Gather your crowd, but first build your community.

I recently responded to a Facebook post asking for clues as to why a website wasn't engaging traffic. "I have a website, it gets traffic but no enquiries, why ?" I genuinely wish I had a pound for every time I hear or see that question, I wouldn't need to work at all, in fact just charging a pound for every time I answer that question in a public forum, over coffee or lunch, in the street even (yes it's been known!) would be enough to pay the bills! Instead I know and understand that people don't usually post on social networks for advice on their website if they have budget to spend on it, I therefore hop along, put in my two penneth in the most constructive way I can find and move on. I don't tout for their business, I don't worry about what other people who might be in the same line of work as myself are doing either. However my friends and acquaintances often do. This instance of responding to a Facebook post / question was typical of how it usually rolls;

• I give said website literally a 5 second glance - Why ? Well, that's how long you have to capture your audience when they first land on your page, the problems I see there, are therefore contributing factors to lack of engagement
• I reply with constructive comment and working example of productive suggestions
• Somebody in the same field as myself (web and content writing) hops on, repeats what I said in some other form right behind me and asks for the business 'pm me I can work with you on this'.
• I get a plethora of private messages saying oh my god I can't believe they just did that, you gave the solutions now your competition is using it to tout for work
• I walk away unworried and untouched by this, I posted and fulfilled my best intentions. I wasn't touting for work, I was being helpful. 

Anybody who knows me well or has worked with me by now realises that I don't worry about 'competition'. Maybe in the business world I should, but I believe that we all have our audience/clients, nailing our unique selling points ( I don't like that term either but it's a go-to phrase in the business world) and identifying our audience is part of the process. Integral to that is who we are and how we go about our business as well, how we project our skills and use them for the benefit of our clients. My understanding of this means that I know that not everybody is looking for my services because it wont be a fit, equally not everybody is looking for yours. 

As the messages came in about my response to the Facebook post and my so-called competition appearing to annoy my friends and colleagues I took a quick look back at my reply and theirs. I smiled to myself and moved on. Why ? Sure the fellow content writer might use my suggestions, but she is not me. She will have her own writing style, her own understanding of marketing and branding, she may or may not be able to see without my help that a major part of the problem was in fact the business owners failure to gather a crowd. I could write her 10 paragraphs and she wouldn't use them in the same way that I would, and for those very reasons I stopped worrying about competition a long time ago. Not because I am conceited and think I am the best (I am though, honest - ask my mum! :-) ) but because a) I hadn't popped along trying to procure business, and b) as I just pointed out, the person who posted will or wont find a good fit there. 

Over the past 12 months my business life has taken massive changes of direction. I now focus on online content writing more than ever. Over recent months that has even moved to content writing just for me, not just for clients, and my attentions are being drawn in this direction increasingly - when life and work permit. I am co-owner of a busy and large business network, I still love my web and content writing role, I've recently pulled those skills together to plan and launch an online  anxiety management course (pulling further on my former background in mental health) which I love to deliver, at last I get to use all of the skills I enjoy in one role! In my role as content writer and web geek I have learned the value of gathering a crowd in order to really make things work for clients, and I repeatedly see people who fail to understand it's necessity. Whilst reflecting on the above it became apparent to me that it's something I probably should have pointed out here. For writers more than anybody are often seeking to engage, put their wares out there and hopefully get a reader or two (million). 

There is a lot of information out there on the internet already covering this, I wont bore you by repeating what others say. However I do want to point out something that many are scared to say. It's ok to look around and find your influencers. People who you feel are achieving a level of the success you aim for. Their model is working, what can you learn from it ?

For example, my working life means that branding is something I think about, it's also something I am aware applies to the process of gathering audiences and building followers. In my opinion, as far as blogging goes, Jeremy Crow has this nailed. He writes about multiple subjects, all under the whacko umbrella. I love that he did that. I can see how it contributes to his success and it was the first factor which drew me into following him (Of course his content, and his personality are major contributors also ! ).  Furthermore he engages with his readers. This is again is more common ground from my own perspective. He understands the value of his audience, he doesn't take it for granted and he keeps his interaction genuine. In this respect he has his formula for gaining and keeping his crowd successfully. I'm in. 

Identifying your influencers is a great starting point for gathering your own crowd. Influencers aren't limited to people's whose success you want to mirror, they are people doing things you respect, admire, like etc. Furthermore they are important because these are the set of people with whom you are likely to find common ground and build genuine relationships. I often share and comment on other people's posts and blogs. However I never share and post for sharing/ posting's sake. I believe that my engagement should be kept to something genuine, I interact and build relationships based on content and interaction that I actually have something to say about / add / think about. Starting out in the blogging world can be a long slog. Finding other bloggers and writers who you respect, whose work engages you is a great first stop in terms of both finding inspiration, challenging your limitations, and building a community. This isn't just a writers strategy, it's actually the way of the business world. Ask our network members and they will tell you, they advance their business skills all of the time, based on the interactions they have with the people they respect within the network. Having that community to bounce around in is a fundamental part of our growth as writers, the rest is up to you, and as my network partner so adeptly describes in her own blog, There Is No One Youer Than You.