This post’s title is not a play on words. It refers to the need for more business owners to use Self Promotion to boost their marketing efforts.

Henry J. Kaiser reportedly once said:

When your work speaks for itself, don’t interupt.”

I agree. And I also believe one should explore ways to make it speak as loudly as possible, for the target audience to “hear” it.

Every serious minded person in business should practise self promotion without inhibition. I offer insights you can use, by drawing from my personal experiences.

How To Make Your Work Speak For Itself

The products or services you deliver to buyers constitute your “work”. Everytime you do “it” the value it is perceived by others to provide determines whether or not your work speaks for itself.

To put it another way, when your work makes others give you good reviews, referrals, or endorsements, then it means it speaks for itself.

Note that this would happen spontaneously most times. People will typically offer such positive feedback without being asked, and could even go out of their way to endorse you and/or your products and services.

Getting people to respond as described above requires diligent investment of quality time and effort in creating a uniquely positive and satisfying experience for anyone you relate with.

Never take anything for granted. Strive everyday to make your “work” better than yesterday’s. Put all your heart and soul into delivering something that will blow your recipient’s mind away anytime she comes into contact with it. Burt Dubin calls it creating a “Wow!” experience.

I would say you should aim to get everyone who comes in contact with your “work” to say “Wow!”. That amounts to making your work speak for itself. And if you can make that happen often, your success would be inevitable..

That’s what people who achieve and maintain long term success do.

How To Turn Up The Volume, When Your Work Speaks

Once you’ve mastered the art of making your work speak for itself, you need to make sure everyone can hear it whenever it does.

I say this because depending on the kind of work you do, and how/where you do it, your work may speak but it could be inaudible because it’s whispering!

One example: As a writer you can be exceptionally gifted in producing top class write-ups to meet agreed deadlines. Those you work for are likely to appreciate this and give you rave reviews and even repeat business.

But if you do not own a website from which to showcase your amazing written works and testimonials, you effectively reduce the “voice” of your “speaking work” to a whisper.

As you know, people’s attention gets drawn where the loudest “noise” is coming from. In the 21st century, that place happens to be the Internet. This means you can cheaply, quickly and easily create your own place on it, where your work can be better “heard” as it “speaks”.

Doing so will make it easy to turn up the volume as the need arises. For instance each time you write a new book you could put up a free preview on your website so more people get to hear it loud and clear.

When you add testimonials and positive reviews given by others to the book and on the website, you’d be turning up the volume even more.

And you could also send out free samples or complimentary copies of your book to thought leaders in your niche.

If your work so impresses them that they say “Wow!” and go on to talk about you to their network of fans admirers, you would have further boosted the “speaking volume” – and more people would “hear”!

Over time, as you repeat this process, you’ll win greater recognition for your efforts, as well as the accompanying rewards.

Final Words: Use A Website(With a Blog) To Turn Up The Volume

Self Promotion involves telling others the good things you can do for them, to help them get what they want.

It’s a form of marketing. And every business needs that.

As long as it is done with enthusiasm and in a manner that does not offend fair and mature minded others, there’s nothing wrong with doing self promotion.

Some people try to be too modest or humble with respect to what they do. So they shy away from using this strategy. But that’s rarely a wise thing to do.

Burt Dubin, on a live radio program shared a quote attributed to the great Napoleon that reads as follows:

“Modesty is for people who have something to be modest about.” – Napoleon

You need to acknowledge your true capabilities so that you can be a blessing to others. Playing small will not help you do that. And your creator would not want you to diminish yourself out of fear or exaggerated humility.

If you want people to choose you over others who do what you do, you can either talk a lot or let your work do more of the talking for you.

The latter option is often a smarter and more effective strategy because it saves you a lot of time and effort, and stress!

Instead you are able to pour useful energy into your work so that it makes the best possible impact on all who come into contact with it.

