The Fierce Business Babe Podcast Ep 297: Growing Your Audience

Today, I am going to be talking about your audience. I will be diving deep into how to grow your audience, along with busting some of the many myths we hear about how our audience affects our business and so much more.

GROWING YOUR AUDIENCE

BY: MELISSA LIN

Today I am going to be chatting about growing your audience. This is a topic that comes up a lot, especially in the social media, the online entrepreneur space. Somebody recently actually asked me about this specifically. We were chatting and she said that the thing that she was focusing on at the moment in her business was trying to grow her follower count on Instagram. This is actually something I hear a lot from people and I'm excited to kind of break that myth for you. There's so many myths that I hear people say, you know, there's that myth of, "Once they hit 10,000 followers on Instagram, that's when I'll be successful," or like the other myth of "Once I can get a bigger following that's when I can start my business," or "That's when I'll be successful".

Today I'm going to number one: bust some of those myths for you and number two: provide some ways for you to actually grow your audience and also talk about why growing your audience is important. However, it's not like that one thing that's going to make or break your business. So, make sure you have your notebook, your notepad, wherever you take notes, make sure it's handy because we're going to be taking lots of notes.

The Audience Size Myth

So first and foremost, let's talk about some of these myths that you may have heard before. Now some of the big social media and business correlation myths that I've heard are things like, you know "You can only be successful if you have a bajillion followers" or "You can only be successful if you have a ton of engagement on your page," right? "You can only be successful if you post at the right moment on the right day, and it's like the right content," so, big question: are some of these things important? Yeah, for sure, but maybe not in the way that you think. So, are these going to make or break your business? Definitely not. Now, what I mean by this is: you can have 2000 extremely warm audience members that are ready to buy from you, and you can still have a six figure launch. You could very well have a hundred thousand followers, but have no idea how to market your business and not be making any money. So it's not necessarily about the number of followers you have or how many people in your audience you have.

So for example, let's say that you have easy numbers, like a $7 or $10 ebook for sale, then yes. It's going to be a bit more difficult and take more time for you to reach maybe $5K a month or $10K a month if you have a thousand followers, right? Because you need so many more to hit $5K a month if you only have a $7 or $10 offer, versus, you know, somebody who has maybe 100 thousand, 200 thousand, 300 thousand people in their audience. However, a whole nother example is, if you have, let's say a $1,500 coaching program or a $2,000 coaching program and an audience that trusts you and wants to learn more from you. Audience size doesn't really matter. You could have an audience of a thousand people, a thousand incredible people who trust you, that you could sell out your coaching program pretty easily versus somebody with maybe a hundred thousand that don't have that high trust, like, know, relationship with their audience and not sell a single coaching spot. Not saying they wouldn't, but I'm just saying that is something that could potentially happen. So a larger audience, doesn't always equate to business success. Okay. That's something I want you to really keep in mind. A larger audience does not always equate to business success.

I've seen people with a hundred thousand followers not make money because they don't know how to structure their offers. They don't have foundations in their business. They think, oh, I'll just create a quick ebook and boom, put it out there and people will buy it. I don't need to talk about it and that is not necessarily the case. There's more to it. However, something that a larger audience does do for you, is it gives you the opportunity to connect and to build relationships, to serve and to add value to more people. So it's not necessarily about the number of followers. If you think about it, it's really more so about you building and growing an audience that is attracted to your content, right? They're interested in what you're teaching. They're your ideal clients who are starting to like, know and trust you.

So it's more so about having some solid foundations in your business so that you have something for them, right? Have incredible content that you're giving out for free. Right? All of your captions and your mini trainings and maybe even podcasts episodes continue to give an impact. You've got all of that for them. So, you've got those solid foundations. As you start to build that with your audience, that's when the numbers, the number of people in your audience, that growth, will have more effect on your business. So let's say that you do have your foundations. Amazing! Yes. Congrats. You're wanting to get in front of more people so that you can create a bigger impact, right? You can continue to add your value, but I want to go into some things that you can do to continue to grow your audience. Something that I have seen in a lot of entrepreneurs is that growth is typically like the leverage point in most businesses. So if your audience grows, like you've gotten to maybe the $10K level or $15K level, you have all the things in place, your foundations, your systems, your team, and your leverage point is usually growth. Usually, not always, but growth is a big leverage point for many. So, you know, as you continue to grow the rest of the dominoes will fall in place. However again, we need those foundations and need to create consistency. We've got to really have that stuff down.

Growing your Audience

Now, let's talk about how you can actually grow your audience because that's what we're here for. We want to start to get in front of more people. As you get in front of more people, you get to help more people, which is definitely the goal for all of us. I know so many of us want to help more people. You want to make a difference. You want to change the world. You know, that's why so many of you started your businesses because that was one of my big why's as well. So I know you're in my audience. If you have very similar, you know, beliefs and values as me as well as why you're probably here still. So, let's get into it. Let's get into some ways that you can either start or continue to grow your audience.

Create Viral & Polarizing Content

So the first thing that you can be doing, and again, there's a ton of different growth activities you can do. The first thing that you could do is you could start to create some viral content. So something that really sticks out to folks, something that's going to help, or it's going to stop them from scrolling. So think about like, what is it that you typically share to your friends, right? If you see something on Instagram or you see a YouTube video, like what is it that you're typically sharing? What are you contributing to basically make it viral, right? That's the type of thing we want to also do. So usually like a captivating video, something with humor or something fun. So creating some kind of viral content definitely will help with growth.

