Know, Like, Trust: Three Steps To Winning The Business

(Photo by Michael Dawes)

The long, and sometimes winding, road from nobody to somebody

Okay, I’m back. I appreciate your loving support for my inner child. (I sometimes call her Wie Wie.) But we are back to discussing business, and today I want to talk about the very basic thing in marketing that you just can’t afford not to know. It’s so basic that, when I started my business, I didn’t give it much thoughts – I took it for granted. It’s about the three steps to successful sales: Know, Like and Trust.

In order for a potential customer to do business with you, he or she first need to KNOW you exist. You and your business. Then they need to LIKE you. They may not consciously admit they are doing business because they like you, and there are certain businesses that this factor hardly matters (such as businesses that address emergency – when you are locked out of the house, you probably call the locksmith in your town even if he is not the most pleasant person. . .), but in most cases, this is critical. Finally, they need to TRUST you enough to put their money and emotional investment in your business.

It sounds simple. Common sense. But actually getting this process working is . . . well, it’s a lot of work. Let me explain by an example.

Who is this guy? James “hire me” Chartrand?

While I was trying to learn about blogging by checking famous big blogs, I noticed I saw some names repeatedly in their comments. Like James “hire me” Chartrand.(Note: He doesn’t sign this way any more, I think. This was awhile ago. But still, this is a great twist – if you have a common name, learn from his example how to stand out.) I’m not sure how many times I saw his name before I actually started recognizing it. Read: many many times. This is the KNOW step.

Then one day, I was writing my own comment at a big blog. Now you know how things are at those A-list blogs. Most comments are like “Great post!” “I totally agree.” kind. I actually had a point that I thought was valuable, and had to think a bit how to say it. And while I was staring the screen, I noticed this guy James also wrote a comment asserting his point. I thought, “Hey, here is someone who can actually think, and not afraid of saying it!” This is the LIKE step. Or maybe the beginning of it.

So I finally clicked on his name and went over to their blog. “Men With Pens” Hmm. . . do they have anything interesting for me? I subscribed to their feed and honestly, pretty much forgot about it. (I have way too many subscriptions that I just can’t keep up with all the posts . . . my apology here.) Eventually, I noticed they respond to every comment on their blog. Now I try to do the same on my blog, and I know how hard it is. They have far more comments and they still do it. So this is quite remarkable.

Then I asked if they could do an interview for me. They were graceful both in the interview and in responding to comments. My LIKE thermometer went up. Now I’m their fan. I read their posts very often, and I check their blog evaluation every Sunday. They seem to know what they are talking about, and their actions live up to their words, so I TRUST them. I like writing myself so I’m not going to hire him as my copywriter, but when I need sophisticated web work (I am an entrepreneur and have lots of ideas. . .), I know who to contact. Read: If you are in business and want to have a website but have no clue how to do it right, or if you have started blogging and realize you actually suck at it, check them out.

See how much work James has put in to this Know – Like – Trust process?

Note: James didn’t bribe me to say nice things about him. And I didn’t write this to earn brownie points for this blog’s evaluation that is scheduled on August 24th. James is fair, and even if I call him the “handsome debonair king of the blogosphere”, I know he will be brutally honest about what he has to say about this Yes to Me blog on that judgment day.

How I am working on the Know – Like – Trust process.

It took me a while to realize that just having an online presence doesn’t get me known. That was the first mistake I made. I also made the wrong assumption that, once people notice me, they’d surely like and trust me – because I’m a lovely trustworthy person Well, online persona doesn’t quite reflect all my good qualities in real life, and most internet surfers have extremely short attention span to notice anything that is not explicitly clear.

I realized I needed a strategy and actual work – lots of it – on this Know – Like – Trust process.

Being noticed is very challenging. I’d like to be known as professional Akashic Reader, and I want to be known not just among the “spiritual” kind of people but also people who don’t yet realize their spiritual nature. This is why I have two websites, this and Akashic Record Reading.

Yes to Me offers a place of learning and sharing for aspiring entrepreneurs and personal development enthusiasts. I do as much commenting and guest blogging I can to get attention and traffic to here. My hope is that my readers become to like me and this blog because of the many features like Interview With Successful Entrepreneurs and Gratitude Friday. When you like this blog, you are more likely to spend time here, and you might check other pages like this. In other words, I’m gradually awakening your spiritual awareness. (Of course this doesn’t mean I expect all readers to check Akashic Record Reading website – Yes to Me by itself is a great learning place, open and free to all.)

Trust is also a critical part. It’s a shame some people just spread some tarot cards and call themselves psychics. I also heard about nasty stories that they would “light up special candles” for extra $XX. I don’t do this kind of thing (nor my friends). My prices are clearly written on my website and I even offer 100% satisfaction program. But for people who don’t know me well, or someone who is suspicious about “spiritual” service in general, how can I win their trust?

Yes to Me serves to make this point also. I mean, do you think someone who writes all these quality articles as volunteer work would cheat or offer bogus service? My sincerity is right in front of you. You can also see I’m quite practical. (Just to let you know, I don’t use any drugs. Zero. No nicotine, either. And I hardly ever drink. I do drink a cup of coffee a day.)

But I know there are plenty of room for improvement. How can I improve my Know, Like, Trust factors?

And which step of Know, Like, Trust do you find most challenging?

