Secrets of Influence: Start with Skills!
How do we level up our influence?
Exploring the valuable skills we each have helps a lot because we can teach what we know and immediately begin helping others. My business consistently struggled online until I started focusing on creating videos showing solutions to the most challenging problems I had faced in my life from being an entrepreneur with no startup capital to my personal struggles with alcoholism and video games. If we want to grow our powers of persuasion, the secret is to start with teaching because all of us have solved problems that others are still struggling with.
Where do we discover people?
- Word of mouth recommendations from friends and followers. I discovered Steem via @robertgenito who invited me to sign up and promised I would thank him later.
- Searching for help with problems. When I grew frustrated with my lighting setup recently, I did a lot of Goolging and shopping to help me find the answer. In the process I discovered many new sellers and blogs.
- Advertising. Most of our wants and desires are nearly completely programmed by companies spending money to influence us into wanting their products.
Teaching opens all possibilities!
As we share what we know how to do and love doing, we open ourselves to being involved in all three of the primary discovery methods. In 2013, I uploaded a Facebook advertising tutorial on YouTube which brought in thousands of viewers searching for help with Facebook ads. Those viewers made word of mouth recommendations which then triggered YouTube to show my video in suggested videos (free advertising).
Hear the full story!
Would you watch the video on YouTube to hear the full story because combining the reading with the video is likely to inspire action in giving our best and the unbelievable results that flow from there? I tried to upload it on DTube but it was not working today!
Love,
Jerry Banfield
Everyone wants wealth and success, but very few are willing to work hard to achieve them. By work hard too, I do not mean digging holes.
People need to work hard on developing skills that other people highly value. Become a residential security expert as I have done or a private investigator as just two examples of thousands.
Those things are what I'm passionate about, so that is why I pursued them as skill sets. What are your passions, and what are you doing to improve your knowledge and skills related to them?
Another way to look at it is what I tell my children. I tell them to do what 95% of other people either do not want to do or cannot do. If you stick to something within that rare 5%, you are almost guaranteed to be successful.
Also, follow my motto, and stop wasting your time in life. My motto is, "Stop playing or watching the part of a hero, and be one instead." In other words, stop being entertained by circuses (TV, games, etc.) and get to work instead.
Time is your most valuable asset. Use it wisely. Stop wasting it!
I also tell my children to learn a STEM profession, a trade, and at least one additional language. That's another easy way to understand the path to success. If you do those things, you are again almost guaranteed to be successful.
Exactly!
And
Right on!
Success keep friends I love steemit
Everything you say is agreeable, but I would add that being success oriented in life cannot be the only driver and that by doing that we miss other important steps in our personal development. There has to be a time for doing something that is NOT useful, for staring at the beautiful things in the world, for thinking, for playing an instrument - not just because you're entertaining someone or showing your skills but just because you enjoy it - for learning ancient Greek, time for loosing time, for listening. Don't misunderstand me, I agree with what you wrote, especially, if someone has a dream - and everyone has - we need to stop finding excuses and just pursue it. But sometimes the beauty of being human lies in our capability to just question the skies, and not in giving answers.
Well said. I especially like:
Thank you!
That is the truth, it doesn't have to be complicated, just has to be done. Step step step, repeat.
Very beautiful advice. Thanks for sharing :)
Thank you and followed. :)
Thank you for your support :)
Goog help, bro!
You always give motivation to me!!! Thank you.
Hey I just dug a drainage ditch which added value! :)
Seriously though, agreed. Learning another language definitely broadened my thoughts. And each new language after that is even easier!
I should really stop using that example. haha You can dig for gold and oil too. That's pretty profitable!
In the Army we would joke about being ordered to dig a hole, and then we would be ordered to fill it. Fun times!
Yeah my dad also served, and told me that when a superior officer says something like, "That lawn looks like it could use a mow" -- that it's a direct order! :)
Thank you for the uplifting advice based on your experiences online . I have been meaning to watch your YouTube videos but kept putting them off because I've been too busy but I am glad I started with this one as it has been very motivational and more than anything, convincing. Five years ago I wanted to start a business online. I was inspired by many of the courses that I had taken online for free. I had my own ideas on how I was going to deliver this courses but this meant that I needed to become more comfortable with different software devices to make them attractive and interactive. Is a perfectionist and as a teacher I wanted to deliver amazing content from the beginning but the time-consuming aspect of learning and focusing so much on the aspects that I lacked such as knowledge of software and web design eventually lead me to never starting the project at all. Today I find myself at the same point as I was five years ago. Unable to give up my desire to deliver the skills and teaching content that I am passionate about, I have ended up in rolling for a Masters program in Teaching. I find myself dealing with the double task of further developing my teaching skills and at the same time wishing to pursue the online project I had in mind. I have been on steemit user now for nearly 3 months but have found it very hard to write about something that is not happening to me at the present moment. In my thirst to write with authenticity, I failed to find a topic to write about and now after watching your video it had finally occurred to me that I should be writing about teaching , that perhaps this is the best platform in which I could deliver the content that I had in mind without the special effects of course. Now it is just a matter of finding the time to create and post . Thank you Jerry for the lightbulb moment and for finally helping me find the focus of what I would like to deliver.