The next thing I would say is starting to create some polarizing content. This might sound scary because this means stepping outside of our comfort zones. However, when you start to take that next step, move into the next version of you, step outside of your comfort zone and create some of that polarizing content, what this is going to do is, of course, start to attract those who truly want to hear you and truly want to be in your audience. So something that shows your stance, something that you do or don't believe in. Something that others may be too afraid to talk about or afraid to say. So, I'll give you a few examples of some of the big things that I like to talk about in terms of business and starting to scale in your online businesses.

So one that not everybody agrees with and that's okay. However this is what I truly believe, is that you don't need a website to start your business. I did not have a website when I hit my first $5K month. I didn't even put my full website together until we were at about $10 to $15K months consistently in the business. So, it's something that I really believe in and that's not what everyone believes. So that's something that's a little polarizing out in our industry.

Another example is my stand on how often to be selling in your business. So I believe that you get to sell every single day in your business. I talk about this over and over and over. So create some polarizing content. What are the things that maybe others are afraid to talk about?. A lot of people online are afraid to talk about money, right? Worried about judgment, worried about this, worried about that. So creating some kind of polarizing content always helps with growth. You get in front of more people, right. It's easily shareable. People will share that sort of thing.

Start Collaborating

The next thing I recommend is. Drum roll.... Collaborating. So for the longest time, believe it or not, I actually avoided this. Now, it's one of the biggest things I recommend. If you're wanting to get in front of more and more people, it’s time to collaborate. Collaboration, not competition. So, in my very early stages of business, when I was just starting, I was so afraid to collaborate. I was worried I was going to get judged by other audiences. I was worried some people weren't going to like me. I was afraid that, you know, my audience would want to go over to whoever's audience I was collaborating with. I was worried that they were going to go work with them instead of choosing to work with me. I had all of these stories that just were not serving me, and a lot of them were just absolutely false and not true. So, of course, I have new stories. Now I absolutely love collaborating. The big reason why you may be sitting there asking yourself, well, why do you love to collaborate so much? Because maybe you're afraid. Maybe, you're where I was a few years ago. So I want to share why I love to collaborate.

So there will be people in my audience who might absolutely love who I collab with. I collab with people that I know are going to add value to my audience. That's all, it always gets to be a win-win. So there will definitely be people in my audience who are going to love who I collaborate with and there will be people in that person's audience that love me and come over to me. So I do truly believe that there are an abundance of clients out there for everybody. So go collab. Go get in front of more people, go pitch yourself to be on a podcast, you know, pitch yourself to do an Instagram live with somebody else. Go collab. Get in front of more people, because what happens is you getting in front of more people gives you the opportunity to create an even bigger impact, which means you're helping more people that truly need you and your team.

Educational Content

The next is something that I love, and this is something that you can definitely do a few times per week is creating educational content. That's easily shareable. So this can be like infographics that are very easily shared. So I've got quite a few on our Instagram page if you follow me over on Instagram, @the_melissalin. But shareable content. So infographics, it is so easy for people to share and take you and get you in front of more people. People will also save it and come back to it later, which definitely helps with the algorithm with Instagram right now. So. Shareable content. Shareable anything, really.

Utilizing The Tools

Utilize the tools that social media provides you. typically, anytime a social media platform that you're on releases a new software or a new feature, this is something they want you to use. they want you to be social on social media and test out these new features. typically these newer features are also things that are going to support the algorithm, for example when reels came out for the very first time, they were the form of content that would get you in front of more and more people. so when we take a look at your sales process in your business, which if you've never worked with me before the way I look at your sales process is you're attracting new people into your community into your audience all week long, your content is doing some of that and your content starts to nurture your audience, create that like know trust factor with your audience, and then you also sell in your content.

Different forms of content have different intentions on social media, especially once the platform is figured out whether the new features going to stick around or not. so right now, reels are the main form of content to help you grow and help you get in front of new people. however, if you're only posting reals then you're posting mostly content that is going to help you grow and get in front of new people, not necessarily content that's going to nurture your audience and also convert your audience to actually buy from you.

As I mentioned different content forms have different intentions and this may look a little different for each person.

Be Your Authentic Self

Then the next thing that I want to say is just really being your most authentic self. Right? Be you. Say the things that you want to say. Speak what is true to you and also share aspects of you so people can connect with you on a fun, friendly human level as well.

So those are some ways that you can start to grow your audience today and keep in mind, you know, your number of followers, your growth, that doesn't necessarily equate you with business success. So always keep that in mind. Now today, we've touched on some myths that I busted for you around audience growth and number of followers. We also walked through some ways that you can work on growing your audience, and also why growing your audience is important. However, it's not the thing that's going to make or break your brand.

I'm actually going to add in one more bonus for you, just because I love, love, love, adding value. Another thing that we can do to grow is go and share your lead magnet. Pinterest is another software and other tool that you can use to get in front of more people, share lead magnets and Facebook groups, get out in front of people that you may not be in front of right now, so that you can create that bigger impact. So again, those are the things that we touched on, growth, busting some myths for you and ways to grow your audience. So, let me know your biggest takeaways. Tag me on Instagram or send me a DM @The_MelissaLin. I would love to hear from you some of the ways you are growing your audience. I am always going to be your biggest cheerleader, so you taking the time out of your day to hang with me truly means the world to me. I’ll see you next time!

Topics we cover include:

The Audience Size Myth
Growing Your Audience
Create Viral & Polarizing Content
Collaborating
Be Your Authentic Self

And so much more!

Times to check out:

(8:20) Business success myths

(11:58) Building an audience attracted to your content

(17:40) Collaborating

(21:00) Use social media features

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