TES 065 - Build a Thought Leader Platform

Hey there, real quick before we jump into the episode, listen, if your earnings treadmill hasn't set you free yet, running faster won't either. Listen, hustle without principles just going to burn you out. So here's what I want for you. I want you to join me for my money machine experience live. It is three free trainings. Deep dive into how to escape the treadmill and build a money machine that actually works for you. All right, grab your spot here by going to moneymachinelive.com and I'll see you in the free training. Hey everyone, this is Mel Abraham, the author of the number one best selling book the Entrepreneur Solution and the founder of Thoughtpreneur Academy where we teach you how to capture, package and monetize the ideas, your wisdom, your expertise, the ideas in your head in a way that gives you more impact, more income and more freedom. And welcome to this episode of the Entrepreneur's Solutions show. And in this episode we're going to talk about how do you go from idea to thought leader and how do you create the path of impact through your positioning? So I get often asked this question of thought leadership and thoughtpreneurship, especially with Thoughtpreneur Academy and all of that. And this is going to be a little different episode. I'm going to try some things new in this one, so bear with me. We're going to see if technology cooperates in this one too. But here's the deal. Going to talk about what I call the thought leader platform. And if you want to download the action guide for this episode and you just want to go to melabraham.com session065 or just text me mylegacy one word, no spaces to 38470. Make sure that I give you the download link for the action guide. And so let's just jump in, let's just talk about why this is important. What we're talking about here, this concept of going from idea to thought leader. And there's so many people out there, the infopreneur space and people hanging their shingle out and saying, I'm an expert, I'm an expert, I'm an expert. And I got to tell you that and this may rub people, some, some people the wrong way. There's a whole lot of.

Junk out there. And my, my perspective is how do you really position yourself as the thought leader? Now part of this is, and I don't have the time to go into it in a tremendous amount of depth in our episodes here, but part of is you Got to do some deep thinking. You got to have some really good content. You've got to really have some information that is distinct, unique and impactful that is going to shift people's way of thinking. Remember, the idea is to really shift people's behaviors through a shift in their thinking. So if all you're doing is going out there with the same stuff over and over again that other people have talked about, I mean, let's just like a cliche, you know that concept of let me talk about fear, okay? Fear stands for false evidence appearing real. I mean, it's so cliche, it's comical nowadays. But the fact of the matter is that if you're going to go out there to speak, if you're going to go out there to write, if you're going to go out there to put yourself out there as a thought leader, as an expert, then we need to go beyond what was already done. We need to provide.

Additional perspective. We need to provide.

Some depth and some layers and some breadth to what, you know, put it out there that.

