The Month Of No Self-Promo: How Can I Help You Be Successful?
“You can be more successful in two months by becoming really interested in other people’s success than you can in two years trying to get other people interested in your own success.” – Keith Ferrazzi, Never Eat Alone
I have a good story.
I’m an Irish guy traveling around the world without flying, for four years, working from my laptop.
And I’ve gotten pretty good at telling my story. I was at a language exchange last week and found myself the center of attention in a circle of seven people. They all seemed fascinated by what I had to say, and I was only too happy to keep my mouth flapping.
That kind of scene isn’t unusual for me these days. It happens quite often.
The problem is, I usually leave such a scene without knowing much about anyone else. I get so caught up in telling my own story and sharing my own ideas, that I fail to find out the interesting stories of others and learn from them.
It’s been the same online for a while now. I’ve been overly concerned with telling my own story, and have spent most of my time trying to make myself successful. I haven’t done a good job of connecting with others and helping them spread their message.
Changing it up
To try remedy this, I’ve decided to go extreme and flip everything for the month of February. What happens if I hold back on all the self-promotion and instead devote my time and energy to helping others succeed? What happens if I stop telling my story and encourage other people to tell theirs?
So here’s what I’ll be doing different in February:
- Listen more than I talk in conversation.
- All tweets and Facebook updates have to help promote someone else’s work.
- Reach out to at least one person every day and ask how I can help them.
- Actually follow through and help people, without any expectation of reciprocation.
- In every blog post that I write, highlight some cool shit other people are doing.
I’m also going to call on you fine folks to suggest other things I can do. This whole idea only came to me recently so I’m sure it can evolve into something much more concrete before February hits.
Measuring the success of this experiment will be tough. It will largely be intangible, but I think I’ll get a good feel for whether or not the whole thing makes a positive difference. I’ll report back in March and let everyone here know how it went. Hopefully it will lead to some positive, permanent changes in how I work.
Of course, in the long run I’ll always have to spend some time looking after number one and promoting my own wares, since nobody is ever going to care as much about my success as me. But I’d like to have a better balance between helping others and helping myself. For the last year or so I feel I’ve been too much on the ME side.
The hardest part of all this may be the face-to-face conversations. I love telling my story and sharing lessons I’ve learned with other people. Quite often though I get carried away and realize after half an hour that I’ve been doing all the talking and I’ve yet to learn anything about the other person. And this sucks because I know I can learn just as much from others as they can from me, if not more. So every time I dominate a conversation, I’m stopping myself from learning something new, and I’m missing an opportunity to make that person feel valued and important. That needs to change.
So, how can I help you?
Are you working on something cool that I can help promote? Is there someone in my network that you’d like to be introduced to? Or maybe I can help you out with a few tips on blogging or web development.
Keep in mind though that I won’t be doing lots of free web design work. I’ll still be charging my usual rate for that ($45 per hour) since I’ll need to make a living. But I’m happy to help point folks in the right direction or do small tasks for free. As long as it doesn’t take time away from my paid work, and I don’t have to spend more than 50 hours total in front of the computer per week, nothing’s really off limits.
Here’s to your success!
Love that quote at the top.. Great reminder. I think I should follow suit with you in Feb. or starting now even.. It seems hard to come from a place of service when I don’t even seem to have helping myself figured out… Never mind that what I do is offering a *service* of web design.. heh. I’m unfortunately coming from a place of survival mode and maybe that affects my work. =/
I hear you, Janet. Part of the reason I’m doing this now is that I feel I’ve reached the point where my audience will do a lot of my marketing for me.
I like to think that I could have done something like this a year ago, but I’m not sure if that’s true. Should be an interesting experiment.
Niall,
Right on! I agree with this philosophy.
Here is how you could help me:
I’m curious about a list of rockstars that you met at WDS and in your blogging days. Could you make a list of bloggers with links to their website for me?
Thanks buddy! (Ps. Video #2 is moving and I guess there is no chance you will be in the states in February?)
Benjamin! Methinks a great post would be a list of my favorite bloggers and what I’ve learned from each of them. That would help expose their work to more people and also introduce my audience to more cool content.