And ultimately, their positive responses will become the material you use to further promote your work or to “turn up the volume” for more people to discover you

So go get your website, start writing articles on your subject using a blogging tool like WordPress on it. Aim for quality pieces that qualify to be called “epic” or “pillar” content, to turn up your work’s speaking volume.

NB: This applies to virtually any business type. There is hardly any product or service that will not benefit from having a website – that has a blog.

Write guest posts to make your “work” talk even louder from other people’s websites.

Keep doing the above diligently, no matter how slowly you may seem to be progressing.

Over time, you’ll be rewarded with attention from your target audience and the search engines.

And your work will not only be talking louder, but it will also make others start talking – excitedly – about you.

The above process was what led Patrick Meninga to become a famous blogger “overnight” (actually over a 5 year period) by earning $2,000 a month in adsense income from Spiritualriver.com, and then selling it for $200,000.

Read this post for 10 lessons you can learn about how to do what he did. (You’ll also get a Free PDF that contains a verbatim transcript I created of a podcast interview of Patrick journey to success that was done by Yaro Starak in 2012.)

Tough times can be blinding. Hardship can be traumatizing. When things are not going the way we want, we humans, despite our high level of intelligence, can be so quick to forget the good times that preceded any bad ones that emerge. And so we complain and whine, asking “why me?. Those who feel they can no longer cope eventually decide to cut corners to escape further adversity.

Many Have Heard That Hardship Presents An Opportunity to Grow

You’ve most likely heard or read the above in one form or the other in the past.

I’ve however discovered that despite encountering this truth, many people find it hard to accept.

And so they actively explore ways to get what they want in life without experiencing difficulty hardship.

That’s why we hear of athletes who use performance enhancing drugs…

Of students who, instead of reading, bribe their way to exams success…

Or blog/website owners who buy links to boost their search engine rankings even when they know Google considers it illegal.

What these people fail to realize is that they’ll always lose out in the long run.

People Who Cut Corners Hurt Themselves

Probably due to fear and anxiety arising from the harsh economic times, some people are giving in to the urge to cut corners in their personal and work lives.

Sometimes it’s because they have dependants to cater for.

But cheating and/or corner cutting can be intoxicating. Once you’ve fallen into the trap, getting out becomes difficult and will often require a rare brand of courage and determination.

Cheating denies you the opportunity to improve yourself. It makes you lazy, because psychologically you no longer feel pressured or challenged to exert or stretch yourself.

Over time you’ll discover you no longer have the hands on competence to match, or compete effectively with others who don’t cheat.

Your self confidence will suffer greatly, and you’ll become fearful that they’ll discover you’re not as competent as they think you are.

That the numerous articles getting churned out from your blog, which you claim to have authored by yourself, were actually written by a writer you secretely hired.

We know creating content on your blog will not necessarily be all you. It’s accepted that content can be purchased.

But when you begin telling others that you personally wrote content you know you purchased, that’s when you cross the line.

What You Can Do

Good times are unlikely to push people to cheat or cut corners. When things are going the way we want we don’t complain.

The only time we do that is when we don’t like what’s happening to us.

So the key to preserving your integrity, self respect and discipline is to stand firm. Refuse to compromise your values or integrity, no matter what happens.

Instead, dig deep and challenge yourself to find legitimate and honourable ways to overcome the bout of adversity.

In the short run it may look like an unwise move. But in the long run you’ll be better off. Indeed, if you’re sincere, you may be pleasantly surprised by a solution that could come to you. Your creator who sees your heart will provide a viable alternative for you.

In Napoleon Hill’s Think and Grow Rich, he mentioned that in response to a question about what he would do if he lost his entire fortune, Henry Ford replied:

“I’d have it all back in 5 years.”

That kind of response would normally have been put down to over confidence or arrogance. However those familiar with Ford’s antecedents had little doubt that he could do what he said.

