Hi, I’m Naomi Burgess and I’m an expert in blogging. If you’re reading this, chances are that you’re an expert in something too. This blog post will tell you if you should call yourself an expert and what advantages that title can bring to you as a business owner.
Knowing an Expert
What is an expert? When someone says that they are an expert in something, you usually think “Wow that person must be really smart”. That is true – in order to qualify as an expert, you should be very skilled and knowledgeable at a particular field, be it financial consultancy, blogging or creating organic hair products. However, there are a lot of people who’re just as skilled and knowledgeable – are they all experts?
The answer to the above question is No. You might be a math’s genius or a terrific writer, but if none of your work sees the light of day and the eyes of customers, you’re just a really smart person, but not an expert. The title of an expert implies that you have expertise and recognition of customers and come recommended as such. But how does one earn that?
An Expert has expertise
If you’re launching your own business, chances are that you have a lot of experience with something and know a lot about it. For instance, if you’re launching a line of organic hair products, you likely know a lot about organic remedies and what’s good for hair, which is wonderful. At this point you’re probably asking yourself though – does all that make me an expert in organic hair products?
The answer is yes. There are many so-called “experts” out there who position themselves as such and yet their knowledge and skills are far from excellent. If they can call themselves experts, there’s nothing to stop you from advertising yourself as such. Indeed, when people hear the word “expert”, most of them are impressed. Experts have clients coming to them, they have to spend less time on knocking on doors and engaging in cold calls.
Experts need not to market themselves
Chances are that you’ve already proven yourself to be an expert in your previous endeavors within the field, so there’s no shame in admitting that you are. Modesty has never helped any business owner and it’s not going to help you. Starting any business is difficult, and it’s even more difficult if you’re not putting yourself out there, marketing yourself the best way you can. Marketing yourself is an expert is a strategy that would set you apart from your competitors in your niche and give you a lot of interesting projects, for which you can charge extra as an expert.
Maximize your potential
So how can you start advertising expert products/services? Choose what you’re best at and capitalise on it. Make sure that the premise of your business is going to keep your interest for a long time – there will come a time when you would want to advance and develop more products, and you should, but if what you’re currently interested in is just a passing fancy, you won’t get much out of it, even as an expert, because it’s important to like what you do.
Be Approachable
As I said earlier, there’s little need to be modest when you’re running a business. If you can back up your claim that you’re an expert – and I hope that you can – do so. That way, you would attract more clients and you would be able to justify charging premium prices for your products/services, because you have the knowledge and the experience required for making them great. However, don’t be arrogant. Use your knowledge and experience to help people, not patronise them. This applies to your coworkers, as well as to clients and suppliers. If you can’t get along with the people around you, no matter how good your products are, you would always have fewer clients than other industry experts who genuinely do their best to help people.
The most important thing in running a business is being yourself. You have a unique set of skills, knowledge and experience – make them work to your advantage and advertise them any way you can – at events and seminars or on the web for example. Don’t be afraid of being an expert!