I won’t be in the US for another couple of years unfortunately. Grounded for a while thanks to my own challenge!
Hey Niall, I liked when you held the camera and showed the drop!
It’s great to see you are taking on a whole new challenge/experience for the month of February! That is what is life is about- at any given moment, exploring what is most intriguing.
I hope you are able to help lots of people this coming month, but just so you know buddy, you have helped hundreds, if not thousands of people by doing what you are doing already. Maybe at times it seems like self promotion, but I can bet you that many are living vicariously through you and in a small way, you are changing their lives for the better.
I am vicariously traveling
Thanks, Matt. I like to remind myself of that, too. Still, lots of room for improvement
Keep doing what you do, bud.
Love this.
Suggestion, if you don’t already do it: for every new e-mail subscriber you get, send them a personal e-mail and ask how you can help them.
I like it. I already have an automated message sent out when someone subscribes, inviting them to tell me what they’re struggling with so that I might be able to help. I also invite them to promote themselves on a secret intro page here on DtR (as with new Twitter followers).
But sending personal emails would definitely be more effective. Right now my response rate for those automated emails is down around 5% methinks.
I love this posting. I love it for the removal of ego and the honesty. I am starting my own business and it’s easy to get caught up in the “me” mode. My business, however, requires the exact opposite of that. I am a birth doula and aspiring midwife. I service all women, regardless of their ability to pay ~ I see lots of bartering in my future and consider that a good thing. A spin-off of that business in an outreach program called “My Sister’s Hand”, helping teen single mothers through whatever decision they’ve made in their pregnancy with support and mentoring. The lack of funding in my state is tricky. I am learning that by supporting them all without regard for it ever coming back to me is really the key to making someone feel truly supported, and it’s good for the soul. (Which is what lead me here to begin with.) Marketing isn’t my strong suit. Any suggestions? Meanwhile, I’ll keep dishing out the support and the questions as though the pay doesn’t matter…because truthfully it’s the last thing that should, in this line of work. I wish you well and would like to hear how it’s going. So many things you’ll learn on the road~ faith in the goodness of people is one of them. I hope you’re always at the right place at the right time and that you’re soaking it all in. It’s a beautiful day out there – everyday – when you notice everything. Be well and giggle as much as possible. -Lora
Lora, that comment was like a warm hug
I can tell just from your words that you’re great at what you do. Your caring shines through.
As for marketing, I recommend reading through Chris Guillebeau’s archives over at The Art of Non-Conformity. He’s all about anti-marketing, understanding that just important as defining who your product/service is for, is defining who it’s NOT for. Sometimes the best thing you can do for a potential customer is to tell them they’d be better off taking their business elsewhere.
I found the book Delivering Happiness by Tony Hsieh has some good lessons on this type of marketing, as does anything by Seth Godin.
Hope that helps!
Hi Niall,
Totally understand this problem! It’s especially hard for people like youself, as you say, who have amazing stories to tell.
The one trick that has been useful when writing is to write whatever you want to write down, then look at how many times you write the words ‘me’ or ‘I’. Then spend some time converting those to ‘you’. It will alter the mood of your writing, and you might have to rewrite the whole thing, but it changes the approach of your writing to the reader.
I like that idea a lot, AK.
I think there’s a balance I need to strike, because I feel a big reason I’ve gotten as far as I have with blogging is that I’m willing to share a lot of personal stuff. People seem to dig that. But I’m sure I can balance it out a bit better so I’m not just telling my own story over and over again.
Hey Niall, I’m not sure how you can help me be successful, but I’m composing full time now and selling my music via stock music sites (just one exclusively for now). This is my sole income – I try to get scoring jobs for films/shows etc. but thats very hard and takes a lot of time, when I could just be composing new tracks to build up my passive income.
I’ve just released my new album called “Fluidity” as a side project. Its my 2nd album and I just release them for fun – if anyone ever buys one, I’m over the moon.
So yea…don’t really know what you could do to help me be successful, but you have a great idea and I hope it goes well
Thanks, Emmett. I love what you’re doing, man. Been really impressed at how you’ve been building up that business.
I’ll be thinking of ways I might be able to help you out.
Cheers!
Hi Nail!
Great!