Infact, it was that same mental attitude that enabled him push his team of highly trained (though self doubting) engineers to develop an engine that made car ownership affordable for the masses.

Though a Stark Illiterate, Ford Was a Man of Education

An educated person is one who knows how to apply the knowledge he has, to achieve the goal he has set for himself.

Henry Ford started out as a stark illiterate working for Thomas Edison until he became a supervisor.

Nothing that I’ve read about him suggests that Ford enrolled for studies in a formal institution. Instead, he worked in an organisation where he was exposed to creative use of the human mind for the purpose of producing useful inventions.

And he had the unique priviledge of watching a master at work: Thomas Alva Edison – one of the greatest and most prolific inventors the world has ever seen.

Based on the above, it’s no surprise that Ford eventually got to a point where he began getting his own creative ideas to develop useful solutions. Hill mentions in his book that Ford got an idea to develop a new type of engine that would be cheap to manufacture and consequently make it possible for the non-rich to afford them.

Edison saw no merit in the idea when Ford proposed it to the renowned inventor at the time. Instead he offered the latter a promotion to drop the idea and focus on “more useful” activities he (Edison) had planned.

But Ford was convinced, and quit his job to pursue the idea he had. Since he was not schooled, he hired those with relevant engineering training and told them what he wanted.

That step reflected the depth of his real world education. Rather than try to get an engineering degree to do it himself, he wisely assembled the best qualified engineers he could find and challenged them to produce the result he wanted.

Here is a useful point to note:

Mainly because Ford had no schooling, he used his experience from exposure to creative processes under Edison as a basis for developing his own ideas.

It is also worth noting here that Edison himself achieved his amazing feats of invention despite having only a few months of schooling exposure.

So both men had poor schooling in common. Yet despite having this handicap, they would shake the world with the solutions they developed!

Ford Acknowledged Few, (If At All Any) Limitations

Now, when Ford told his well schooled engineers what he wanted, they were quick to tell him it was impossible to build such a car engine. Again and again he told them to go back and keep trying, but each time they returned saying they’d tried and it was not possible.

“I want it, and I’ll have it!” he reportedly told them. So they went back, kept at it, and eventually the new car engine was born!

The above story depicts an interesting trend:

People with less schooling seem to be less conditioned to recognise obstacles or limitations of any sort, when in pursuit of a valued goal.

In contrast, well schooled persons, especially those who have studied up to tertiary level in traditional institutions frequently tend to be strongly influenced by unspoken rules, guidelines and a general need to seek consent or agreement/approval from others before they can go after what they want.

Their exposure to the regulated schooling system which subtly discourages contrarian thinking and action often conditions them to act that way.

To Succeed You Must Commit To Learning & Applying What You Learn Continually

A quote credited to Alan Toffer reads:

“The illiterate of the 21 will not be those who cannot read or write. They will be those who cannot learn, unlearn and relearn.” – Alan Toffer

Henry Ford understood the above truth. And that was why he could confidently state that he would rebuild his financial fortune within 5 years, if he lost it.

Those of us who are better schooled than he was can learn from his example. We must actively engage in learning how to improve our knowledge, attitudes and skills towards organising resources available to us to achieve our goals.

That process will ultimately lead us to a level of mastery at which we, like Ford back in his time, will be confident that we can bounce back in 5 years or less if for any reason we lose the wealth we’ve acquired.

One great benefit of achieving the above mentioned state, is that you’ll always have peace of mind. You’ll be free from fears, worries or anxieties about losing what you have, because you know you’ve done it before and you’re sure you can do it again.

As a result, you’re unlikely to be found guilty of acting desperate in times of crisis. Persons who acquire their own wealth or fortunes through crooked or questionable means will rarely behave in the manner Ford did. And they are certainly unlikely to be willing to consider the possibility of losing their wealth, talk less of answering to the question: “What if you lose everything?”

