AP 0474: Which Platform Is Best for My Ambassador Group?

AskPat 474 Episode Transcript

Pat Flynn: Hey, what's up, everybody? Pat Flynn here and welcome to Episode 474 of AskPat. Thank you so much for joining me today. As always, I'm here to help you by answering your online business related questions five days a week.

We have a great question today from Erich, but before we get to that I do want to thank today's sponsor, which is FreshBooks.com, a company that is serving over 3 million small businesses including my own with managing our business finances from our income, to our expenses, and even invoicing. They have a really great, professional way of invoicing. If you are a coach or do any consulting or have any clients, for example, they make it really easy to get invoices out there to your clients so you can get paid sooner than later. They have an award-winning mobile app, too, so you can check the financial health of your business on the go too. So I recommend checking it out 'cause I use it, and also it's great. Thirty-day free trial if you go to GetFreshBooks.com and enter “AskPat” in the “How did you hear about us?” section. Again, that's GetFreshBooks.com, enter “AskPat.”

All right, here's today's question from Erich.

Erich: Hey, Pat. My name is Erich, and I have a coaching website at HarmonyInsights.com. I remember a while back, you had a Facebook page for Pat's first book, and my guess is that the goal of that was to rally a community around the release of that book and bring them along for the journey. I would like to do something similar for the next leg of my journey with Harmony Insights and establish that more intimate audience that I want to let in on the successes and failures that I experience going forward, so show them how I approached it and maybe how they could as well. Give them the courage to go out on a limb. I'm trying to figure out, is the best place for that a separate Facebook page knowing that that audience is going to be a little bit more intimate than my general audience? Or should I do it on my main Harmony Insights website to drive traffic to it? My one concern with that is that visitors to that site, if they were to read these very transparent blogs, might be put off by it or assume that I'm less established than I am, or that it might just undermine my credibility in some way. So any input that you could lend on the best place to do that would be really helpful. And as I already have an AskPat T-shirt from the past question, if you'd like to give that to a listener who comments on this question if you decide to include it in your show, that would be fine by me. Thanks so much. I really appreciate everything you do.

Pat Flynn: Hey Erich, what's up? Good to hear your voice again, and I hope we were able to provide some service for you in the first question. Here you are in the second question. I'm appreciative of you offering a T-shirt for somebody out there who is listening, and I think it'd be kind of cool. If anybody wants an AskPat T-shirt, use the hashtag #AskPat474 and I'll choose somebody at random within a week after this show goes live. We'll just send you an AskPat T-shirt. I'll connect you with Jessica, my assistant, and we'll send that to you within a couple weeks. So again, within a week after this episode goes live, which will be by November 20, 2015, use the hashtag on Twitter #AskPat474 and we'll send you an AskPat T-shirt thanks to Erich. So Erich, thank you so much.

Now let's get to your question. The interactive group that you have to support you going forward with the next project that you have … I think this is a great idea. It's something we should all do for these upcoming projects, especially if you have something like a book coming out. In fact, if you actually go to PatsFirstBook.com, you can actually see that that group is still live, although it's grown to much more than just a support group for my books. I've actually taken myself out of it quite a bit because I just haven't been involved as much, but it has grown to become its own awesome thing to help other authors out there. Everybody is sharing Amazon-related things and covers to see what people like best, and all those sorts of things. So if you want book help, go to PatsFirstBook.com. That'll redirect you to the Facebook group that I set up.

But when I initially set that up, it was about 1,000 people by the time Let Go came out, which came out a few years back. This was my first book that I came out with, and it was great. It was absolutely great because I was able to get feedback from the group as I was moving along. I probably could've utilized them more before the book came out in terms of what do you like about this section? Or what do you think of this artwork? You know, asking questions and getting them involved is one of the best things you can do, because then by the time the book comes out, they'll be even more supportive of your work because they've had a role in how it's turned out to be. Then you'll get more downloads, more reviews, more shares, all those important things, too.

But again, even if it's not a book, having a community that is specific for an upcoming project that you have to help support you, to help give feedback, to help give insight on it and to help promote it when it comes out, and to help push it and be there for you when it goes lives. It's super important. This is what some people call the ambassador group or the launch team. Jeff Goins talked about it in a recent episode of the Smart Passive Income Podcast. He said it was very important to actually utilize it because of his advice. It was key, actually, and I know a lot of entrepreneurs who are doing this too with all different kinds of projects.

Now, where should you house this community? Should you house it on your website? Your concerns are valid. I think depending on how you are with your audience typically, it might set you back if you were to say why you're doing certain things with the way you're launching this book. If it's public, then it's not going to be as effective. You want to make this group a special group where they feel like they have something that others in the space that you're in in their audience doesn't have. It makes them feel special. When people feel special, they're more in tune. They're more likely to give feedback, and they're more likely to support it too down the road like I said earlier.

So one of the best ways to do this is just to set up a secret Facebook group. It makes it private, but it also makes communication easy too for you to get feedback on things, but also for people to communicate and connect with each other too. So that's where I would put it and that's what I did on my group there. I'll be doing another group for this next upcoming book launch. It'll be a different group and it's important that it's a subset of your current audience and it's ones who have essentially voted to be a part of this. You'll want to nurture this group. You'll want to give them things ahead of time. You want to give them rewards for their activity and all those sorts of things. I think doing it on Facebook is a great way to do it, and having it separate to your website again makes it feel more special and will have them more likely to take action. Plus, Facebook … Most of your audience is gonna be on Facebook already anyway, 'cause most of the world is and communication is very easy there. It's easy to go back and also search for certain things and see communication that has happened in the past too. It gives people an insider view.

So, Erich, I hope this answers your question, and I look forward to hearing the results from it. So, thank you again so much for offering the T-shirt for somebody. Again, #AskPat474. Just leave a comment about this particular episode or just say, “Hey, I'd like a T-shirt.” I'm gonna select somebody at random, so that's that. Erich, thank you for that. I wish you the best of luck. Keep me posted, please.

For those of you who are listening, if you have a question you'd like potentially featured here on the show, just head on over to AskPat.com. You can ask right there on that page, and I also want to give a big shoutout to FreshBooks.com for sponsoring this episode. FreshBooks, thank you so much because you've made my life so much easier with organizing my business finances. They are also serving 3 million small business owners besides myself in their quest to make finance headache and stress free. They also have great invoicing too and an award-winning mobile app so you can check the health of your business finances on the go. Plus, tax season is coming up too. It's gonna make it so much easier for you down the road. So just get smart: GetFreshBooks.com. Go to GetFreshBooks.com and enter “AskPat” in the “How did you hear about us?” section to get the 30-day free trial. Again, that's a 30-day free trial by going to GetFreshBooks.com and enter “AskPat.”

Thank you so much for listening today and this week. I appreciate you, and here's a quote to finish off the day by Arthur Ashe. He said, “Start where you are. Use what you have. Do what you can.” Cheers, take care, and I'll see you next week in the next episode of AskPat. Thanks so much. Bye.