What I think is even greater is your confession about the talking to much. That’s an act of courage.
You could help me by helping me spread my message amongst Dutch bloggers, and/ or give me names of Dutch bloggers who rock the world. I’ve seen English-language-bloggers all connected and there’s shit loads of them. For me the main reason to write in Dutch, and help the Dutchies rock the world too. But I haven’t connect to any of them, they’re hard to find.
Thanks and good luck!
Hey Irene, thanks for the comment.
I met up with two very cool Dutch bloggers while in Amsterdam. Perhaps you know them already?
- Esther: http://identitales.com/
- Simon: http://blog.simondroog.nl/
I was trying hard to spread the word about my blog in Ireland, too. There’s something about having an audience and making a difference in your own country that’s hard to beat. Anyway, that’s still a work in progress for me. One thing I’m trying to do is land a weekly or fortnightly column with one of the national newspapers. That would surely help get me known. Maybe you could try something like that, too. Can’t hurt to ask!
Woow, thanks! I will defenitly check them out! Awesome.
And thanks for your idea about the column. I will think about it and let you know…
This is great Niall. Good timing too. I want to run a few ideas by you regarding a project I’m working on as I feel your expertise in WordPress and some other things may be required
.
I’ll send you an email shortly bro.
Cheers
I think we all have a tendency to blow our own trumpets, I know I did in the past and it wasn’t exactly positive stuff either!
As for ideas, one very good one that comes straight to mind is doing another call-out you did a few months back on people who listed our big ridiculous goals last year, maybe even encouraging us to track our progress through the month of February as well.
If it wasn’t for you calling me out the last time, I wouldn’t have started my countdown on my blog, for example.
Another idea is ‘ tag ‘ a selection of people and encourage them to either write a comment or make a blog post on a topic of your choice. Of course, you have to ask a tough, out of the ordinary question and be sure to give a full, honest comment on those who make a post.
And if you really want to be serious about the whole no promo thing then attach no videos of yourself to your posts for the month of February as well, perhaps getting other people to fill in instead?
Those are just a few ideas, I’ll probably be able to think of more later.
Cheers, Adrian.
I’m actually wary about taking my voice off the blog completely. I was thinking of having nothing but guess posts on here for the month of February, but I’ve noticed that the guest posts I’ve had in the past never got very many comments, even though they were of good quality.
Methinks because this blog is so tied in with my personal voice and story, that the readers may feel a little cheated when they don’t get to hear from me.
So I may accept a few guest posts next month, but I’ll try to have my own voice in there somewhere, too. As much as I want to help others be successful, I don’t want a dozen different voices coming at my audience in quick succession.
I like the idea of calling people out again, though I have to admit that I’ve been sucking at following through and working on my Spanish since I’ve been here in Budapest :-/
I wasn’t really thinking of videos in context of guest posts. What I meant was you would still be writing your own posts but the attached videos would be of other people talking about the posts instead of you, allowing them to give their own slant on the topic, that is what I had in mind when I said that.
That said, I understand why you would be wary but I was just putting the idea out there.
Ah, pretty cool idea actually! Making me think, Adrian. Thanks!
Hi Niall,
I can exactly relate to what you are saying: you find yourself in a middle of a conversation because people keep asking you about your cool story – and then you end up not knowing anything about them. Happens to me as well and listening more is definitely doing it.
Although you might feel like missing out on this part, I think you don’t. I did answer your question of what you can help me with and I really appreciated your help. However, I like your experiment as a conscious act of increasing a certain part that feels imbalanced and am curious what will immerse from that willful decision to listen more, especially in conversations. I’ll remind myself on that, too.
A suggestion regarding no self-promo: I got to know you because I was following Jen Gresham’s blog. You pointed me towards a ton of great material from fellow bloggers – wouldn’t it be great to highlight certain material you consider a great read or watch? I got tremendous pushes from your Courage Course list of “Recommended Reading” – this might be worth a look to publish a comment every once in a while to point out really good material and help both readers and fellow writers. You probably do that already from time to time.
Looking forward,
Sabine
Thanks, Sabine! I like that idea a lot. Will likely do a few posts along those lines next month.