“Either do wrong or feel guilty, but don’t do both; it’s too much work.” – Rudolf Dreikurs (1897 – 1972) Psychiatrist

There’s a lot of social pressure to get yourself liked and approved of in today’s world. Most people would love to be accepted by others. However, the truth is that this may not always happen for everyone.

No One Can Avoid Criticism – At Least No Living Person!

As long as you’re still alive, criticism can and will come your way. No matter how nice, friendly or good you are – or you try to be. It’s just the way the world is. If you’re always good, some people are bound to find fault with you for that. They might call you a “do-gooder” for instance.

You cannot be perfect. But even if you could be perfect, people would criticize you for being THAT way!

There will of course be times when people will criticize you for a good reason.

When they do (maybe for shortcomings you actually have) try not to argue or be too defensive. Take it in your stride. If you feel there’s been a misinterpretation of your actions, do your best to correct it, without being argumentative.

But again, don’t be apologetic for being yourself.

Here’s an important point: Quite often, criticism may come your way as you focus your efforts on achieving a set goal. Maybe you started spending less time with friends or family members. Not all of them may be willing to accept the “change” initially.

You will need to decide how important your goal is, and whether you’re prepared to abandon it to avoid criticism from them e.g. if you’re trying to start a new business.

Don’t Let Fear of Criticism Make You Neglect Your Goal

The best thing is to pursue your goal with focus and passion. That is what will see you through the dark hours of your struggles as an entrepreneur.

You cannot afford to subordinate your
focus on your goal, to every whim of those around you e.g. to routinely help with domestic chores, or play with the kids etc.

If you work from home for instance, they must be made to understand that your being around them, does not mean you are available to them. Do not try to please them by neglecting your ultimate goal.

Otherwise you will be surprised to hear those same persons who prevent you from focusing turning around to ask you how come you’ve not made significant progress!!

I once read about a category of entrepreneurs an author called “Super entrepreneurs”. People in this category were said to have total involvement in their work.

Willis H. Carrier, (inventor of air conditioning – Carrier Corporation) was an example. He “was considered dangerous at the wheel of a car when concentrating on the solution to a problem”. One account has it that he once totally forgot his intended destination, after boarding a train while deeply immersed in thought about a new idea!!

There is no doubt that Willis Carrier must have been criticized for his absent mindedness. But judging from the successes he achieved, that may have been an inevitable fallout of the intense focus he needed to have, in order to conceive his inventions.

Therefore, if you really want to make the most of yourself, you must accept that not everyone will view your actions in a positive light. And you will not always come across as being “cool”. At least not until your breakthrough occurs. Not everyone will be happy or satisfied with you. You must however understand that what you think, and how you feel matters more than anything others may say.

If It Gets Too Much, Find Ways to Be Alone i.e. To Get Some Quiet Time

Sometimes the criticisms and other distractions may become too much to cope with. That’s why making needed progress may sometimes require your choosing to be alone. At least until you finish doing the important tasks that will get you what you want.

Many people prefer to be around others. They want to feel wanted and to be noticed. They’ve been taught to believe that something’s wrong with them, if they stay alone.

The truth is however that a little quiet time away from the noise and distractions of normal society can do you plenty of good. Many successful people actually do it a lot, and most attribute their ability to re-invent themselves to the discipline of creating some quiet (or me) time for themselves.

It’s a great way to refine your focus towards achieving your goals.

Commit to getting away for some quiet time to work on your goals. When you’re done, you can return to the warm embrace of your loved ones until the next “session” is due. This way, over time, you’ll move closer to your goal, until you make it come true.

As I’ve said from the start of this article, not everyone will understand why you’re doing it. But there’s nothing wrong in carving out some private time for yourself, to work on what matters to you. So, don’t be afraid to do it, when the need arises!

NB: According to my blog publishing schedule this post on Self-Development should have gone live today.

But I accidentally set the schedule date for yesterday. When I noticed it came online, I quickly unpublished it – and have now just put it back online today Wednesday 13th Feb 2013. Have a good read!

