Trends in Marketing and Visibility for 2024

If you can demonstrate how you can bring value to somebody else's audience, it makes it a really easy win. And a really easy yes, for them to view as a guest speaker on a podcast, part of an event, doing an email list swap, just shouting you out on social media, whatever that looks like. Because when somebody else does that, it automatically gives you additional credibility, you have that lended grace to that has been built up by the person who owns this audience or who has curated this audience. For however long they've been doing that they believe this person is good, and they, they're there, because they find that they add value. And when they put your name into their sphere, and they speak it in a positive way, which they would be doing, then you're automatically going to have that much more credibility. And that just takes you a lot further on that trust building relationship with potential new clients. So looking for other people's audiences is my number one thought that step for visibility trends are 2020 for.

This is the Entrepreneur School Podcast where we believe you can run a thriving business and still make your family a priority. This show is all about supporting you the emerging or early stage Entrepreneur on your journey from solopreneur to CEO while wearing all of the other hats in your life. My name is Kelly Sinclair and I'm a brand and marketing strategist who started a business with two kids under 3am, a corporate PR girl turned entrepreneur after I learned the hard way that life is too short to waste doing things that burn you out. On this show, you'll hear inspiring stories from other business owners on their journey, and learn strategies to help you grow a profitable business while making it all fit into the life that you want. Welcome to Entrepreneur School.

Hello, and Happy New Year, welcome to 2024. And I hope that it has already started off really great for you. I know that it's only like day two. But the reality is, two years ago, I welcome to the new year in a hospital room with the news that I needed my gallbladder removed. So if you're not currently in a hospital or needing surgery, I think you know, it's pretty good, you're in a good place off to a good start if you if you need something to compare it to. Anyhow, I wanted to come in today and do a bit of a different episode with some sort of trends that I'm seeing, predicting or willing to, you know, put my neck out there for for this coming year with respect to visibility, marketing and business. And I saw this idea because the Washington Post does a piece every single year, it's called the list. And on one side, they have what's out and on the other side, they have what's in. So I wanted to make my own little version of this and I came up with six things out in in for the list of 2024 trends for your business.

So let's dive into it. First on the list of things that are out. And I hope that you will all enthusiastically support me in deciding this. It's other people's opinions. And within is other people's audiences. So let's scrap worrying about what other people think. Making decisions and choices in with respect to other people's opinions and worrying about how we might be perceived for doing certain things. And instead lean into the fact that other people have created amazing audiences that we can tap into, and leverage in order to grow our own exposure and visibility for our businesses. So I think that this is one of the most underutilized strategies when it comes to visibility. And it's, it's truly a core PR, traditional PR tactic, if you will. And that means identifying where you can find other people who have audiences that overlap and align with yours. Of course, making sure those other people are people who you align with from a brand values perspective, and then finding ways that you can connect with each other and showcase each other and bring value to each other's audiences. And it doesn't always have to be two ways but if you can show demonstrate how you can bring value to somebody else's audience. It makes it a really easy win and a really easy yes for them to have you as a guest speaker or on a podcast, part of an event, doing an email list swap, just shouting you out on social media, whatever that looks like. Because when somebody else does that, it automatically gives you additional credibility, you have that lended grace to that has been built up by the person who owns this audience, or who has curated this audience. For however long they've been doing that they believe this person is good. And they, they're there, because they find that they add value. And when they put your name, into their sphere, and they speak it in a positive way, which they would be doing, then you're automatically going to have that much more credibility. And that just takes you a lot further on that trust to building relationship with potential new clients. So looking for other people's audiences is my number one tip for visibility trends are 2024.