Wow. What a cool idea! I personally feel like I’d probably get burnt out pretty quickly if I put all my energy into helping others. I also think that you can’t really help others effectively without helping yourself first. I guess, though, that once you’ve gone after your dreams and reached a certain level of contentment, it’s natural to want to reach out and help others find that contentment too. It seems like that’s the way it should be. I’m curious to see how this experiment turns out!
Thanks, Jana.
I feel now is a good time for this because my audience has grown to the point where other folks do a lot of my marketing for me. So even if I went a whole month without promoting myself, I doubt I’d see much of a traffic drop here on the blog.
Hello! My husband John and I have been reading your blog since around mid-December and we love it! I had been toying around with the idea of scaling down our possessions and you inspired us to make the move. We can now fit everything we own in our closet, including our twin mattress, and I can fit everything I own alone in my backpack (also inspired by you!). I can’t think of anything you could do for me except keep writing!
Thanks so much, Sierra! I love hearing that I’m helping folks make some positive changes in their lives.
More power to ya
Eschewing self promotion in order to self promote? What a gimmick!
Wow, Ron. Two comments from you and nothing positive. I’m sure we’re going to get along great
Niall and Ron, sitting in a tree…
Niall: Pretty cool view from up here, huh?
Ron: I’ve seen better.
Okay! Hilarious Niall.
hello
I recently subscribed to your blog and enjoy your posts very much!
Your choice to do a “no self-promotion” month is quite inspiring and my respect for you just doubled.
Keep writing and inspiring others! I’m looking forward to hearing how it goes!
Thanks, Imahni!
I’ve found in travel that asking questions about ‘you’ in conversation brings about a lot of learning. As well as an opportunity to connect by asking questions.
You’re traveling the world, Niall. How about coming up with a few questions for February conversations.
#3 could be how can I help you with <>?
You may find yourself being introduced to the bloggers in the world-space of each person you meet.
Guessing you’ll end up with lots of beautiful women buying you a beer:-)
Thanks for the comment, Cynthia.
“How about coming up with a few questions for February conversations.”
Can you elaborate on what you mean by that? Sounds interesting.
Ahhhh…. February’s fading fast.
I meant simple questions, maybe one a day.
How might I help you make a difference in someone’s life today?
Who might appreciate a helping hand today?
What’s happening around town today where I can pitch in and help?
When might I ask local leaders about helping out while I’m in town?
Where do people who need help turn around here because I want to help someone today.
blessings,
Cynthia
Why
Q: Who
Q: How do people get news here?
Q: How can I make a difference for someone by writing about your town?
Q:
Q:
Cynthia Ann Leighton recently posted: How I Got 21 Days 6842 Dollars Online Revenue
How could you help me? You already did, Niall!!!
even though all of them will be less important…
Buuut if you want to help me more I’m sure I can came up with a lot more thinks you could do to help,
Fire away!
Refreshing post Niall. I’ve been following your blog since I saw your guest post on Benny’s Fi3M.com about learning Spanish from scratch. Service to others is indeed the key to many things in life. Good on you for reminding folks about that!
I don’t need your help for me but I’d like to ask you if you could give someone else a hand. I enjoy @PassoniFabiana ‘s music very much, but her back story and what she is trying to do are just as good as her music.
She moved to the US from Brazil to try to break into the music scene. Her music is Brazilian. Her band is a hybrid of Brazilian/US and her vocals/jazz phrasing are beautiful. Her band plays Brazilian music with horns!
She has just come out of a two year battle with breast cancer and is trying again to get her career going. If you could give her a twitter mention to your followers, it might help her to break through the noise and reach some people. Her website is http://fabianapassoni.com
Hey, Ronald. Love that you’re asking me to help someone else
I’ll definitely check out Fabiana’s music and see if I can help spread the word.
Cheers!
This is how reaching out to help others becomes contagious. Love it Ronald!
Niall,
Thanks for reading the book, man! It’s excellent. I plan on reading it a second time soon, just to help soak in the concepts.
I predict that February is gonna be an amazing month for you. As for any way to help me, I would appreciate any suggestions/tips on a new project that I’m working on.
I’m outlining personal development books, writing questions about the book content, and then recording short videos about each section of the book. It’s like the opposite of Spark Notes. In my course, the viewer goes in-depth into the material, answering questions as he/she goes along.