Related post: Learning To Love Networking

If you like this article, you might enjoy my eBook on spiritual entrepreneurship. Click here for free, immediate download

Power of Two: James Chartrand and Harrison McLeod

(Photo by leefotos)

Welcome to the Interview With Successful Entrepreneurs series! This is where we learn the startup secrets from those who actually took the leap. Before becoming entrepreneurs, they were professionals and managers, or college students, just like you. From there, they made the changes. . .

Milestone in this Interview With Successful Entrepreneurs series

This is the 10th post of the series! I’m so grateful for all the interview guests who so gracefully took the time to do this with me.

Today’s guests are the gorgeous duo from Men With Pens, James Chartrand and Harrison McLeod. What is remarkable is they each have special roles in the team that make the pair far more than the sum of the two. Thinking back, I have already interviewed two pairs of entrepreneurs, Kim & Jason, who are married couple, and Skip & Yasmine, who started off as a solo entrepreneur and college intern. Further, Monica, Naomi, and Laura each have their partners in business. Is two better than one to succeed as entrepreneurs? Read on.

1. Tell us a bit about your business and why you started it.

James: Our business offers full-service web presence to individuals, the self-employed and businesses that want to get online. We provide website creation, design services, content writing services, WordPress installation and setup services… If it’s written or needs to look good, we’re the guys for the job. In short, we help people earn a living through the web. Feels good to do that.

Harry: We started our business years ago out of strict need. James had left his job and faced a long, hard winter with no income and two children to feed. I suggested poking around online for work. He found it, and within three months, I left my full-time job to step into working in our own business.

James: That’s the boring answer. We find that many people are much more interested in how we became the daring duo taking the blogosphere by storm.

Harry: It all started with creative writing and role-playing games (RPG). We met on an RPG forum and became close friends very quickly. Our skill sets were completely different and yet those skills meshed so well together that they created a strong foundation for massive potential.

We saw the opportunity for a rocking partnership, and we seized it. We haven’t looked back since.

2. What were the three biggest challenges when you were starting as new entrepreneurs?

Harry: Learning the ropes had to be number one. We had the skills and the business knowledge we needed, but we knew very little of bringing this to the virtual world. We learned many lessons the hard way, invested a ton of time to understand web working and we spent a great deal of money on self-education. It was a long, rough ride and it took a lot of dedication to make it work.

James: The problem was that most of what we found was garbage information. We were taken for a ride many times because of poor advice. That’s why we made it our vision to offer better to people so that they didn’t have to make the same mistakes we did (hence, our blog offering solid, reputable advice).

Harry: Another challenge was creating a solid system that allows us to fully share and collaborate from a distance of 3,000 miles. It isn’t easy to work together in an office that doesn’t really exist. We tapped into every resource possible to create a virtual office that lets us work side by side, no matter how far apart we are.

James: I have to say that a definite challenge I believe many people overlook is adapting to cultural differences and international business. When you look at the virtual world only from your country’s perspective, you find out quickly that there’s much more than you out there – and you need to change your ways and methods to welcome all people with their differences.

I’ll toss in a bonus challenge, too: Realizing that your life has completely changed is a huge wake-up call. Being an entrepreneur is more than just working on your own for a living. You suddenly wear many hats and you suddenly have to be an expert at everything, from salesperson to customer service representative to accountant to business CEO.

Harry: Yeah, that was a huge wake-up call for me. It’s hard to run a business and I think many people feel it’s so easy. It isn’t. Your business hours rise and your personal free time dwindles – and I think these reasons cause many new businesses to fail. People are unprepared to overcome these obstacles and aren’t ready to step into such big shoes.

3. And how did you work through these challenges?

James: I think that it’s a combination of too many factors to list here. I do know that you have to know your strengths and use them while recognizing your weaknesses and finding ways to work around them.

We’re lucky to be two people that work together, because we complement and enhance each other’s ability.

Harry: I think we’re also lucky in that we’re very different people and our personalities, strengths and weaknesses balance each other nicely. That’s important – if you don’t have balance, the whole venture becomes that much harder and you burn out quickly.

4. What is the best part of being an entrepreneur for you?

Harry: I don’t consider myself an entrepreneur at all. James is the front man with the visions. He’s out there chasing the dreams. I’m working behind the scenes to support him and help make those dreams a reality. That isn’t entrepreneur in my definition of the word. But what I do is a very important part of the business.

James: That’s true. I need him, he needs me, and when we make it work, it’s fantastic. Knowing that we are able to reach any goal we want and having the confidence to do so is the best feeling in the world.

Also, it’s extremely fulfilling to know that we can help others reach their goals. Having our business lets us reach that vision every day.

5. Any advice for people who dream to have their own business and yet find it hard to make the leap?

James: Establish a Plan B. And C. And D and all the way to Z. Never leap without a safety net, and at the same time, always be ready to seize the opportunities you have and take the plunge. There’s no such thing as failure – there is only learning experiences.

My Takeaway
Wow, partnership is attractive. I guess it can make the business a lot stronger if I can find the right partner.
I also find James’ comment on cross-cultural understanding interesting. He is English – French bilingual, and I’m English – Japanese bilingual. It makes me think maybe there are more ways I can utilize my special background that typical Americans don’t, or help people who only speak English. Not necessarily translation . . . something bigger . . .

Are you a solo entrepreneur or do you have a partner? If you are looking to start a business, do you intend to go by yourself or do you want to find a partner?

If you like this article, you might enjoy my eBook on spiritual entrepreneurship. Click here for free, immediate download