It is a 7-minute read – please enjoy!

For years, I have consulted with high-achieving non-profit organizations and small business owners, and I have found that it takes a ’10 + 10 + 10 Know, Like, Trust Factor’ to grow your audience. It does not matter how effective your presentation is, how well you know your material, or how well you put your words together in speaking or writing. This is until you obtain the final piece for the Know Like Trust Factor.

See if you can guess what the final step is to be done before getting to the end of this blog. When considering marketing for a non-profit or small business, we seek strategies that are proven effective time and time again. Let’s take a look at one key strategy that works, provided it is done correctly. Here is a list to get you started:

What I have found is that the ‘game isn’t won yet’ because I’ve got 30 ideas regarding the Know Like Trust Factor. And it’s time to try as many of these ideas as you can to increase your KLT Factor. So, let’s begin.

10 FACTORS TO KNOW YOUR AUDIENCE

1. Get clear on who you are talking to: Don’t talk to ‘everybody’. Identify your buyer’s persona so that your content is tightly positioned for that buyer.

2. Develop expertise in your niche: Use unique content to position yourself and prove yourself as an authority. Give your ideas, names, labels, formulas, alongside empirical evidence. This approach has a far greater impact than simply voicing your opinion.

3. Create the right content: Research, ask questions, and dig deep to ensure you create content your target niche wants to consume.

4. Develop a free, valuable product: Use it as an incentive to build your email list. First, discover what’s keeping your audience up at night, then offer a detailed solution packaged in an e-book, special report, or white paper.

5. Encourage sharing with a wider audience: This expands your network and helps more people get to know you. Social media simplifies sharing mechanics, but to leverage its power, you must be remarkable in some way … thought-provoking, engaging, stimulating, entertaining, etc.

6. Build relationships with key influencers: In the authority stakes (as in all of your professional life), who you know is almost as significant as what you know. Use social networking and blog comments to attract influencers to your topic. Don’t be a suck-up, but be smart and tactical. After all, you won’t be the only one vying for attention!

7. Create a popular blog: Focus on your topic, express your personality, and use it as a base to express your unique perspective. Some great advice sites are out there to help you get better at this.

8. Interview the experts. This proven technique lets you tap into an influencer’s audience (and boldly position yourself among them).

9. Guest blog: If you write meaningful and original guest posts on relevant blogs, you can tap into a whole new audience. It’s the quickest way to get to know more people.

10. Get creative: Content marketing isn’t all about the written word. You can explore webinars, product reviews, podcasts, infographics, white papers, e-books, and videos, to name a few. What appeals to your audience?

Imagine two people with identical products and prices. One person comes across as boring, having no personality, and impersonal. The other is charming, interesting, and makes you feel positive. Which one would you rather do business with?

10 ACTIONS TO BUILD LIKEABILITY

A high profile alone is not enough to convert prospects into customers. You must also build relationships to nurture your likability. Here are ten ways to become better-liked online …

1. Be authentic and express your unique voice through your content.

2. Be real: If you come across as a dull, faceless business, you will simply turn people off. Instead, boost your popularity by writing with passion, sharing your stories, and getting personal.

3. Be nice! It sounds obvious, but it isn’t. Don’t annoy or badmouth people. Be helpful, responsive, and generous with your time and attention. Your audience will love you more for it.

4. Initiate a two-way conversation: Invite your audience to engage and interact with you. Invite comments on your blog posts and ask questions in your autoresponder sequence.

5. Be relevant: Listen, research, and ask questions to discover your audience’s pain points. Package your ideas into thought-provoking blog posts, share your solutions on a webinar, or drip ideas through an autoresponder.

6. Be visible: While the written word is powerful, it’s not the whole package. Incorporate video interviews, Google+ hangouts, and podcasts into your content marketing strategy. Allow your audience to hear you speak and see your body language.

7. Put your face to your name: Remove the egg from your social media profiles, display an engaging picture on your website, and tell your business’s story in a captivating way on your About Page.

8. Get your social media ratios right: Let’s remember that 95% of the process is about relationship building, and 5% of the work is about sales.

9. Be generous: Share content and encourage others to do so. Don’t expect people to share your stuff if you don’t demonstrate a commitment to doing the same.

10. Deliver social proof: If your numbers are good, show the tweets and shares of your articles or publicly state how many subscribers you have. Content that attracts a lot of attention will attract even more.

10 FACTORS THAT WILL BUILD TRUST WITH YOUR AUDIENCE

While you’re delivering truly valuable content, you’re not selling. However, you are paving the road to eventually selling a product related to your content down the line. When selling online, authority and likeability alone are rarely enough — you need to become truly trusted.

Here are ten ways to gain real trust online …

1. Give away your best stuff: The web is swamped with free content. If you want to stand out, even your free offers must be remarkable. Love this one!

2. Don’t disappoint: If you say you’ll post an article every day, post one every day. Break your promise, and your credibility evaporates.

3. Be consistently your audience to from you, and When you do, they’ll come to you first rather than elsewhere.

4. Incorporate testimonials: Let a third party vouch for you by sharing their experience of your work in their own words. It’s a great way to demonstrate how you deliver a positive experience.

5. Use case studies: Real-world stories as examples and proof of your work. This demonstrates your capabilities.

6. Don’t steal: While it’s wise to be open to ideas you tweak, never plagiarize. It’s wrong. (It’s also stupid and counterproductive.)

7. Avoid jargon and pompous language. Please keep it simple, be approachable, and eliminate unnecessary details.

8. Apologize when you need to: You’re not always right. When you make a mistake, put your hand up, acknowledge the error, and state plainly that you’re sorry. Your audience will respect you far more than that futile attempt to hide it away.

9. Give your audience space: Use content to allow your audience to choose you in their own time. Whether they come to you in a day, a week, or a decade, you’ll get far more respect than that sleazy salesman who won’t go away.

10. Offer a guarantee. When your audience is ready to buy, reduce their risk. For example, offer a 30-day trial.

And when all or most of these things are done, don’t forget the one missing piece – to ‘AUTOMATE’. It is the cousin to the KLT Factor and also the missing piece to your KLT Factor process.

Dr. Laureen, Fundraising & Non-Profit Expert

Website: www/solutions4non-profits.org

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