I’ve released my first course (Dale Carnegie’s How To Stop Worrying and Start Living), and I would appreciate feedback on how I can improve. Please don’t go through the whole course, though…it’s very time-consuming and that would take away from time you could be out and about in the world!
But if you could review some of the questions in the PDF/DOC, I would appreciate it a lot. Here is the link:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=optwS0Qu9ww
Thanks!
Josh Lipovetsky
Josh, I just took a quick look and I absolutely love this. Sending you an email.
Two things I’m sure you’re considering, and I’d love it if you’d share your plans so far about:
1. How are you going from Middle Europe further east in these “interesting” times? At least, it looks as though you’re headed east. I’m personally wondering what’s the best way to get from Istanbul to Australia.
2. Do you have any specific plans yet for crossing the big oceans without airplanes?
My as-yet-only-a-fantasy (but changing my life right now to make it happen) is to make a full swing through Istanbul, Tasmania, Mexico, and back to the US.
Hey Anne!
1) The most difficult part is getting to India without flying. I’m still hoping I can figure out a way to get a visa to Pakistan. Failing that, a boat from Iran to India might be an option. Plan C may involve going up and around through Kazakhstan and China, but that would probably involve a lot of visa hassle, too.
Assuming I make it to India, I’d then hope to go down to Sri Lanka and get a boat from Colombo to Singapore, then explore SE Asia from there. I haven’t really though about how I’ll get to Australia or New Zealand after that though.
2) Not really. I’d like to avoid cargo ships if possible, because they sound really boring, and I’m not sure they’d even have internet for me to work.
Your trip sounds amazing. Definitely keep working to make it happen. Maybe we’ll meet on the road
You help me to believe that there are still amazing, inspiring people out there. So thank you already!
Aw, thanks Alice!
Great post! Actually, almost everything you post gives me a new way of looking at things… even if I don’t necessarily agree with every word.
I enjoyed your manifesto very much, and it really helped me to let go of some of my fear of failure. I’ve been putting more effort into my own freelance writing business, with the ultimate goal of allowing it to bring in mostly passive income for me, and allowing me to travel. (I have a husband and children, so it’s not quite as easy as just picking up and going with my laptop!)I’m planning a 4-week trip to Europe next summer (2013), and depending on my business to fund it… I hope it can be done!
Anyway, without being long-winded, here is what would help me: a list of the 10 or 15 or 20 most influential books that you’ve read. I’m currently reading “The Well-Fed Writer,” and I’ve ordered “The 4-Hour Workweek,” and I’d love to know what books you’ve read that have inspired you or have given you great business advice.
Thanks for the comment, Michelle! I like the sound of the journey you’re on.
I actually have a recommended reading page on this site, but I haven’t updated it in a while. I like the idea of highlighting a few books on the blog. That would likely get some great discussion going and introduce everyone here to a few new and helpful reads.
Thanks for the idea!
Hi Niall,
You recently met my sister Sunaina somewhere in Budapest and she mentioned your blog to me cause she knows I’ve been looking for some courage and practical help to get up and go on a walkabout too. Anyway after having a quick look around your blog I have to say you are very inspirational indeed so thank you. As of now, you cannot be of anymore help to me than you already have by telling me (and others) your story. Best of luck with this project – I’ll be checking in to see how you fare.
Oh and Sunaina mentioned you are headed India way and IF there is anything you need here…home, bed, food, know-how let me know when you’re on your way over. I’d love to help.
Samira x
Hey Samira! Thanks so much for checking out the blog, and for the offer of help in India. Seems the whole family is quite fantastic
I’m hoping to be in India by late-Feburary, but not sure yet which part. Hopefully our paths will cross at some point
All the best!
