Am I A Digital Thought Leader?

I am Erin. I am our Director of Operations and I am here with Amanda Northcutt, our wonderful CEO. We are all about how digital thought leaders and creators can build businesses with rock-solid recurring revenue. So thank you for joining us today. We are so glad to have you. Okay. As we're jumping in, we're kind of talking about what it is to be a thought leader, some issues that might come up. So let's just jump right in. Okay, Amanda, some of our viewers might be wondering, am I a thought leader? Am I cut out to be a thought leader? Do I have potential? I'm not sure if I'm qualified. I'm not sure if anyone will even listen to me. How do you respond to these common fears?

Yeah, unfortunately, we hear these more often than we would like to when I'm in direct selling conversations or doing coaching calls or anything like that. And unfortunately, I hear this more often than not from women. And so we have like a special emphasis on wanting to work with women and help women sort of like discover their area of both expertise and passion and the experiences of their professional and personal life that can come together in the culmination of sort of like a knowledge-based business. And so we help people find out what their knowledge-based business could be, meaning what do I have inside of me? What ingredients do I have inside of me that can be put together and brought forward to the world in the form of like digital products and services, right? And, um, yeah, like, like you said, Erin, everything— I'm not sure if I'm qualified, people won't listen to me. Like, I really, really just— it hurts my heart to hear those phrases from anyone who has experience. And other people, you know, on the outside that know you well probably see that depth and breadth of experience and passion and the wealth of knowledge that you have inside of you that you've accumulated over the course of years, right? We're not talking about people who are quite young aside from like literally, but folks who have gotten a little bit further into their careers, maybe they're at least 30 years old and are not yet just recognizing these, again, these little seedlings of what could be a knowledge-based business and that they have the actual ingredients and makings of enough information and knowledge and expertise and wisdom to package up and pass on to those who need it most. So that's kind of like the big picture why we're here. But anyway, Erin, does that answer your question? I can't remember.

Yeah. Just like, what do you say to people who's battling the fears? You got it. Okay. So how can someone start overcoming these doubts and what are some practical steps they can take?

Yeah. So we're all quite familiar with imposter syndrome, but I, Just finished up a 2-part newsletter series. The next one goes out tomorrow. The one last week on was like, so you're not sure if you're a thought leader, but you know you want to start a business. Here's the actual literal practical steps that you can take to, um, help prove to yourself what others probably already see. And so this is actually, uh, upon reflection, pretty much the exact same exercise that I went through a few years ago. Um, During COVID it was 2022, I was working in Silicon Valley and was doing work that I really enjoyed, but did not find deep purpose and meaning in it. And so I knew there was a little bit something more out there for me, but I couldn't quite put my finger on it. And so I kind of asked myself, if I was coaching someone else through the same situation, what would my advice be? And what came forward was a series of questions that led to this little like Venn diagram exercise that we're going to talk through in a minute. And then the third sort of thought exercise that we'll hopefully get to today. So questions that I would love for you to answer if you find yourself in this kind of specific predicament where, you know, there's something more out there for you, you want to do work that is purposeful, meaningful, you want to own your own business, but you're just not sure like what the hell to do, what to talk about, right? What the basis of your business should be. So questions that I wrote in our newsletter last week. A few of them were, what topics or subjects are you so into that you would talk to a wall about for hours on end if it would listen? That thing that you always find a way to bring up in conversation, no matter like how hard the segue or the rabbit trail you have to pursue. It's like, get to your topic of interest. So that's one, number one. And then another question, what do different people come to you to get advice on over and over? You can kind of find the commonality on what do your Parents, siblings, friends, cousins, neighbors, whatever. Like, what are they coming to you for your specific advice on? And then we all—it's the week after Mother's Day, so happy Mother's Day to all of our moms who we love and love their their honesty and also support and encouragement. What does your mom, BFF, partner, dog, sister, etc. say that you are the best at or that you are really really good at? Those who know you the best know you unlike. Well beyond the surface, you know you at a very deep, deep level. What do they tell you? And then where does your experience lie in your professional life? But not only your professional life, your hobbies, your relationships. Like what have you done? Like have you taken the time to kind of sit down and write out like this is what I've done in my in my life, right? And this is what I enjoy. And then what do you do in your daily life that feels like it's actually worth? Doing, as opposed to just another obligation, something that's got to be checked off the list. And the last question is, if you've job hopped quite a bit, can you step back and again see a common thread linking each professional position that you've held, right? So these are really, really interesting thought exercises. Some questions I'm sure would resonate with you more than others, but they're going to surface things and you're going to be able to step back and look at your answers to those questions and spot trends and that thread again, that's pulled through kind of like your whole life. So I definitely encourage you, if you find yourself in this place, to take the time to answer those questions.

Yeah. So once someone has kind of identified their strengths, their topics, kind of their skillset and their, their lean, what are the next steps in becoming like an actual thought leader?