And so number two, what is out showing up for the frequency? What is in showing up with intention? So I know that we use this phrase a lot showing up and what does that look like? It means, you know, being present in different ways with your marketing on social media, and events in person, or whatnot, or in your inbox, like sending emails, doing all those things. But a lot of the time, we feel like, I feel like so many times people have asked me, How often do I need to post on social media? How often do I need to do this, and it's all about the numbers, it's really not about the numbers, when you show up instead, with intention, you're creating quality content that comes from a positive energetic space, that's going to make better connections with people because you're in more alignment when you create it. And you're in that better space. So I don't care how often you're showing up. Honestly, I know that when you show up with intention, you are actually going to show up more than you it's just going to automatically do that. But if you're doing it just for the numbers, just for the like, I need to check off. You know, having done six reels this week, or being in my stories every single day, or whatever it is like just let's not think about content creation and showing up from a frequency standard. Let's set a standard of intention instead. Because that's going to be so much more powerful, it's going to feel better for you, you're going to enjoy it. And it's going to land way better on the people on the other end, like reading your content, meeting you at the event, whatever, because you're going to carry the energy with you of not wanting to be there if you're showing up just to check off a box. So let's let go of that. Let's go showing up for frequency and allow in showing up with intention, as we're thinking about our content and visibility strategy for 2024.

All right, number three, what is out counting followers. I think this has been out for a long time. But I want to re emphasize counting followers, and what is in counting on relationships. So this is like scrapping the vanity metrics, the social media growth with a number of people who you think are in here for old and worrying about how many likes and watches you're getting on social media, and instead focusing on building quality relationships. Because one good referral relationship one good recommendation, one good collaboration could lead to so much more than when we're focused on these things that we've been trained to believe are important. They are not important. It actually blows my mind that some people are getting paid based on the number of people on their social media, because they're there's nobody verifying even what real accounts look like, after the time, you might see people coming across. And if you're not constantly pulling out like robot accounts from your followers, you're gonna have the same problem. You're not getting the quality followers or not necessarily even real people. So building quality relationships and focusing on that, again, a true attribute of what strong PR really is all about is going to take you so much further, so much faster, in 2024.

All right, number four, what is out is sharing your tips. Meaning of the How to content and what's in is sharing your ideas. So let's bring in thought leadership to this debate around what makes good content and even start thinking about content from a way broader perspective of that value is not specifically giving somebody instruction value is all about sharing your ideas in order to give somebody a new way of looking at something perspective is everything. And a lot of the times people are struggling because they believe something that doesn't necessarily true. And if you can show them that they are believing something that is hurting them, and they have then the power to change that. That's an amazing aha, that's so much value that you can add without having had to tell them the step by step how to do this thing. I also think that we're just kind of getting over having so much content like that, where it's just telling us like how to DIY your whatever. And it's not, that's not really helpful, and it just becomes noise. It's the sea of the same as far as content goes. So when you start leaning into sharing your ideas, you now give yourself the power to have opinions. And I feel like this is something we all need to practice is, what are my opinions? What are my beliefs? Why do I believe that? And why is that important? That if you can ask and answer those questions and beaches, constantly giving yourself a space to practice talking about it, the easiest being, of course, your social media channels, your emails, and perhaps if you like to go on podcasts, or speak at events, you can test out different ways of sharing about what matters to you, and what you believe to be true. And go with that. Because in life, there is no right and wrong around ways to do whatever it is that you help solve. So for me, I work with entrepreneurs and business owners on growing their business, through visibility and PR. But there are many ways to grow your business. And I'm not saying that anybody else who's not sort of waving the flag that I'm waving is wrong, I'm just waving my flag. So what is your flag? And how can you bring your ideas to the table, because that's also going to help position you as an expert, increase your competence and, and allow people to align more with who you are and what you're all about, which creates a way better environment for you, and for who your clients are that you're attracting.

