Don’t Wait Until You're Ready

I know many people who will start social selling and creating content when they are ready.

They just need some more time. They want to learn to write better, create videos, or get more time in their day first.

Then they’ll get started.

These people know they will benefit from social selling and building their personal brand. So they WILL do it… just not yet. They aren’t ready.

In this week’s Sell with Social, we will help those people get started. We will talk about why waiting until you are ready never makes sense. That, in fact, right now is the perfect time to start. 

Excuses Are Abundant

Our egos are great at explaining why we shouldn’t do something.

In an effort to protect ourselves from embarrassment or loss, our minds are good at making excuses why we shouldn’t take a risk. It’s self-preservation at its finest.

When it comes to social selling, we tell ourselves all of the reasons that we can’t succeed:

• “I’m never going to be as good as that person.”
• “I don’t have time in my day to dedicate to this.”
• “I don’t know how to create content like that.”
• “I don’t have the right tools to make this work.”

I hear excuses like this daily. 

And it’s stopping people, who I am confident would reap massive benefits from social selling, from taking action.

But these are all excuses. They are ways to convince ourselves that it’s not possible to accomplish the goals we want to achieve.

However, you can do it. Once we get over accepting that it won’t be easy or familiar, we can roll up our sleeves and get to work. 

When we believe we can reach our goals, suddenly, the excuses go away.

Do you think a baby ever thought, “I don’t know how to walk, so I’m not going to bother trying.”

Or, as a teenager, did you tell yourself, “Driving a car looks complicated, so I don’t think I’m going to learn.” 

Of course not! We know intrinsically that we must get through the learning process to develop our capabilities.

We’re not born “ready” for much of anything in this life. We first have the desire to grow, and then we take the necessary steps to learn the required skills to achieve. 

Capabilities Come With Action

“You don't learn, then start. You start, then learn.” -Sahil Lavingia

The quote above from Sahil is one of my favorites. It encapsulates the very essence of this entire post. Your capabilities come with your taking action, not the other way around.

If you are waiting until you’re “ready” to start social selling, content creation, or thought leadership, let this be your sign to start now. 

This is the perfect time for you to get started. 

Nobody is “ready” when they first start, and that’s the whole point. Even the best YouTubers had to start at the beginning of their journey.

I love the clip above from Marques Brownlee, as it highlights just how far he’s come from his very first videos, to growing an audience of tens of millions of subscribers.

But even better… even Marques cringes at some of the content he initially put out. He recognizes that he was FAR from perfect when he first started. However, he didn’t say he regretted getting started. 

Set a Goal to Grow

I want you to consider what goal(s) you can set for yourself for social selling.  

As I noted in a recent LinkedIn post, your goals should challenge you. They should not be something that you are capable of doing today. 

You should set a goal that will force you to grow. 

It should require you to learn new skills, build new habits, and transform your strategy.

It could be:

• Grow my followers to 5,000 people on LinkedIn.
• Upload a video each week.
• Create a post every day.
• Leave 5 comments every day.

Set a goal for something you want to do, irrespective of your current capabilities. 

Then, start figuring out how to make it happen.

It might require that you block off time on your calendar. Or it might require that you watch YouTube videos to learn something. Or it might require you to talk to peers already doing it (*cough* Catalyst Community *cough*).

The point is to not limit yourself to achieving great goals, simply because you are not ready… yet.

For this week’s action items, I want you to start taking action on a goal you are not ready for. 

Take time to consider what you haven’t been able to do because of a lack of skill, not a lack of desire.  

Here are this week’s action items:

1. Determine What You Want - Think about what you want to do related to social selling that you are currently holding back on starting. It could be committing to social activity, creating content, or developing a personal brand. 
2. Set a Goal - Then, set a goal for yourself. Make it a goal that is not something you are capable of doing today, but you could learn the skills over time to achieve. 
3. Get Started - Finally, get started… even if you are not ready. Be creative and adventurous as you start doing things that may feel uncomfortable. Pay attention to how it feels as you start taking action. 

I’d love to hear what you’ve been holding back on doing. Drop a note in the comments or reply to this email. I’m here to help you on your journey!