Yeah. So if you can Well, in terms of actually becoming a thought leader would be, uh, figuring out what your— the middle of a 2-circle Venn diagram, just to really, really simplify this. If you've got your experience listed out in one circle and your areas of like that you're most passionate about listed in the other circle, the topic of your business probably lies somewhere in the middle. And a little bit down the road, there's a 3rd circle that says what will people pay for, and we need to like double-click a little bit further into that and make sure that your idea is validated and that people will purchase it and that it solves problems that are painful enough to motivate people to take action to solve them. But finding that area of overlap between your expertise and passion, share what you know with others, right? And so we're here on LinkedIn. Obviously, there's tons of options. You've got Twitter or X, Instagram, TikTok for at least a little bit longer, YouTube. And so there's email newsletters, which obviously we're huge on. There's so many different ways to kind of like share your thoughts with the world, and I would just start experimenting. And yes, that's a very vulnerable experience, but, uh, you have to— I don't know if y'all are familiar with something called like the spotlight effect. It's like this phenomenon in psychology where we think that people are thinking about us all the time because we're thinking about us all the time, but in fact everyone is thinking about and worried about themselves. They're not so worried about you. So like Um, there's always going to be like internet trolls and stuff like that, but if you are sort of rehearsing, if you will, sharing your area of experience and passion, um, into the world, aside from a few internet jerks, people are very forgiving and they're cool with you like experimenting things. And even like the top creators, most followers in the world, they're constantly experimenting and putting stuff out there and like failing and failing and failing, and they'll hit, you know, have a viral hit or whatever the case may be. But I would encourage you to just test in an environment that feels safe to you and start to see what resonates with people based on how they interact with what you're putting out into the world.

Yeah. And maybe like a personal tip here in the beginning, like getting that momentum, building that momentum can be really challenging. So in your experience, as you have been building different businesses or even your personal like online self, Like, how do you overcome those fears or those thoughts of like, I don't know if I should be doing this? Like, what do you do when imposter syndrome like rears its head?

I like to have proof points, right? Like proof points of my success in the past. And so, you know, like testimonials and things like that are helpful. Even when people interacting with content or replying to a newsletter to ask a question or to give a compliment or something like that is really, really helpful. And so it's, it's reminding yourself of your past successes and also remembering, honestly, like, your worth does not come from your professional accomplishments or lack thereof. Like, you are a valuable and worthy person no matter what you do or don't do. And so, like, detaching your worth from your work— I had to learn this the very, very, very hard way. Those things were so, like, tightly bound in me in my 20s. And I'm a much more mature and hopefully wise person for having gone through that. It's been like very painful separation process. But now I feel much more free to experiment and to try things because I know that like my worth and value as a human and how people who are close to me view me does not, is not reflected in any work that I do or don't do. So.

Yeah. Yeah. That's, yeah, that's really good. I did try to drop the picture of the Venn diagram in the chat, but it won't let me. And a picture. So if you are really wanting to see that, just sign up for our newsletter and then respond to it because we'll see it and we can send you last week's edition of the newsletter. And then you'll also have our newsletters coming to your inbox every week and you won't miss it going forward. So this has been incredibly insightful. Before wrapping up, any final thoughts or advice for viewers who are ready to start their journey as thought leaders?

Yeah, yeah, I do definitely have one more. So this is the subject of our newsletter that's going out tomorrow, so it's a little bit of a teaser. Um, but also you can sign up for our newsletter. The link in my bio, the button under my name, will get you there. But it's newsletter.welevelupcreators.com. Um, so we'd love to have the honor of being in your inbox every week. But, um, one sort of like major proof point that could be very, very helpful to you is to do like a little branching style brainstorming. And so, you know, if you can find in the middle of that experience and passion Venn diagram, we call those your EPs. Okay, find a primary EP, that one subject in there that is really— your heart is drawn to, you feel most passionate about it, and you have deep, deep knowledge and experience in it, right? So write that thing on the left side of whiteboard, a piece of paper. I like to roll out like butcher paper on my big table and like go to town and writing notes and brainstorming, um, or Figma or Miro are all good. But you want to write down your primary EP, and for me that's recurring revenue, like earning recurring revenue online. And then write down 3 subtopics about recurring revenue or whatever your primary EP is. And then under each of those 3 subtopics, write 3 sub-subtopics. So now you have 1 thing on the left, 3 things, and now you've got 9 things. And then you want to write 3 more sub-sub-subtopics, if that's even a thing, um, for each of the 9 sub-subtopics. But anyway, you end up with 4 ideas around a primary EP. If you can— that kind of like rolls off the tongue pretty quickly. You can do that in 10 or 15 minutes. Like, you have the absolute potential to be a thought leader in that subject matter area, whatever your primary EP is. And if you can go 2 layers deeper, you actually end up with 243 ideas you are an expert at that point. Like, unequivocally, um, undeniably, you are an expert. And so, um, that's a really interesting proof point for you to, to take yourself through. And just, um, putting pen to paper— this exercise doesn't take long because this is the area that you have the most experience with and you're most passionate about. Um, and then that's also like really solid content ideas as well. You can make like infinite amounts of content, um, even just if you get to where you're 3 branches out, you've got 40 ideas. So that's a really, really powerful exercise, not only to clarify in your mind what your primary area of experience and passion is, but also out of content ideas. I would totally do this if you already have a business and you're already rolling. That's a really helpful thing to do. Um, yeah, so that, that's my advice. I would actually like put pen to paper and Quiet the bullshit thoughts in your mind that are telling you that you don't know enough, you aren't enough, you aren't worthy enough, people won't listen to you, and all those other things that are probably running through your brain constantly. Let's give your brain some proof and kind of like shut those down and move forward with your life and your business.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's really good. Awesome. Well, thank you so much, Amanda, for those encouraging words and tips and tricks. And remember guys, don't forget to subscribe to our newsletter if you do not already follow us. I dropped a link in our chat so you can find it easily there. And don't miss our live next week. So thank you so much for joining us. We appreciate you spending time with us. Have a great week. Bye.