Alright, so number five is all about peace. This is something that I need to work on. And I am trying to allow. So I would love to change the dynamic and the paradigm around how we believe we should be getting things fast. So what's out is going fast, and what is in is going slow. allowing things to happen at the pace that they're meant to happen in our lives and in our businesses. Instead of worrying about that that was q1 goal did not happen in q1 or we didn't hit our numbers for the month, or whatever it is. Because business and life are in seasons, and everyone has different lengths of season. And there's no such thing as a flower growing in the winter. And just doesn't happen. So I'm here I'm for 2024 to lean into going slower, and also changing the standard of what that case looks like. Because this whole hustle culture that has been around as an interface is, especially with so much online interaction ways of seeing other people, we think that we should be able to achieve so much in so little time. And especially when we're also parents doing this entrepreneurship thing. It is challenging, and there's things that are gonna get in the way and all of a sudden, your car breaks down and you need to buy a new one and then your kids hockey skates break and you need to buy some new ones. And all these things take up all of your time. All of a sudden in a week. There's your whole week, you didn't get your podcasts recorded. You didn't get your outreach done. You didn't get your social media posts. Oh, well. Let it be. I am totally speaking to myself here. So I hope that this resonates with somebody else as well.

All right, now let's move on to the last one. What is out is trying to control the outcome. And what is in is exploring what's exciting. Again, message to Kelly. This is one of the things I find most difficult trying I want to be in control. I want to plan I want to know when I'm going to make X money, how many people are going to join my program, what I'm going to be wherever I'm going to be and I like create my little plan. For the last three or four years I have been creating my business plan on a dry erase calendar. Because the reality is I have to erase it so many times and sometimes it hurts to do that to think ah this plan I had or this last year in 2003. I took an entire month month off without having that planned Because I needed to, that's what had to happen. I had to pause. And so I had to cancel a launch plan. So a whole program that I had decided I was going to do, I cancel it all, and I never even brought it back. But that all just it just had to go. So controlling the outcome sometimes also means controlling how you make money, and then exploring what's exciting, is allowing yourself to feel like does this feel good? Do I want to do more than that of this? Are people asking for this? I've noticed for myself that people have been asking, and we're curious about PR about what does that look like for small businesses? What does it look like for media to get media to build out a media strategy to get featured in the media, all of these things, and that wasn't on my radar a few months ago. And now I'm actually listening to it and seeing that it does feel exciting for me to kind of go back into my roots as a PR practitioner, someone who's formally trained even in that industry, and in that practice, and the play with it, because at the end of the day isn't running a visit is all about having more fun and more autonomy, more ability to do things that you love. I sure hope so. Because if we don't love what we do, we are not going to keep doing it. And it takes a lot more than just showing up every day to feel good about running a business. There's so much emotional, financial, and all of the things invested on your own part into your business that you really have to love it. So exploring what's exciting, I feel is going to be an amazing trend to lean into for 2024.

So I hope that you find these interesting, let me recap quickly, let's go out with other people's opinions, and in with other people's audiences out was showing up for the frequency. And in was showing up with intention out with counting followers and in with counting on relationships, how was sharing your tips, and in was sharing your ideas out with going fast and in with going slow and out with trying to control the outcome and in with exploring what's exciting. So I hope you can take a piece of this into this year with you, as you are starting to shave out what your year looks like. build out your plan, set your goals, allow the pace to be whatever it needs to be for you right now.

And I can't wait to hear about it if you have a really exciting goal. Or if you really resonated with any of these pieces. I'd love to hear from you on Instagram, just send me a message in my DMs at KSCO_Kelly, I'm primarily on that account rather than the podcast account. I love to hear from you. I would love to know what you are working on this year. And if there's any way that I can support you, I am all for it. If you are looking for support with your visibility, if you made a goal around creating more visibility for yourself in 2024, if you're looking to really elevate yourself as a thought leader in your industry, if you want to position yourself as an expert in what you do in your field, that is my jam. And I'm here to help you with your brand with your visibility with your PR. So reach out and I will talk to you again next week.

You did it you just listen to another episode of the Entrepreneur School Podcast. It's like you just went to business school while you folded your laundry, prep dinner or picked up your kids at school. Thank you so much for being here. I want to personally celebrate your commitment to growing your business. You can imagine I'm throwing confetti for you right now. If you enjoyed today's episode, please leave us a review. Make sure you're subscribed and let us know you're listening by screenshotting this episode and tagging us on Instagram, head to entrepreneurschool.ca for tons of tools and resources to help you grow your business while keeping your family a priority. You can subscribe to our email list and join our community. And until next time, go out there and do the thing.