or what if I get bored? Or what if I choose the wrong thing? What if narrowing my message costs me opportunities? This is the limiting beliefs that happen in so many people's minds. And what I want you to know is choosing one thing does not mean you can only do one thing. It means you give people one clear way to enter your world. Think about a restaurant, okay? A restaurant may have 50 items on the menu, but it's often known for just one thing, okay? It may be known for steak, it may be known for the pizza, it may be known for the best breakfast in town. That does not mean the restaurant only serves that one item. It means that there is a reason people talk about it. There's a reason why people recommend it. There's a reason why people remember it. There's this place in Ventura, I can't even think of the name of the restaurant. Actually, but I know how to get there, and what I know they're known for is they have these biscuits. They're like 6 inches tall, and when you open them up, they're just light and fluffy. They're just like the most amazing, decadent, delicious things you've ever put in your mouth, and they have this raspberry strawberry jam, okay? It's a hybrid between a raspberry and a strawberry, and they make this jam. It still has the seeds in it, and you put this jam along with butter on this biscuit, and oh my God, Goodness gracious. Let me tell you, that's what they're known for, but that's not the only thing they sell. Your one thing is not the full menu. It's the reason why people walk through the door, and you have to give people a reason to walk through the door. So I want you to write this down. I want you to be narrow in your reputation and broad in your ability. Okay? Be narrow in your reputation and broad in your ability. Broad in your abilities. Okay? Once someone comes through the door, you may discover several ways to help them. You may offer consulting, or you may offer events, or you may offer coaching, or you may offer speaking, or you may offer courses, or you may offer services, or some type of implementation. But the market should not have to memorize your entire business model before it knows when to call you. Okay? You need to be able to know what is the one thing that you want to become known for. So, here's a way to say this. Let me see if I can share my screen with you. Okay, let me see if I can get this open here. So, what I want you to do and I don't know why my— there it goes. What I want you to do is I want you to take the one thing. Let me see if I can share this. Okay, I want you to take the one thing. And I want you to look at it as it has 3 parts, okay? Now if I were my friend John, I would be doing a beautiful Venn diagram, okay? But I want you to look at this, okay? So the first thing I want you to do is I want you to say, okay, who is the person you serve? Okay, who is the person you serve? What is the problem you solve? And then what is the result? Okay, what is the result that you want to help them create? Okay, okay, so, so what, what's the person? Okay, who's the person? What's the problem? What's the result? Okay? What I want you to do is I want you to see if you can narrow this strong one thing down to this, okay? So for instance, I work with coaches. So that identifies the person, okay? So that identifies the person, but it does not identify the problem or the result, okay? So let's say that you, you know, I work with coaches and let's say I help them gain visibility or help them grow. It's still too broad, okay? People come to me when they have expertise but cannot turn it into an offer people buy. So now the market can recognize the moment when someone needs you, okay? So another example is like I help— I teach public speaking. That's a large category. I help speakers create better presentations. That's slightly clearer, but it's still broad. You could say, "People come to me when they have a message but do not know how to turn it into a keynote that leads to revenue." Okay? So that's the person, that's the problem, that's the result. You have to know these 3 things, okay? So let me come back and see if I can help us do this. So for instance, I said that I work with coaches, that's my person, okay? I help coaches grow, okay? And then the result, people come to me when they have expertise but you cannot turn it into an offer that people buy. That's mine, okay? And so that's why like right now I'm on a tour doing my Stupidly Irresistible Offers, right? And what I'm doing with that is I'm helping people take their expertise and turn it into a stupidly irresistible offer. That's my one thing. Now is that the only thing I do? No, it's not. That's not the only thing I do, but right now that's the part of my business business that I want people to be known for, okay? Is I want to be known for the guy who works with coaches who have a visibility issue, but they're really good at what they do, and I want to take that and I want to turn it into an offer that people can't say no to, okay? And so there's 4 decisions that in order to do this, there are 4 decisions that you're ultimately to have to make, okay? There's 4 decisions that you're ultimately going to have to make if you're going