Hey Niall,
Happy to see you and my sister have digitally met
I was reading a blog post today from one of my biggest role models. Dr. Sunitha Kirshnan works with trafficked women and children in India and has done some amazing work over the years. Her organization Prajwala, is where I’m hoping to go next after Budapest. Her post today was a little upsetting. As with all things in India, religion, culture, tradition are unfortunately used by fundamentalists to keep society ticking the old fashioned way. I don’t know what exactly you can to do help – but here is the article i was reading. http://sunithakrishnan.blogspot.com/2012/01/should-i-protect-myself-or-my-women.html
Her organization has come into some negative media unfairly and she’s torn between saving the name of Prajwala at a heavy price or letting the media continue to bash it and protect the women she has rescued. She’s leaning towards the latter of course, but she needs support from as many people as she can get that we still believe in what she does!
Thanks for posting that, Susu! That’s a heartbreaking story. I’m not sure what I can do to help either, but I’ll try come up with something.
Thanks again.
Love this Niall!
Jumped in on a couple of conversations as I traveled down the comments. So great to see how much you help people even before you start your month of no self-promotion.
It’s also great to realize there are endless way to help.
I need to remember that when I’m struggling or feeling tired and overwhelmed and feel guilty for not being able to help more.
Thanks for the reminder that helping doesn’t come in just one size.
Thanks for all that you do, Kai
Hi Niall,
Love that you are taking a moment of introspection to see the giving self. It’s a great experiment and a wonderful lesson in life.
I highly recommend Tim Sanders – “Love is the Killer App” or his newest book “Today we are Rich” during this giving month – both will keep you fueled on personal growth with good information while also still being business relevant and such.
As for the help.
In January of 2010 I launched an ebook that included 30 authors (embracingtwitter.com) and it was a great experiment in coordinating a lot of great, smart people for a high-quality ebook.
I’d like to have you co-author an ebook (at least one chapter) in a similar multi-author ebook for my 2011 experiment: http://www.upgraderenegade.com where I am trying to convert more than 10,000 hours of experience over the last 15 years as a consultant and web professional. Upgrade Renegade is virtually 100% about other people, giving them tools, tactics, and specific advice on how to be a web professional and build a business out of it (the inner workings sort of stuff).
Although it’s just launched, I’m confident it’s going to be important and helpful to many people like us.
Can you help?
Justin McCullough recently posted: How Owning One Pair of Pants Exposed Important Truths About Business.
Hey Justin. Thanks for the comment. You’re a busy man, lots of cool things going on
I’m a little confused though: Have you already launched the Upgrade Renegade ebook? If not, I may be able to help out with a chapter. What topic would you have in mind?
Cheers!
Great question. Site launched, but ebook is in preperation. I want to get atleast 10 authors involved. Content MUST be highvalue, help-my-business, not more echo-chamber-how-to-blog type stuff.
So for you, perhaps you might talk about how you arrived at $45/hr as a web dev rate, what your limits (acceptable ranges of service) are and what your biz focus is.
Or, you might talk about how you manage your money, what billing system you use or project management system you use and why. List goes on, we can email for specifics on what you would most love to write about.
Bottom line, the site (and ebook) promise: “Boots on the ground business intel you can use to win clients and grow your business”.
If it meets that, we are good to go!
The twitter ebook I mentioned was just a point of reference so you could see something of this nature I’ve done in the past.
Will be great content for all and will create lots of cross-over interest.
All the best. Hope to see an email from you.
Cheers!
@mccJustin
Hi Niall,
you’ve already helped me a lot with your manifesto. Great piece of work. I want to believe that Cork is a good place to compose something like that. Lived there myself for a year and still believe that it has been the best year of my life so far. I was able to find myself in a lot of things you are mentioning in your manifesto and I feel that the advice given will be very useful. What I am struggling with is sitting down at my desk to get some work done for my PhD. Lack of focus, I guess. I’d appreciate your advice. Hope you can stay warm in Romania. Must be freezing there. It sure is cold here in Germany.
I wish you all the best:-)
Almut
Hey Almut, thanks for the kind words. Yeah, Cork certainly has a magic to it. If I ever live back in Ireland long-term again, methinks I’ll be settling there.
As for focus and productivity, I recommend you check out this recent post at Wandering Earl: How To Be Productive Anywhere
Leo Babauta also has a free version of his book called Focus, which I suspect will help a lot. Check it out here.
Cheers!
Hi Niall,
thanks a lot for your suggestions. Indeed, Leo Babauta’s “Focus” was very helpful in many ways.
All the best. Almut