Introduction

Hunger and thirst have no respect for IQ, skills, certifications or other abilities one may have. No one  can survive them. Unless you’re a cyborg or robot. We only differ in terms of how long we can keep going. And that’s why having grit, or developing it can prove useful to you. Indeed, it could save your life! This true story emphatically illustrates the accuracy of the foregoing statement.

Village Assignment Shields Us from Serious Political Unrest

I experienced the need to depend on grit to survive severe physical and psychological trauma during my one year of compulsory National Youth Service in 1993, after graduating from the university.  It all happened in my place of primary assignment: Gulu Vatsa village, in Lapai local government area. Incidentally, I was posted there at my request. I wanted to visit my place of birth –New Bussa (Due to the way things turned out, I was not able to until I left).

There were four other youth corpers who served in the village with me – three guys and a young lady. Our stay in the village coincided with a period of historic sociopolitical unrest tha
t engulfed the country following the cancellation of the June 12, 1993 presidential elections.

At that time, except for occasional lorries bearing belongings of easterners fleeing the north, we saw nothing to indicate the seriousness of the matter. That is except for what we read in newspapers that arrived many days stale.

Things started out well, with all of us resuming teaching jobs in the village’s two schools. I taught mathematics and agriculture in both schools.

Our Monthly Stipends Stop Coming & Tough Times Begin!

However, some months into our stay, something strange happened. We discovered that our monthly stipends normally paid into our individual bank accounts stopped coming in. At first we thought it was just a delay. But the next month the same thing happened. By then we were all low on funds and getting worried.  

But it was difficult to find someone competent to ask. Back then mobile phone technology did not exist in Nigeria. The village lacked electricity access. It was not even connected to the national grid! And there were definitely no land phone lines – talk less of people who owned such devices. Transportation was a dicey matter. By 5 pm, the last car or bus would normally have left the village. Anyone with the intention of leaving would have to be willing to walk many kilometers in the middle of the night. Otherwise finding a place to sleep over till the next morning was always the only sane alternative.

That was not all. Potable water was also not readily available. A water plant reportedly donated by an international NGO had to be put on at specified intervals for villagers to fetch water for drinking and cooking. But petrol to power the generator was not always available.

So this was a real village in every sense. And like any other, living there was tough in certain respects, especially getting access to basic necessities.

The above is just to give you a background picture of the environment that prevailed during the time we had to endure being without money!

Back to Our Missing Monthly Stipend Palavar

In the third month or so, we contributed money so one of us could travel down to the local government headquarters in Lapai. He was to find out why our stipends were not getting to the bank at our end. We all waited with raised hopes. But he returned with no useful findings to report. We were devastated!

But it did not get all bad quickly. If we’d been in the city, things would have gotten painful much faster. The cost of living in the village was very low, as it was home to a tribe/ethnic group (Gwaris) renowned for their farming prowess.  Many farm products like yam and its processed products were thus cheaply available. This greatly helped to prevent little money we had left from running out quickly.

I regularly saw kids as little as 6 years old carrying massive hoes on their shoulders walking briskly to and from the farms daily. The women too. There was food to be had for little money.  

But We Eventually Ran Out – One by One.

The problem was we did not have even the needed little, due to our situation. The young lady amongst us had wisely come with a considerable amount of extra money.  It was her very first time outside Lagos in all of her life. She had nursed misgivings about living amongst people of a different tribe – and who practiced a different religious from hers.

But I’d told her I was born in New Bussa in Niger state. And that a few weeks earlier I’d been warmly welcomed into the Minna home of a friend’s parents on showing them a short note he gave me. “They’re good people” I assured her.  