to become known for just one thing, okay? So here are the 4 decisions. The first one is— decision 1 is you have to choose the problem. You have to choose the problem, okay? The problem should relatively be easy to recognize. It should be important enough that people want to address it. It should be expensive enough that solving it creates real value, and it should also be specific enough that someone knows when it's happening, okay? So, personal growth is not a clear problem. Leadership is not a clear problem. Business success is not a clear problem. Those are broad categories. A stronger problem sounds something like this, okay? My team is growing, but I'm still making every decision. Or I have plenty of expertise, but I cannot explain my offer very clear. Or I'm getting leads, but very few of them are becoming customers. Or my marriage is not over, but we've stopped communicating. Or I'm speaking on stages, but the speeches are not leading to revenue, or they're not leading to more business. See, those are recognizable problems. Okay, so the question you're gonna ask when you're making this decision, okay, when you're making the 4 decisions, okay, the— we're gonna call this the 4 decisions. The question to ask here is, what is happening in someone's life or business immediately before they need me? Okay, and that question will often reveal your position position more clearly than asking, "What do I do?" Okay? So, let me say that again. So, what's the question you're gonna ask? Is what is happening in someone's life or business immediately before they need me? Okay? What's going on? And when you can answer that, then it'll get clearer. It'll get clearer. Second thing is you need to choose the result. Now, notice I'm putting these in singular terms. Okay? After choosing the problem, now you would— now what you want to do is you want to identify the result you want to be known for producing. So this result must be easy to understand and easy to repeat. So just as the problem that we, we talked about earlier should be easy to recognize, it should also be important, it also should be expensive, it also should be specific. Okay? Well, the result very much follows a similar pattern. The result must be easy to understand and easy easy to repeat. For instance, many people use words that sound meaningful, but do not tell the market what changes. So for instance, they'll say things like, well, I help them get transformation, or I help them get alignment, or here's a big one, I help them get freedom, or help them get confidence, or help them get clarity, or I help them with empowerment, or help them with growth. Those are all good words. The problem is none of them are measurable, and even though they may describe part of the experience, they do not give people a concrete picture of the outcome. A reputation— that's what you're trying to build— spreads when the result is easy to explain. So instead of saying, "I give entrepreneurs clarity," say something like, "I help entrepreneurs turn all their ideas into one offer they can confidently sell." See, that's, that's much better. Instead of saying like, well, I empower speakers, I want you to say something like, I help speakers create a keynote that naturally leads into a paid offer. See, that's specific. Instead of saying I help business owners grow, say something like, I help service businesses turn 12 to 24 qualified prospects into a 6-figure weekend. See, the second version in each of these examples Examples gives the market something it can understand. It can remember it. It can repeat it. So, here's what I want you to remember. Write this down. People may appreciate your process but they remember the result. They remember the result. So, you have to choose the problem. You have to choose the result. And the third decision you have to make is you have to choose the phrase. You have to choose the phrase. I like making things memorable, okay? Once you know the problem and you know the result, now you need language that makes the idea easier to remember. You need a phrase that can travel with you. It could be something like, you know, the name of your framework. Like I have the Pointer System. It could be the name of your offer. It could be a clear promise. It could be a strong point of view. It could be a phrase that describes the problem. It could be a phrase that describes the result. Examples sort of include things like, like, here's my programs, like Small Event Big Profit, or The Six Figure Keynote, or 12 to 24 People, Six Figures One Weekend, or Stop Calling Yourself a Life Coach, or Decide What Part of Life You Change. Okay, another one I say is do not create more content create a reputation. A strong phrase becomes a verbal handle and that's what you're trying to do. People remember handles. When you're trying to build a reputation, you want to build a handle. So for instance, like if I was to say like McDonald's, "Do-do-do-do-do," like everybody would know exactly what follows it. "I'm loving it," right? Okay, back in the day it was like "Your way, right away" at Burger King now. There's phrases Phrases. Wendy's used to have one called "Where's the beef?" These are handles that give