Someone'S going to look at and go, this is a new slant. This is a new perspective, interesting insight, and that they're willing to join on with you. And so I'm off my soapbox now, but I'm going to invite you to think deeply. And that's not really the topic here, per se, in this episode. Actually, this episode might go over on two episodes because I'm going to talk about in the next episode, how do you. The steps to get there. But I'm going to talk about the framework here in this. So let's just talk about why it's so important. Why is it important to shift from ideas? Because ideas are dime a dozen ideas. People come up with ideas in the shower while they're driving and they never get anything done with them. The only value to an idea is provided by the action you take on that idea. When that idea comes to life, shows up in someone else's life and makes a difference. Now there's value in those ideas, otherwise there's just useless thoughts that are bouncing around and not giving any value to the world. And so if you truly want to be considered a thought leader, it's about impacting society, it's about impacting communities, it's about impacting the individuals with your thinking, with your thoughts, with the information, the insights, the content that you create. And so when we look at this, if we don't get this right and you're not positioned as a thought leader, you're lost in the weeds. No one's going to see you, no one's going to find you. No one even knows you exist. You're just another one of the blabbing talking heads out there. And I know I may be rubbing some people the wrong way in this, but. But this is kind of a thing that I think we need to call the elephant in the room. I mean, there's so much information coming out at us on an ongoing basis. 106 billion searches on Google each and every month. It's 40,000. Over 40,000 searches each and every second. There's so much information coming at us that how do you stand out? You know, because if we don't get it right, we're lost in the weeds. And. And if we don't get it right, we have no impact. One, because they probably don't even find us. And when they find us, it's not useful information, it's not meaningful information. So we have no impact. And ultimately the challenge is that if that's the case, we got no future. So if you're really trying to build a business, if you're trying to build an expertise, if you're trying to build a practice where you're known for what you know, and you're known for making a difference with what you know. And we can cite a lot of people out there that are in this space. A Gary Vaynerchuk, a Seth Godin, a Brendan Burchard, a Jeff Walker, Guy Kawasaki. All these people are out there making a difference and shifting lives with what they know. But if you can't stand out or have a great impact, then there is no future for you. But. But if we get this right, we get this right, you're going to stand out. They're going to know who you are, but they're not going to know who you are just for who you are. They're going to know who you are because of the difference you make, because of the insights you have, because of the information that makes an impact on their life as we move forward. So you look at this. There's a reason that the Entrepreneur solution sold 16, 17,000 books in the first two weeks. And so we need to really dig down deep and make sure that we put as much of us into building that content. That's a topic for some other programs, other sessions that we can get into. But it's going to cause you to stand out. When you move from idea to thought leader in a proper way, it's going to cause you to stand out. You're going to be perceived as high value, people are going to look at it and go, this stuff is really good. And they're going to. And when you see that, what's going to happen is that they're going to chase you down, they're going to look for you, they're going to constantly try to find you because it's high value. They're going to talk about what you do. And ultimately, people stand and take notice. And so when you are out there as the thought leader, as the person that is known for what they know and that what they know makes a difference or makes an impact, shifts people's lives, people are going to stand and take notice. So if that's the why, if that's the important things as to why we need to get this right, what do we need to know? What are the key things that you need to know to move from idea to thought leader? What's that pathway, if you will? And I think the first thing is this. We need to get clear. You need to get clear about what it is. You know what it is, you think what it is that is insightful. That is your unique perspective. And in Thoughtpreneur Academy, we call it your unique genius, your unique intelligence. And there's processes we go through to try and get clear on that. But without that clarity, if you're not clear, then the market isn't going to be clear either. So we need to. We need to get you clear with what it is, you know. The second is you got to get out there. So I got to get clear first, then I got to get out there. In other words, if I got clarity on what I know, and I have those insights and I have an idea of how to. How to capture it, but I never put it out there, it's not going to do anything. Remember, like, the ideas, they just die in the darkness. It's about the action and the impact you have with those ideas that becomes truly, truly important. So I got to get clear, I got to get it out there, then I got to get good at it. Okay, now here's the challenge, is that some people would say, oh, no, wait a second. Put get good as first. But I'm going to tell you no. I'm going to actually invite you to go get clear, get out there, and then get good. Because the market's going to sharpen what you know. The market's going to be going to be the sharpener of your axe, of your blade. They're going to turn around and tell you and ask you questions. They're going to quiz you, they're going to test you, they're going to require you to refine your thinking at such a level that you'll ultimately get good or you'll get gone. But I want you to get good, I want you to stick around, I want you to continue to grow, but we need to get clear. We need to get out there and then we need to get good. We need to be dedicated to the process of growing ourselves, the process of being better each and every time, the process of nurturing the skills that we call, I call the mode essentials. In Thoughtpreneur Academy, it's really about understanding the essentials. Whether you're going to get out there as a speaker, a writer, a trainer, a mentor, a coach, any of those things. There's some essential skills you're going to need to know. But over time, we just need to get good at it. Then we'll get masterful at it. But the challenge is that what a lot of people do is they say, well, I'll get good at it first and then I'll put it out there. That's reversed because what they're really doing is using the getting good at it as a procrastination tool. So here's what I want you to do. I want you to get clear about what you know. I want you to figure out what that message is, what that journey is, and I want you to get it out there. And as you get it out there, refine and define and continue to refine and define until you get really good at it and stay with it. So that's, that's the process of what it is that we're talking about in this context of what I call the thought leader platform. So what is the process, the deep seated process and the framework? Now what I want to do is kind of give you this framework. I'm going to do it in a different way than I've done before. I know that some of you have been with me for a lot. I mean, we're on, I don't know, we've done a lot of episodes of the Entrepreneur Solution show and a lot of times we do it in a bit little different way. But this time I'm actually going to draw it out for you. It's going to be like you're sitting with me on a flip chart. So if you're listening to this on the podcast, get over to the YouTube channel and watch this so you'll get a chance to see how this plays out. Because what I want to do is I'm actually going to take you and draw, if you will, the framework for you. So let me just switch over to my.

