Incremental creation
If you happen to have a bunch of saints show up and tell you exactly what to do, good for you. (Jules Bastien-Lepage, Jeanne d'Arc, 1879. Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons)
The one thing I could offer that would benefit my fellow entrepreneurs the most? Clarity.
Unfortunately, it’s not something I can sell. You pretty much have to set off on a traditional hero’s journey with fantasy animal friends in order to find it for yourself.
Some people do try to sell clarity — or the promise of clarity. But the formulas they offer to help you find it are going to be things you already know you are supposed to do — maybe even things you’ve already done.
The conventional wisdom these days, if you want to start an online business, is to figure out your niche and who you want to serve, and then create content to serve them. It’s right up there with spending less than you make in order to save money and taking in fewer calories than you expend in order to lose weight. We know how to do it, but that’s still not enough to help us find success.
It’s the kind of plan that only works when it works. It requires knowing what you want to do ahead of time, and not all of us do.
As a matter of fact, I advocate for the opposite approach for those who are overwhelmed by options. Start creating content first. Then, as a result of these efforts, you will gradually (though not necessarily slowly) figure out who you want to serve and what you want to do for them.
I believe that the clarity comes from the actions you take. It would be convenient if clarity would inform those actions, but that can’t happen until it happens.
It’s great if you already know what you want your business to offer, and to whom. Some of us start there. But some of us don’t. Some of us are looking for the next idea.
Often, ideas come from the experience of working with people and seeing what problems come up. If you haven’t done that part, why would you know exactly what problem you want to solve?
There are brilliant content strategists who show you how to map out a month’s worth of content using a special matrix. Such a plan makes it very easy to create content — but only if you know well the people you seek to serve, the problem you want to solve for them, the topics you will talk about, and the way you will present yourself. If you don’t have that foundation already, the sophisticated plan will not apply to you. It won’t be useful to you.
Not yet, that is.
So what do you do in the meantime? You come up with something you want to share, and share it.
If you don’t already have an audience, the thing you create will likely sink without a trace, seemingly pointless. That can be so discouraging that most people do not continue.
However, if you repeat this process again and again, you will start to build up a body of work, you’ll get better at what you’re doing, and you will begin connecting with your fellow human beings. That’s when you start to see the patterns that will help you to identify content pillars and all that stuff the experts talk about.
This incremental approach to creation is messy and unpredictable. However, it doesn’t have to stay that way. As you evaluate your results and spot patterns, you are gaining the clarity that you can use to make a plan that goes a little farther. Keep repeating this process and you will see more and more of the path ahead, which will allow you to make ever more sophisticated plans.
We begin with uncertainty — how else can we begin? But as we move forward, we will gain knowledge and skill that will lead us to clarity. Are you up for the adventure?