On hearing that from me as a fellow tribesman, she’d relaxed. When the stipend problem began, she’d posted a letter to her fiancé in Lagos. A few weeks later he arrived to replenish her supplies. As you can imagine, she was not the only one who was happy to see him

Making Ends Meet: I Begin Helping A Village Teacher Make 80m Long Ridges For N100 Per Ridge

It was inevitable that our lady friend would have to periodically bail us out with cooked meals – she was the closest we had to family. We moved in two’s and three’s most times. I cannot be sure how individuals amongst us catered for themselves when they were alone. However, we sometimes visited the homes of other teachers whose wives served us meals. Most of them had heard what happened, and they were most supportive and helpful.

When I exhausted the funds I had, I knew I had to find a way to earn income. Eating in people’s homes all the time was inexcusable. But it was my first time in a village. I did not know where to start.

One day, one of my students came to me with the idea of getting a piece of land. He suggested that I could plant cassava and sell the growing crop before the end of my stay to make some money.(I eventually gave it away for free when leaving)

I agreed and got down to work on it. The land was easily obtained just like he’d told me. At the end of the first day of work however, I realized I’d drained my energy. Since

I had no food at home, that night was terrible for me. My stomach rumbled non stop. I knew if I did not get some food of my own, there was no way I could keep working on my cassava farm.

One day, one of the village teachers showed up on the plot next to mine to work on his farm. After watching him for a while, it occurred to me that I could make some badly needed money by helping him make his ridges.

From the way he handled his massive hoe, it was obvious that he was quite skilled in its use. But I’d noticed that age was telling on him and making his progress difficult.

We discussed and he agreed to pay me N100 for each 80 metre long ridge that I made. I cannot recall how many I eventually made for him. But the first N100 I earned (less than a dollar – imagine that!) was enough to excite me because it afforded me an opportunity to actually go and buy a few foodstuffs that I could cook in my own room.

But what could N100 buy? Not much. And this was where I really learnt the lesson about having grit. All I could buy was white yam flour, palm oil, salt, onions and ground melon.

I bought a lot of the flour, which mixed with hot water turns into a thick white paste that can be rolled into balls.

It’s a popular meal called “Amala lafu” in my part of the country. But the stew I made was more of a tasteless concoction due to the limited ingredients. To me however, it was better than nothing. It felt good to be able to stay in and cook something I could eat on return from the school or farm. How I managed to swallow and keep that funny meal down remains a miracle to me till this day. I simply closed my eyes, and swallowed till I was full – urgh! It gave me the energy I needed to keep teaching long hours and working on the farm in my free time after I was done with the students.

I Pick Up a Foot Infection That Makes Walking A Nightmare

I continued working on the farm in my free time. I worked barefoot. One day, I cut my right foot on a sharp object. Thinking nothing of it, I let it dry off on it’s own once the blood clotted. Little did I know that I’d picked up a serious fungal infection.

And it was so rare and difficult to treat, that it took 6 months of referral from one consultant to another, to find someone who knew how to treat it successfully(i.e after I’d returned to Lagos).

One that would later make the dermatology deparment in the teaching hospital insist on using me as a subject in a medical class. They also made me wait so they could take a picture of my infected foot before my prescription was given to me. That’s how rare the infection was – so if you see any foot in a dermatology textbook out here discussing Tinea Paedis, it could just be mine

Our Missing Payments Show Up!

Eventually, in the fourth month or so, the outstanding payments of our stipends were released in bulk into our accounts. I can no longer recall how the news got to us. Suffice to say that we were relieved.

But for us – especially me – one thing was clear. Having grit had helped me survive prolonged exposure to extreme physical and psychological hardship without suffering any trauma or other emotional setback – especially being my first experience of it.

Final Words: Get Coaching To Defeat Adversity

The above is just one of so many character forming life experiences that I’ve had. All of them have over the years equipped me to help others deal competently with adversity in their lives.

Be it prolonged delays, disappointments, setbacks or outright failure (which in my world we call Temporary Defeat”), I can help you.

Click the following link to learn more about my experience based coaching/consultation