Is anyone listening?

Of all the entrepreneurial skills, perseverance has to be one of the most needed and also underrated of them all. Because no matter how confident you are in your abilities and results, there are times when it feels like you’re talking to an empty room.

All artists go through these times, whether it’s the stand up comedian who fails to get a laugh or the band that can’t get booked. Painters struggle to find their audience and artisans can easily feel lost among the thousands of Etsy shops.

What’s really going on when no one seems to be listening?

Well first, it could be a self delusion. Some suffer from illusions of grandeur, other from unimportance.

What is the truth?

Do you know your numbers? Taking an honest look at your traffic, engagement through social sharing and time on the page or bounce rate can go a long way to reassuring you if “nobody is reading” or if you’re just not seeing the results you want.

Maybe you do get a lot of traffic but no one is signing up – great! At least you now know where the problem lies.

No one can listen if you’re not talking

This comes up over and over again when someone unwittingly throws themselves a pity party because “no one is reading my website” and down they fall into a pit of self pity. Pun absolutely intended.

But what’s really happened is that they’ve yet to find the courage to share their site and are now trolling for “you go girl!” comments and cheerleading instead of true engagement.

You’re not going to go viral on your first tweet (unless you’re Robert Downey Jr.) and your first dozen or more blog posts are not likely to get much traction. Hence the perseverance skills you need to cultivate.

Isn’t there a difference between persistence and being delusional?

Okay, maybe you’ve been posting and sharing and creating your art in whatever form it takes and you still get the empty room. Crickets. Zero comments or feedback.

Well, it’s time to pivot. And at this point in your business I highly recommend Laddering, a book by my good friend Eric Holtzclaw that will teach you how to shut up and listen to your audience instead of leading with me, mine, I and we all the time. Seriously, pick up the book. Read it.

The world has conspired to tell you that you can become rich on anything you’re passionate about, mostly because the people selling those lies are getting rich telling you that. The truth is what you’re passionate about has to be of interest and bring value to other people if you want to make money and not just have a hobby.

Nothing wrong with hobbies by the way, I think we need more of them. You know, doing stuff you love because you love doing it? All for that.

Maybe, just maybe, you’re talking to the wrong crowd. Or in the wrong medium.

Are you playing country music at a rock concert? Recording videos for people who would rather read? Speaking to audiences who like workshops, not ebooks?

The number one rule of marketing, in my opinion, has to be to know your audience. Know what they want, how they behave, consume and interact. You could be saying all the right things in the wrong place. Or at the wrong time.

So before you cry into your Starbucks over the fact that no one cares, or post that on Facebook, take a real look at your numbers, speak out and share and be in the right place and time with the correct medium for your people.

And please remember you’re not owed an audience just because you have DSL and an iPhone.