The name “influencer” has gotten a bad wrap.
But isn’t that what we all want?
We make content to help people make positive changes in their life.
Here’s the Oxford definition: the capacity to have an effect on the character, development, or behavior of someone or something.
The first mistake is rejecting wanting to be an influencer.
Why?
Because people said it’s lame? Sleazy?
Would it be embarrassing to have 100,000 followers and those followers buy your offer and you make multiple 6-figures while changing lives?
What if you simply owned the truth of what you want and who you get to be?
My girlfriend, Natalie, works a corporate job and is extremely happy. She enjoys the work and loves getting a bi-weekly paycheck. She makes her own hours, finishes work at 2pm and has the rest of the day to run, skate-ski (the newest hobby), mountain bike (also the newest hobby), and play with our dog, Telly.
We’ve had long convos about me not understanding being truly happy in a corporate job.
I was a civil engineer in New York City for 5 years. I didn’t hate my job, but I didn’t love it. It was a great pay and surely I could have stayed and found peace in that if I was more clear on what I wanted outside of work instead of spending the weekends partying and drinking.
But even then. I don’t think I could have.
I craved to do work that inspired me and to make an impact on people’s lives.
So in 2018 I quit and moved to Colorado to pursue my first love of fitness by becoming a personal trainer and CrossFit coach and thus began the journey into entrepreneurship.
This September Natalie and I were driving down to Mammoth Lakes, California for her third ultra marathon of the year and we got to talking about leaving a legacy.
She has no interest. Work is great and she loves being able to log off at the end of the day (something I do not do).
Then I projected my old wounds of not owning what I truly want and kind of waffled on my own desires.
“Yeah… I mean… In 200 years probably nobody will know my name. Maybe it’s a silly pursuit.”
Dude! Fuuuuuck me!
I can understand her stance AND own the fuck out of what I want.
I want to spend this (as far as I know) one life making an impact and building a legacy.
I want to empower people to share their stories, and speak their truth so they can live their most full and joyful life. No longer hiding by the fear of other people’s perceptions of what’s good or bad and right or wrong (you can see how I still struggle with trusting myself and probably always).
If what I build here goes away in 200 years then all the more reason to say fuck it and send it.
Not because it’s better or right, but because I can feel it in my bones that this is what I want to spend my life doing.
It’s not your content, it’s you
Funny enough, the work I preach is the exact work I most struggle with.
I flow in and out of fully trusting myself and COMPLETELY losing trust in myself.
Recently I noticed I’ve been analyzing other creator’s content, not because I love analyzing content, but because I am trying to unearth some hidden secret that will get my engagement back up to where it was this summer.
It hasn’t been working.
Duh.
I know this already.
There is no secret to content.
Yes, there are principles that help you influence more effectively. Things like storytelling, speaking at a 5th grade level, and the pace of your writing or speaking.
Yet still, if the focus is on content first and not YOU first, you’ll likely fall into the same trap I have fallen into the last 2 months.
That is: waiting on the external change before the internal change.
I preach to my audience to trust themselves. It’s at the core of the work I do because “everything works.” [continued reading]
Scroll through your discover feed now and you’ll see there isn’t one style of content that fills it. Trends come and go. We had a big bout of those 6-second reels that said, “read the caption,” and now, I haven’t seen one of those in months.
The “hacks” don’t work either. I’ve had reels go viral with no hashtags and no trending audio.
To me, there is one thing above all that will increase your influence.
Buddy the Elf, what’s your favorite color?
Yes, if you’re a regular reader here, I’m talking about Elf again. It’s all in preparation for my Storytelling Training on Monday, December 9th (you can sign up at this link and I’ll send you the calendar invite).
I wanted to go beyond storytelling and understand why the main character, Buddy, is so beloved.
Buddy after all, is an influencer.
[spoiler alert… but if you haven’t seen Elf by now, shame on you]
He got the most headstrong, grumpy character (his dad) to spread Christmas cheer by singing loud for all to hear, thereby saving Christmas.
How did he do it?
One word.
Embodiment.
Throughout the entire movie Buddy embodied who he truly was, an Elf.
It didn’t matter when Papa Elf told him he wasn’t actually an elf.
It’s who he is down to his core.
It didn’t matter that his step-brother told him, “you’re so weird” after he chugged a bottle of coke at the dinner table.
An elf’s four main food groups are candy, candy cane, candy corn and syrup. What is coke, if not more liquified syrup.
It didn’t matter that the manager told him to stop smiling.
He loves smiling and smiling is his favorite.
Only ONCE he got beat down so badly that he ran away.
(We all have our breaking points)
Throughout the whole movie, Buddy is Buddy.
He wins over his step-brother by dominating a snowball fight. Classic elf move.
He wins over the girl by treating everyday like Christmas. Classic elf move.
He wins over the guy in the mail room by getting drunk listening to him because there’s room for everyone on the nice list. Classic elf move.
And of course, this culminates to winning over his dad and getting him to sing in public.
Buddy influenced and left his legacy by embodying the truest version of himself.
Your ability to influence is directly correlated to how true to yourself you are being.
Creating content people love isn’t about hacking your way through post after post and then wondering why nobody likes your content.
Creating content is about embodying who you say you are and desire to be (and who you ask your audience to be).
The all time greatest leaders like Martin Luther King didn’t just preach from a podium. They got down from the podium and marched alongside their people.
This is the content I am going teach you how to make at the training on Monday.
By the end of the training you will get the 5-part embodiment framework to tell any story in 90 seconds or less so you can build a beloved brand.
All you have to do is sign up with the button below and I’ll email you the zoom link.
See you on Monday,
Matt
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