Who Cares What Everyone Else Thinks?

Being successful often means making people angry.

Let’s face it, there are a lot of people out there who are miserable and they are content to live with their misery.   Trying to help them is not only futile; it is exasperating.  I am sure you have come across some of these people as you work to build your business.

Clients who arrive in my office seeking assistance have two specific issues.

They earn less money than they want to earn.

They are not happy with the way they are earning the money.

(They are working too hard. They are dealing with difficult clients.  They type of work they do is not aligned with their strengths).

When I prescribe a remedy I am often met with resistance.  I have been doing this long enough to know I need to sell my solutions to my clients.  For as much as they want to get better, the things I ask them to do are so different, so out of the norm, so disruptive to the status quo, I am immediately met with shock and resistance.

Most of this resistance is a projection of the feelings of everyone else.

It seems these business leaders are suddenly concerned about what everyone else thinks.  Shocking, I know.

Here are the three objections I hear most often when I introduce my solutions to a new client.

Maybe you have some of these objections.

“Everyone Else Will Reject Me”

This refers to your peers.  Most people are concerned with what their peers think.  Attorneys are the perfect example of this. At some point, maybe one hundred years ago, a group of attorneys decided they wanted to get paid they way plumbers, car mechanics, and factory workers are compensated.

So they bill by the hour.

Everyone goes right along with it.

Why?  Because if they don’t, they will not look like everyone else.

Sound familiar?

I also see this in decisions about strategy.  I introduce a new concept. Something that positions you as different compared to everyone else.  And you resist it, specifically because nobody else is doing it….

That is the point!

You need to be different.  Being different gives people an opportunity to make a decision based upon something other than price.  Being different helps set you apart.

Who cares what everyone else thinks? Not you.

“I Will Annoy Everyone Else”

This one comes up when I talk about frequency of communication.  Frequency builds trust.  I advise my clients to communicate with their clients and prospective clients on a weekly basis.  When I first introduce this concept, your head spins around and you tell me how much this will annoy everyone else.

In reality, the people it annoys will not be good clients for you.  The people you want as your client will welcome the frequent communication.

I also hear this about the length of the copy we write.  Sometimes it is a web page, sometimes it is a letter, and sometimes it is a newsletter.  The people who work with me always say that everyone else will not read long copy.

In reality people will read whatever you put in front of them as long as it is interesting.  It is only when it is boring that length is a problem.

Who cares what everyone else thinks? Not you.

“Everyone Else Will Say Bad Things About Me”

This is the one that makes me laugh the hardest.  There are people out there who said bad things about Mother Theresa, Nelson Mandela and Gandhi.

So what?

Let them say bad things.

In fact, when people begin to speak of you with vitriol, you know you are reaching new heights of success.   Look at Rush Limbaugh, Howard Stern, Bill Clinton, Sarah Palin … the list goes on and on.  The more you polarize, the more your message will resonate with your core audience.

Who cares what everyone else thinks? Not you.

Here is the bottom line:

You are an expert in a specific area. There is a limited segment of the population who qualify to work with you.  If you are using the right message and it is directed at the right people and delivered in the right way it will resonate with them.

In trying to please everybody you end up working with nobody.

Stop worrying about everyone else and focus on the right client for you and your business. The only votes that matter are the votes people cast with their wallet.

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