people something they can hold on to and then ultimately pass to someone else. And this is how your reputation is built. When someone asks what you do, you should not need 5 minutes, 7 different qualifications, and a freaking diagram to explain it. You simply need language that makes people say, "Oh, I understand." understand exactly what that means. The phrase does not need to explain every detail. This is where some of you guys get in trouble. When we create payoff statements or we create personal value propositions for a lot of coaches, they will take 35 seconds to a minute to give their statement. And I'm like, "No, 8 seconds or less." That's what you're looking for. It needs to create enough clarity and curiosity for the conversation to continue. And if your phrase tells everything, it ultimately tells nothing. So I want you to create a phrase that makes sense, okay? The fourth thing is, is I want you to choose, I want you to choose to repeat it. I want you to choose to repeat it, okay? This is the decision that a lot of coaches that I work with sort of fail to make. So they'll choose a message, they'll use it for a couple of weeks, and then they get bored and they move on. The audience has barely noticed the message by the time the person delivering it is tired of saying it. I want you— I want you to, to hear this. The audience has barely noticed the message by time you are delivering it, or by time the person person delivering it, excuse me, is tired of saying it. It reminds me back in the day when I was a worship pastor and we would choose songs for the worship experience. I remember people on my team would say things like, "Oh my gosh, Chad, I'm just so sick and tired of singing this song." They're just sick and tired of it. I'm like, "I understand that, but the reason why you're sick and tired of it is because we may have done it 3 out of 4 Sundays, you've rehearsed it every week multiple times per week, plus you've done it in multiple— 2, 3, 4, 5 different services on the weekend— and so this is very familiar to you because you're the one delivering it. But the person in the audience, they probably only come 1 out of 3 Sundays, they probably came late the one Sunday you sang the song, and so what's familiar to you is unique to someone else. And so a lot of times when I'm working with coaches on their messaging, most of the time they give up their specific messaging and they go super broad before the audience has actually caught on. And I don't love that. And so what I want you to remember is even though the market has only heard it once or twice, you may have said it hundreds of times. Let me, let me repeat that. Let me say that differently so you can— it sounds better. You have heard your message hundreds of times. That's what I'm trying to say. You've heard your message hundreds of times, but the market may have only heard it twice. Repetition may feel unnecessary to you because you're the person speaking it, but repetition creates recognition for the person listening. Let me say that again. Repetition may feel unnecessary to you because you're the person speaking it, but repetition creates recognition for the person listening and ultimately builds reputation. And so you don't need to become known by introducing a new idea every week. You become known by returning to the same valuable idea from many different angles. So write this down: your content can change without your position positioning changing. Okay, your content can change without your positioning— without your positioning changing. So let's recap. Okay, so as we're coming back here and we're, we're realizing that what we're trying to do is we're trying to go from unknown to unforgettable. And you don't become known because more people have seen your name. You become known when people can connect your name to one specific problem, one specific result, or one specific idea. And you can do many things, but you cannot become known for many things. And one of the reasons why people like you possibly stay unknown is because you have not given them a reason to know you. And talent isn't why they should know you, okay? Talent isn't why they should know you. Your audience is asking, what's this person the expert in? What problem do they solve? What should I introduce them, you know, who should I introduce them to? Or when would I need them? Or why should I keep paying attention to them? And so what we said is, we're trying to, instead of building recognition, we're trying to build a reputation. And so the reputation test is you want to ask yourself, when my name comes up in a room that I'm not in, What do I want someone to say that I'm the person for? Okay, and you're trying to figure that out. And something else we said is that your one thing is not everything that you do. So a restaurant can be known for their, their amazing biscuits, but biscuits aren't the only thing that they sell. And so we said that a strong one thing has 3 parts: it's the person you serve, the problem you solve, and the result you help create. Okay, and a really good way to say that is people come to me when they have expertise but I cannot, you know, but cannot turn it into an offer people