Recently I received an email from a self-discovery coach announcing that ‘Instagram is dead’ and asking if I wanted to learn how she grew her TikTok account from zero to 40k followers in 8 months with a one-off masterclass costing £62.
The problem I had with that email is that there was no evidence, info or facts to back up her offer. Just vanity metrics. She’s not a marketing or social media coach.
It was very random.
I had lots of questions. There was nothing on her website.
I’m not bashing her, I’m sure it’s a very thought-out and well put together masterclass, but it didn’t make me want to ‘grab my spot’.
*Hits delete*
This got me thinking about the importance of making extraordinary claims, integrity and being transparent in business to build trust…
I recently worked on designing some presentation slides for a lovely copywriter pal who was giving a website copy masterclass. I made sure I included some stats and facts to back up what she wanted to talk about because she hadn’t included any.
Why?
Because it’s really hard to build trust if you don’t back up what you’re promising, sharing, offering…
…You’re the expert, so of course, you know how important what you’re doing is but does your community, followers and subscribers?
So if I’m saying that I help businesses with their email marketing and you don’t think it’s worth the investment because it’s not important or valuable then I’d make sure you know the facts as well, share my knowledge and the success stats I get for my clients.
You don’t need to just take my word for it, especially when we’re building a connection. I prefer to slowly nurture, that’s my vibe.
…I’ve been fooled before by fake connections and attention. I’ve felt conned and groomed into making bad decisions and investments. I think I know better now, but I still get suspicious.
Seriously – how much fake ‘authenticity’ BS is there?!
To get around this it’s important to share tangible results, feedback, testimonials, stats, quotes and facts. It’s crucial to building a relationship or making a sale.
If you’re ‘claiming’ to do something extraordinary share the evidence and transformation. It’s powerful!
“Don’t you believe in flying saucers, they ask me? Don’t you believe in telepathy? — in ancient astronauts? — in the Bermuda triangle? — in life after death?” No, I reply. No, no, no, no, and again no. “Don’t you believe in anything?” “Yes”, I said. “I believe in evidence. I believe in observation, measurement, and reasoning, confirmed by independent observers. I’ll believe anything, no matter how wild and ridiculous, if there is evidence for it. The wilder and more ridiculous something is, however, the firmer and more solid the evidence will have to be.”
– Isaac Asimov, Science Fiction Writer and Professor