How to Really Build Trust as a Newbie

Hey there, this is Kevon, and welcome to my show. This show is where I share what I'm learning in business with you because that's what I really enjoy doing. These days, no matter what business that you're running, you need to build trust online, right? Everyone is literally creating content and building their presence.

The thing is, you need to convince people to take that first step with you. And that is super, super hard. I've worked with so many people, and they always get anxious because they're thinking, I'm at step zero. Why would people trust me? I have nothing to show. So I might as well keep on creating content and maybe writing some newsletters.

This is what I want to explore with you because even though you're a newbie in the knowledge space, you can build trust with the public, you can. So let's change your mindset today.

You know there's this bakery shop that is making so much noise locally in our town right now. I think they started like two years ago and then I just passed by the bakery shop last weekend and there's still a lot of people lining up every single day. So to tell you the truth, we actually bring our two daughters there for breakfast as well and we try to go on a weekday around 8:30 a.m. so that we beat the crowd. So basically it's a really hot bakery shop.

Backstory, the quality is really good because the founder, the chef, was working in a big name hotel for 10 years. And then he started this bakery shop maybe 2 3 years ago. So the thing is, the food is really high quality. But then, once I tried a few other bakeries, I realized the croissant from this bakery and the croissant from that bakery, It's really hard to spot the difference.

Like it's so marginal. So that makes me think that, well, food quality is important because without that, you will have no returning customers and you will have no word of mouth, but that's not just the thing that is required to have this like hot popularity. People are all talking about it. I think it blew up because, you know, back then started from two years ago, everyone was talking about it.

When it first came out, you know, when we were hosting friends at home, they would literally bought a bunch of these bakery goods and they would brought it just as like souvenirs or like desserts. So then we can all enjoy together. And then out on the street, you'll see all these people carrying bags.

Like they want to share this new found joy with their friends. So it's like a virus. And I think that is what is needed when you want to, you know, just be known it's about getting people to talk about you.

Coming back to our knowledge business space, right? I think we all get trapped into that passive business game. So what is passive as in you're creating a ton of social content, different kinds of content, and you're also writing newsletter. So you think that. Well, by doing this too well, you can have the entire business rocking the world.

Like people are lining up wanting to pay you. I think we have this impression because everyone is painting that picture. It's most likely because they're selling you how to do better social content or how to start or grow your newsletter, right? We all see that all the time, but we understand that it's not that simple. If you think about it when you're new and you enter a room kind of full of people and you start shouting, Hey guys, I'm offering this, I'm amazing. You can come check it out.

Usually when you think about people creating content and they're a newbie in this space, it's essentially that picture. Does that really attract people? If you're just shouting from your own mouth? I don't think so. Like, if I imagine myself being in that room, I would be pretty annoyed.

I don't like people who just talk loud about their own work. I would be the first one who was like walking out the door. I'm not going to buy it. And I think a lot of people are like that. They're not going to buy it. So something to think about is maybe how you can get other people to shout for you. I think for me, that was also what got me off the ground because people were constantly talking about my free guide. But let's not go there first today. We're talking about, you know how do you build that trust with the public when you're still a newbie, right? I actually have a few ways actually three to share with you so that you can start doing it now instead of just heads down creating all those content That you don't know when they will help you succeed Gain that outcome.

Let's talk about the first one. The first one is what I called Side Project Marketing. So in a way, it means that you're creating a side project that can drive traffic to your main project. For example, I don't know if you know, but I have this free Build in Public guide.

That was my first project when I was starting to share online at the end of 2020. That blew up. Everyone was talking about it. Everyone was passing to their friends. So basically I went from a nobody to a person who is like the go-to person for the topic building in public. So in a way, this side projects becomes assets so valuable that people would go out and tell their friends because it's just so good and it's free.

I had that product for a long time, actually still live today. Is still bringing in a lot of people. A couple of months ago, I developed a new side project, which is again, a free guide. And this time is the 100k case study for building up an education business. So the reason I started developing a new side project is we're in the knowledge space, so it's really important that we're sharing a lot of good knowledge with people, even for free, because that's the first impression.

But again, these free side projects, they cannot be random. They should be really about the topic that you're trying to educate people about. So my 100k education business case study is really connected to my small school brand because I'm going to show you how you can do it. But first I want to show you how I'm getting from zero dollars to 100k dollars.