Ipad.

There we go. So the thought leader platform. The thought leader platform deals with a couple of different things and there's a couple of different levels. And what this really is is about how do I create, if you will, how do I create.

A platform that allows me to shift? So it's going to allow you to shift from idea.

To.

Thought leader.

That's what we're trying to do. So what I call this process is the platform.

And so that's really what is now the first part of the process is that in order to get yourself positioned as a thought leader, we got to find ourselves creating, if you will.

Qualified.

Leads.

So the first step in this is understanding what qualified leads are. And you'll need to spend some time defining what those leads are and then figuring out the access. And I'm going to come back in the next episode. I'm going to take you through some of the three things, the three ways you can get qualified leads, and each of these, I'm going to build these out when I get back, when I come back in the next episode. Right now, I just want you to understand the framework, get your head around the framework of creating that thought leader platform. The second piece of a thought leader platform is that we need to create.

Relevant.

Content.

So I need to create relevant content, meaning that it resonates with someone, it has an impact on someone. And again, there's certain ways to create relevant content. I go really deep in this, in Thoughtpreneur Academy and the Thoughtpreneur launchpad about how do you capture and package your content in a way that's full spectrum. I'll give you a couple of how to's on this when I come back in the next episode. The third piece of this is that we then need to.

Leverage.

Our knowledge.

And what I mean by leveraging our knowledge is that as thought leaders, as experts, the only thing we have to sell is what we know. It's what we know in our head and what we feel in our heart. That's it. And so the knowledge, in order to do that, the challenge is that most people focus on, well, okay, like I did when I first started out in this business, I'm a CPA by education. So our business model, if you will, the worst business model you can come up with is swapping hours for dollars. The timesheet was created in 1919. You would think we would have evolved by now but accountants don't evolve very quickly. The reality is, is that when we go out there in order and I've got so much information, so a client comes into my office, I have an hour, two hours with that client and I spend that time with them and I use my knowledge, but I've used it once for one person and that's it. The question is how do I leverage that knowledge out to put it out there so I can affect many or masses with it. So we need to figure out how do we leverage our knowledge. Because if we're going to be thought of as a thought leader, we can't be known by just one. We got to be known by many. We got to be able to be found. We got to be able to be. When the topic comes up, our name comes up in the process. So I want to leverage knowledge. And then the last piece is this.

I don't. Noticeable.

Distinction.

So those are the four levels of the platform. So noticeable distinction is about does the market know who you are? Does the market really know who you are? And are you standing out from everyone else that is providing a so called solution to the problem that maybe you are solving? And so it's about standing out with distinction. Now why do I use the term noticeable? Why I use the term noticeable is that if it's not noticeable, then it may be a distinction only in your mind. And I'll give you a for instance. And I see this all the time because I work with people in this space and a lot of times I'm working, I've worked with a number of accountants and attorneys and they go, well, you know.

We'Re better service. Well, that's not truly a distinction. In other words, when I say noticeable distinction, it's something that if I, if you mention the name, you know what it is. Like for instance, if I, if I threw out the name Volvo, you would turn around and say most everyone says it stands for safety. Because that was their noticeable distinction. That was their noticeable distinction. Domino's. Okay, 30 minutes or it's on them. That was their noticeable distinction. So what is your noticeable distinction? I'm not talking about something cliche, I'm talking about something real. And your noticeable distinction is going to be something in the context of how you think and the insights you have that stands out from everyone else. Like I said, we use.

