The Importance of Relationships - a podcast by Ani Alexander

Today I would like to talk about numbers… No, no - we will not go into maths or any calculations.

I want to talk about how the digital numbers sort of determine how cool we are…

Let’s see how people who don’t know you judge about your reputation online? They look at how many followers you have on Twitter, how much traffic does your website get, how many likes your Facebook page has, etc. They check who your Facebook friends are and how many of those are well-known and influential people.

It becomes a game of large audiences, big e mail lists and download numbers.

Let’s look at the traditional publishers. They don’t care about what kind of book you have. All they care about is how large is your audience and how many of your book you could sell to them… Which makes me think - hey if I had a large audience and could sell many books why would I need you anyway?

The problem is - When we get into that swirl we forget one simple truth and that is - those numbers represent people. Every single one is a human being who lives, feels and thinks.  Our e-mail list is not a  list of e mail addresses - it’s a list of people. When we look at our website traffic graph - it’s not clicks - it’s people who made those clicks and ended up on your website.

Many don’t realize that it’s not about the size of your audience. It’s about the engagement of that audience. It is about the quality of that audience.

So how do you create a high quality audience. I think it can be built only through relationships.

Honest, sincere and human relationships…

And I do believe that human relationships can be built in the virtual space. You may not be meeting those people in person, but you have the opportunity to connect with them.

At the beginning I was chasing numbers too… I logged in to my Amazon KDP dashboard and tracked the book sales. Those numbers impacted my day’s mood and low numbers made me feel like a failure… But then I looked at it otherwise… Even if only few people gave my the precious gift of their time and attention and if they spent hours and days reading what I wrote and it made them feel something - that’s already impressive and great.

If I compare my podcast stats with the very popular podcasters I may get depressed at some point. But it doesn’t happen because I don’t do that.

I look at the stats and try to remember that on the other end of the word, there are people, who listen now and hopefully get inspired and encouraged by what I’ve got to say. And if this podcast helps even only few of you - then I’ve accomplished my goal.

I truly believe that it’s all about relationships. Relationships are not built overnight and it is a long-term thing. But believe me, it’s absolutely worth it.

It may seem difficult but it is not really. If you care about your audience and provide value to them you’ll be fine. So many successful people during our interviews repeated over and over again that the key to success is helping people. So I guess  it’s time to listen.

The thing is - It’s not about you… it’s about them.

By shifting your mindset from “what is it for me?” to “how can I help them” things will start changing.

Ideally there should not even be “me” and “them”. If you manage to create a community, which will be called “we” then you’ll totally nail it!

So don’t chase numbers. Instead have a goal of creating a loyal audience, who will be around and who will support and encourage what you.

So today I wanted you to Think about those things - because I think that it’s crucial.

That’s it for today. Take care and keep building your dream!

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Further episodes of Brand Architect

Further podcasts by Ani Alexander

Website of Ani Alexander