With this approach you can gain so much trust from the public and you don't even need to be a superstar to achieve it.

Now, let's move to point number two. I think a lot of people are creating content. But they're not really helping people getting the outcome they want. So why I say that is because if you want to teach knowledge, essentially, you can actually be the person who is helping people achieve by using that knowledge.

So you don't actually just need to create content. So if you are new, what is much easier is if you just take your time to do it for someone, and if you do a good job, there must be a story that you can tell that really shows how amazing you are. So I would capture that story, and I don't think that story is just like one single piece of content because you can create social content from it.

I would definitely write a blog post. I would make a long form video talking about it. And I would make sure that everyone coming into my world, they would see those stories. So then, they would trust me a little bit more because they've seen me actually making things happen with this other person.

As we all say, people want what other people want. So in their mind, they're thinking, Ooh, this person is actually helping another person that looks like me. Hmm, I'm interested. Maybe one day I would, you know, use his service or buy his course or buy his book. So that is what's going on in people's mind when you do this.

From this you can gain a lot of trust and again, you don't need to be a superstar to achieve this.

So now let's go to number three. This one is something that i've been seeing a really good example happening around me lately and this person is Lee. She's doing it on X. So how it works is that you're publicly helping people so that you're showing them that you're capable of doing this, but then of course you're helping them privately, right?

And you're just posting these progress publicly. So I call this built in private and earn in public approach and it works magic.

Let's use Lee as an example. Lee is selling design services. I still remember her starting point because she joined one of my sprints and she was having like less than a thousand followers on X.

So that means you can do it with a small circle. She would start and say, Hey guys, I have a ton of design experience, but I'm new to offering this on the internet, just on an open platform. So what I want to do is I want to do it for free and I would only get three people. So please apply through this channel. Basically she get people to, you know, apply for it and she gets a lot of demands and guess what? She would pick three and then they would work together and then all the projects before and after she would show the design publicly.

This is really amazing because one, you're doing the work. Two, you're showing the results. Three, you're talking about, you know, charging for the services. So people understand that this is not something that is, you know, weird or click baity. This is actually a service. So imagine repeating this many, many times.

You start with $0, you get a ton of demand, you show the results. And then now you increase to $50, you get a ton of demand and then you show the results. And then she just keeps doing this until today. I think the last time I checked, she was at about 1500 per month for the same service. And she started from zero.

I think this is really smart because people can literally see that you're all booked out. And so many people have amazing things about your quality of work. So in people's mind, if they need design service. They're not going to wait, they're going to jump for the next price point. So in a way you can get a ton of trust this way and again and again, you don't need to be a superstar to achieve this.

Let's do a quick recap. I think if you're still thinking I'm going to create content. I'm going to write a newsletter. I'm going to grow an audience, and then I'm going to sell something. I think that's a wrong approach. My way of doing it is that content and audience would be a great way to document what you're already doing.

So then in the long run, you can reach more people. So it should be considered a long-term strategy. But you cannot just do this over and over again, right? Because you need something short-term to make you some cash to get those testimonials in. So if you want to do that, that's exactly what we just talked about.

It's about providing the service and earning your reputation in public, or you can develop a kick ass asset that is so good that blows people's mind away. And they would tell it to a friend. So eventually, of course, the hope is you can shift the weight and focus more on content and audience. So then you can reduce, you know, those hand on one on one service, but of course you need to reach a certain size first.

All right. I hope you enjoy the episode today. And maybe you can tell from my words that I really love the side project marketing way. I think it's because as a creator educator. I love to share and nothing beats the feeling of creating a super valuable asset that, you know, people keep passing to each other.

I think that is really an amazing feeling. Like for my free Build in Public guide, I was looking at Google analytics. It reached I think almost like 50, 000 people in the last three years. I really have to do nothing, you know?

So this is why I wrote a buildup story of how I work from $0 to $100, 000 in building my education business. The reason is the same. I really want to show people the step-by-step way. To get this achieved, and it's not going to be an overnight story. It's actually going to be a very strategic approach and you have to really figure out the small steps.

So if you're interested in this $100, 000 case study, well, you can go to broc.to/cs. B-R-O-C dot T-O slash C-S. Then you can op in and get the case study in the email. I hope you enjoy and rock and roll!

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