The cliche analogy of fear. If you don't have a different way of looking at fear and you just go out there with the, the same acronym that everyone else does or the same Way to look at fear. Guess what? There is no distinction. It's not noticeable and people don't care. It's not going to position you as a thought leader. The idea about the thought leaders, that when your topic comes up, they think of you. You're known for what you know and what you know makes a difference. Those two criteria, you're known for what you know and what you know makes a difference. That's what makes people search you out. That's what makes people willing to pay premium prices to make sure that they get in your sphere of influence, in your insights and to get that information. So this is the thought leader platform. This is the path that you need to take to really start to begin this journey. There's a lot of other things we need to do, but if I can get the qualified leads and, and I can do that with relevant content and I leverage that knowledge with noticeable distinction, now things start to shift. Now here's the interesting thing. What I typically will do is I'll actually start with. With if this is 1, 2, 3 and 4, I actually will start with number two first, creating the relevant content. Because through that relevant content, it helps us with one of the ways that we get qualified leads and it gives us information to leverage our knowledge and helps create the noticeable distinction. So although qualified leads is at the base level, we need to use something kind of that the bait on the hook. Now, I don't mean that in a negative way, but something that entices them, something that attracts them to them. And we'll get deeper into some of these in the next episode. But the key is to start thinking about, ask yourself this. As you look at your practice, as you look at what you're doing in your world, do you have a flow of qualified leads? If you don't, we need to fix that. Do you have a flow of relevant content from you that's relevant? If you don't, we need to fix that. Are you leveraging the leads and the content with your knowledge? And if we don't, we need to fix that. And do people know who you are for what you know and the difference it makes? And if not, we need to fix that. That's the game that we need to play to elevate it. And so I hope that you found this of value. I want you to start to look and reflect on what it is you're doing in your practice. Are you somewhere between idea and thought leader or are you at the thought leader place? Do you want to be in that thought leader place and can we get these four elements working for you? So you create the platform that's necessary to get you there. And in the next episode I'll go deeper on some of these things and try to give you some more specific steps to this. But right now I just wanted to get that framework in your head to start thinking in the way that thought leaders think and understanding that platform to make it come true. So here's the thing. As you move forward on this, let me know how I could serve you. Let me know how I can support you. Download the action guide for this. It's called the Thought Leader Platform. You can download it by going to melabraham.com session 065 or just text me mylegacy one word to 38470 and I'll send you the download link. And then again, as always, do me a favor. I mean, I'm having a tremendous amount of fun and having a chance to dialogue with many of you. Share this with a friend. Let me know your comments, your questions. Stay with me. Make sure that you're subscribed to this and let's be on this journey together. Let's have some fun. Let's make a difference as we move forward and let's make it rock and roll. And if you've got a question for me, go to askmelnow.com and just leave me your question, your comments, whatever it is, whether it's on thought leadership, thoughtpreneurship, wealth, entrepreneurship, success, whatever it is. Leave me your comments, your questions, and let's get it. Let's get it on the Entrepreneur Solutions Show. Let me guide you and let me be your entrepreneurial mentor, your thoughtpreneur mentor as we move forward. So I hope again that this serves you and I feel like it's a blessing to me to be here with you and I look forward to seeing you on the next episode and seeing the amazing, incredible things that you're all doing. And I love hearing about it. So make sure you keep me posted on that until we get a chance to see each other the next episode. May your vision be grand, your journey epic, and your legacy significant. See you soon. Cheers. Bye.

We hope you enjoyed this episode. Make sure you subscribe so you get access to all of Mel's business and success tips. And if you like this episode, share it with a friend. If you have a specific business or success question, you can ask it at www.askmelnow.com. remember, it's all about being bold, dreaming big, and living life your way. Because the world needs you until the next episode. May your vision be grand, your journey epic, and your legacy significant.

Foreign.

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