buy. That's a specific problem and a result they're trying to get. And so, we walked you through that and we said there are 4 decisions. You have to choose the problem. You have to choose the result. You have to choose the phrase that you want them to remember and you have to be willing to choose to repeat it. Now, let's move on. I want you to build a body of work around your one thing. So if you're watching this live, you're watching this on repeat, I want you in the comments somewhere to tell me what is the one thing you want to be known for. Don't just pull it out of the air, go back and watch this training again and put the one thing in the framework like, like I gave you, okay? Because being known for one thing does not mean saying the same sentence every day. It means creating creating a body of work around one central territory. Suppose you want to be known for helping experts create small profitable events, like I do. Okay? What you could teach, like, I wrote out a list of things that I teach, I'm going to tell you this. So like, I want to be known as the small event guy, I want to be known as an offer guy. Okay? So I could teach things like why smaller events can to be more profitable large events. I could teach like how to choose the right topic or how to price the ticket or how to find the first 12 attendees or how to choose a venue or how to structure the day or how to create the right offer, how to sell without making the event feel like a pitch. I could teach things like how to follow up after the event or how to avoid the mistake that makes events unprofitable or I could teach on how to turn one event into a repeatable business model or or how your clients use small events to create revenue. All the things. You're creating different pieces of content. You're telling different stories. You're answering different questions. You're addressing different objections. But every piece of content is building the same reputation. And over time, people begin to associate your name with small profitable events, like I would, okay? And so, if you're wanting to be known for small profitable events, and you're teaching all that content, now you got the reputation of being the events guy. That's how I got mine. This is how a reputation is built, okay? So there's 5 content— 5 types of content that you need. So let me share my screen again here with you. There are 5 types of content that you need. Okay, so hopefully you can see this. Number 1, you need to— this is the 5 types of content. I'm trying to do all this on one sheet here, so hopefully you can see it, you can understand and not get yourself confused. Okay, so there are 5 types of content that you need. Let me move this over so I got plenty of room to write here. Oops. Let's try this again. Okay, 5 types of content. Okay, so the first type is you want to be able to teach, and I like that word, teach the idea. Okay, so this is what you're wanting to be known for, the reputation you're trying to build. You're going to explain the principles, the process, and the framework behind your one thing. Okay, Help people understand the problem differently, okay? So what are the principles? What's the process? What's the framework behind your one thing? The second thing you're gonna do is you're gonna challenge the old way. Okay, the old way, okay? So what you're gonna do is you're gonna identify mistakes, assumptions, or conventional approaches that that keep people stuck, and you're gonna, you're gonna teach and take a clear position. The third thing you're gonna do is you're going to tell stories, okay? You're gonna tell stories. Share stories about yourself or your clients and people who have experienced this particular problem, because what stories does is stories makes the idea easier to understand and easier to remember. Remember, when you're trying to build a reputation, they need something to remember. And so the easiest way to get someone to remember and to make your idea sticky is to tell a story. The fourth thing is, is show proof. Show proof, okay? I want you to use results or examples or demonstrations or before and after comparisons, use case studies. Proof moves your message from interesting to credible because there's nothing wrong with building a reputation around something that works, okay? There's nothing wrong with that, okay? What's wrong is when you build a reputation that's confusing people and they're not 100% sure it works, okay? And the fifth one is I want you to make the invitation. I want you to make the invitation. Tell people how they can take the next step with you. A reputation should eventually lead somewhere, okay? You're not building an audience simply so people can know your name. You're building trust around a result you can help people achieve. So if you believe that you can get a result that people can you can achieve, then build your reputation around that, and then make sure you have a really solid, clear call to action. Okay? And so this is what I want you to do. Okay? And so as you're building this— let me clear this up so it's easier to explain. I hope I can get all this without messing this up. There we go. I'm gonna show you this here and so