You're welcome Ana! I loved hearing how you reacted to the video because that is what inspires me to keep making more!
I realise now how important it is just TO START and post my content and ideas out there first. As you mention there, your audience will provide the feedback from which we learn to improve those videos and it may lead to a business idea. I also realise that the inspiration to continue will naturally reveal itself and that I don't have to have everything perfectly planned and laid out.
Success keep friends I love steemit
That's great! I have found that while gardening, I see things and take pictures that others appreciate. (It might help that I've invested into my Steemit account, and tend to upvote everyone who comments -- I'm not sure, I don't have a control in this experiment...)
Good luck to you!
I found that the key to success here on STEEM was drawing whale testicles on MS-paint... Not sure that method works for all though. :D
A friend showed me a video of the eclipse the other day. Unfortunately it was not the moon blocking the sun but rather his testicles.
Success keep friends I love steemit
Did the whale in Moby Dick have testicles? Or am I just nuts? 😋
Whales have testicles? I didn't know that. Thanks :)
Male ones have, for sure, they even have boobs, they are mamals ;)
yeah whales have testicles. they only let it out when they wanna prevent their body from drifting due to water current. You know.. just like anchor.
hahahaha
Teaching others is a very difficult thing, yet very rewarding if you do it properly.
Yes it is both I totally agree @cryptoeera great comment!
Great , great , great advice .... I´m trying to star blogging and the insecurity and the weight of it (total delutional) it frustrates me. I have a bunch odf posts semi-done, and doing the final effort to finish them and posting them fills like an abbys .... I will post.... very SOON
WOOW that is really helpful, and It gives an Idea that everyone can reach what they want.
I hope everybody will listen carefully to the video and benifit from it. because it tells a lot.
ask Jerry how long he struggled in online business and He might never thought he would be who he is today. but he did not gave up, He kept learning and practicing and this is what everybody needs to do.
If you're uncomfortable with yourself it's hard for others to be comfortable with ya.
Don't wait. Post.
This is a process of constant learning. Do it and do it consistently.
You writing "don't wait" reminds me of the supposed five second rule too. People need to decide what to do and then do it quickly to avoid hesitation and your mind being changed.
Time for your daily exercise? Do it right away without giving yourself a chance to procrastinate. It's amazing how easily we can talk ourselves out of doing work. haha
I almost replied to this right after reading it..... then I thought for a moment.....
Completely true. If you think of something, like doing ana exercise, then act on it immediately.
But it is so much easier to let the moment pass.
This do it thing is an exercise in personal freedom. Freedom as in you do things when you want them to be done and not when the circumstances and external events force them into doing them. Or not doing them :)
Followed!
Thanks! I've followed you back too. :)
Totally agree. I do that all the time with exercise. LOL
I am honored by your mention :) I didn't expect it!! I am also so grateful of you Jerry. And wow man, you are looking younger and younger! You must still be eating vegan...and congrats with that :) Btw I love this video format. It is very intimate, just like a heart-to-heart talk should be :) I'm going to continue enjoying this :D
Take care Jerry! You're a great person, and it is so good that this world has people like yourself to be a good influence, a good example, and darn...I sure miss you! :)
Edit: great video. We are all so talented...and we will all influence each other! I'm glad that you are inspiring others to influence others :)
@robertgenito thank you for bringing me into the crypto world especially into Steem!
Jerry, you're sweet and genuine. Thank you for this <3 I am a professional recording artist and I have a unique method of writing a song for people who don't play instruments but want to practice writing songs. Now I know what to do. Resteeming.
Smashed it Jerry!
Great post Jerry! I always think of the late, great Jim Rohn when thinking of skills. "What is a skill? Something you can learn. The more skills you learn, the more valuable you become." It as simple as that. To learn a new skill, we have allow ourselves to become uncomfortable in doing something we've never done before, but in the end, we grow immensely and become more valuable.
Thank you @orionschariot!
@orionschariot thank you very much for explaining the value of being uncomfortable here and voting on me as a witness at https://steemit.com/~witnesses today!
When we are growing up we are taught that the degree is required to learn and make money and When we enter into the professional life we come to learn that it is the skills that matters the most. Not all universities are excellent or good there are many universities passing the students without any skills. When they start looking for a job, there is nothing for them. So i encourage everyone to learn some skills along with the degrees. Degrees are important but more important are the skills.