hopefully you guys can, hopefully you guys can see this. There we go. So we're gonna start up here. So what we said is if you're going to build a reputation, you have to build a reputation around one thing, okay? You have to build a reputation around one thing. You have to know the person you serve, the problem you solve, and the result you help them create. Create? Once you're clear on that, then there's 4 decisions that you ultimately have to make. Okay, decision 1 is you have to choose the problem, the singular problem. You have to choose the result, the singular result. You have to choose a phrase, you have to choose to repeat it over and over and over again. And then once you do that, now the way you're gonna, the content you're gonna create is you're gonna teach the idea, okay, and we We came in and we talked about the different types of ideas that you could create, the principles, the processes, the frameworks. Okay, then you have to challenge the old way. So in other words, there is an old way of doing things and there's your new way. And so you're going to identify the mistakes that people are probably making or the assumptions they're probably making or the conventional approaches that keep people stuck. Then you're going to tell the stories, okay, share stories about yourself or your clients and people who have experienced this particular problem because these stories make your, your one thing rememberable, and rememberable is the fuel to reputation. Then you're gonna show proof, okay? You're gonna come in here and you're gonna, you're gonna, you're gonna use the results and the examples and the demonstrations, the before-and-after comparisons, the case studies, okay? And then you're gonna make an invitation. You're gonna do some kind of call call to action for them. And if you do this, then I really believe that you can build a reputation and go from unknown to unforgettable. So let me give you what I'm calling my 30-day reputation challenge. So for the next 30 days, for the next 30 days, let me share, let me get myself on big screen here. So for the next 30 days, I want you to make one thing your central message. Don't change it. Don't change it. Don't introduce a new identity every time you post. Don't assume people already know what you do. Okay? They don't. For 30 days, I want you to use one clear description of what you do. In fact, put this on your social media today. Second thing, for 30 days, I want you to teach one central idea from several different angles. I gave you 5 different angles. Number 3, I want you to tell stories connected to that idea. Number 4, I want you to share proof connected to that result. Number 5, I want you to use one repeatable phrase. Number 6, I want you to make one consistent invitation. And number 7, I want you to ask other people what they believe you're known for. At the end of 30 days, I want you to ask 5 people, "When you think of me professionally, what do you think I'm the person for?" Don't explain your answer first, don't give them hints, listen to what they say. And their answers will show you whether the message you believe you're communicating is the message they're actually receiving. Okay? So, Here's the little content filter, I want you to write this down. Before you publish, before you present, before you promote, before you create anything, I want you to ask this one question: Does this make it more likely that someone will connect my name to the one thing I want to be known for? Let me say that again. Before you do anything, before you publish, before you present, before you promote, before you create anything, Does this make it more likely that someone will connect my name to the thing I want to be known for? And if the answer is yes, it's building your reputation. If the answer is no, well, it may be good content, but it's not helping you become known for your one thing. You can still talk about your family, you can still talk about your travels, you can still talk about your beliefs, you can still talk about your interests, you can even still talk about politics. You're a human being, you're not a billboard. But when it comes to your professional reputation, keep bringing, keep bringing people back to the same valuable territory and you will build a reputation around one thing. You become known when your name and your one valuable idea becomes impossible to separate. So when they think of Chad, they think of offers. Sometimes when they think of Chad, they think of events because sometimes that's the lane I'm in. Right now, they're thinking— when they think of Chad, they think of stupidly irresistible offers. That's what I'm wanting to become known for. That's the one thing I'm bringing everybody back to. So if you're trying to become— if you're trying to go from unknown to How do you do unforgettable? Become known for just one thing. Alright everybody, hopefully that was helpful to you. Leave your thoughts and your comments inside of the communication here. I'd love to read it. And also, if you would like all of my notes on this, just simply put "notes" and I'll tell you exactly how to get those. Alright guys, God bless. We'll see you next time on Monday Morning Mentor.