Outreach Challenge: 100 Strangers In 30 Days
During the pandemic, I conducted an outreach challenge to connect with 100 people I’d never met before in 30 days.
I didn’t reach out to just anyone, but people who I thought could help spread our message to “create work that works for you.”
WHY I DID THIS OUTREACH CHALLENGE
#1 I felt like my outreach habit had grown stale. I’ve been doing outreach for Life Skills That Matter for several years now, but from time to time, my motivation takes a dip. I find doing a challenge like this reinvigorates my commitment to it.
#2 To remind our community about the importance of their outreach habit. I invited several members from our community to join me in this experiment. Instead of just coaching, I wanted to share exactly what I was doing along the way.
#3 To share with YOU why outreach is the most important action to start and grow your business! The more you practice outreach, the more you get over your fear of rejection and build support for your business, so it grows more quickly.
HOW THIS OUTREACH CHALLENGE WAS CONDUCTED
The goal of making your outreach effective is to remind yourself you need to “give to receive”. Before anyone is going to give you their attention or money, you need to first give them their attention by giving something they need or want.
I didn’t reach out to people to buy our services. Instead, I reached out to people to collaborate with them around educating people about how work is changing and how to create work that works for you.
Specifically, I reached out to:
68 podcasters to suggest a story I could share on their show.
26 HARO pitch submissions to share my expertise about starting a business with journalists working on stories about startups, the future of work, remote work and careers.
5 leaders of organizations representing entrepreneurs.
WDS to lead a meetup as part of their virtual conference.
I only reached out to people who I felt aligned with our values and mission. For example, there are loads of podcasts about entrepreneurship, but some aren’t the right fit for us, so I didn’t bother reaching out to them.
Your outreach efforts will be SO much more successful when you are focused on people aligned with your values and not just anyone with a pulse!
WHAT WERE THE RESULTS?
I got booked on 7 podcast interviews + 2 more that asked me to follow up in September.
2 of my HARO submissions were accepted. One article was published already and one has yet to be published.
I lead a WDS meetup on June 27th for 19 people.
Those were the immediate results achieved at the end of the 30-day challenge. From my past experience, I know the results will keep on coming in because of this burst of effort!
100 people who didn’t know me, now know who I am. I’m on their radar. I wouldn’t be surprised if some joined our community months from now or referred someone to us!
Now you might either be unimpressed or impressed by those immediate results.
I know this is counterintuitive to say, but honestly, I didn’t do it for the immediate results.
This challenge reminded me of the important lesson I’ve learned about outreach from my 20 years as a solopreneur:
You will never commit to your outreach habit if you focus on short-term results alone.
And how many results do you think you are going to get if you don’t commit to your outreach habit?
None.
So, now you might be saying to yourself, “Well Stephen, isn’t the goal of outreach to get new clients or to get a promotion?”
Yes and no.
Your outreach habit produces many different outcomes.
Getting “results” is definitely one of the more desirable “outcomes”.
Your brain is hardwired to seek immediate gratification. It loves a sure thing. It gets easily discouraged when you put in a lot of effort, but don’t see useful results right away.
BUILDING RELATIONSHIPS FROM OUTREACH
The goal of outreach is to get known and to build relationships, not to just get short-term results.
I use this little “poem” to remind our Accelerator members how to build effective business relationships.
Know Me: the first step of building a relationship with a potential client or partner is to just get known!
Until you’ve reached out to a potential client, they don’t even know you exist!
Sure, they may have landed on your website, found you on social media or someone recommended you to them, but they still have never met YOU before.
If you’re selling services for hundreds or thousands of dollars, it’s highly unlikely a stranger is going to buy from you after meeting you for the first time.
Like Me: the second step is the all-important “follow up”. You need to get to know the needs of your potential client or collaborator.
Most people forget about the follow-up, because again, your brain loves short-term gratification! Stand out in the mind of your new connection by following up with extra information, ideas and answers to their questions.
Taking this simple, but often overlooked step, will make you memorable by making your new connection feel understood. Simply following up will dramatically increase their likelihood of “liking you”.
Trust Me: the third step of relationship development requires deeper engagement by offering a free demonstration for a potential client or collaboration on a small project with a potential partner.
For example, when I reach out to fellow podcasters, I propose a two-part series or lesson to share on each other’s show. Instead of “pitching” myself on their show, I invite them to come on my show too.
When I meet someone interested in working for themselves, I ask them about their biggest obstacle to self-employment. Based on their response, I recommend trying one of our free services first. It might be our Lifestyle Calculator, our Weekly Reflection Reminder or even our podcast.
Buy Me: the fourth step is the stage in the relationship when a potential client is ready to financially commit to you by paying you for your services.
Notice in the image above how the phrases get smaller and smaller at each stage? The size of each phrase represents the size of the pool of people you will be engaging with at each relationship development stage.
A fraction of the people you reach out to will become paying clients. You might not like hearing that, but it’s true! If you commit to an outreach habit, you will never run out of paying clients!
LESSONS LEARNED FROM THIS OUTREACH CHALLENGE
This challenge reminded me of other unanticipated outcomes beyond short-term results like:
#1 The probability of getting some results in the short term increases as I reach out more. I wouldn’t have generated the short-term results I did by reaching out to 100 people if I only reached out to 10 instead.
#2 Focus on the “habit” of outreach, instead of the “results” gets me out of my head. To achieve my goal of reaching out to 100 people over 30 days, I knew I had to reach out to a minimum of 5 people each day. Taking action left me little time to waste on entertaining my doubts or my fear of rejection!!
#3 Practice makes you better. I never used HARO before this challenge, so I had to learn how to use it. By my 15th pitch, I knew how to write more effectively for the needs of the journalists I was contacting.
#4 I learned several unanticipated lessons, including:
I got a ton of ideas about how we could improve our podcast marketing after researching a ton of other podcasts.
I was reminded of how much more motivated I am when held accountable by others. Twice a week I checked in with the community members who accepted my outreach challenge.
How to sustain my outreach habit going forward. Sending out three messages a day on average seems to be a sustainable rhythm for me. Working on list building, writing emails, sending emails and following up as individual tasks, made the process so much more manageable too!
OVERCOMING RESISTANCE TO OUTREACH
The number one action for starting your business is outreach.
Yet it is also the number one action people resist!
Here’s what a couple of the participants who joined me in this challenge learned about why they resisted outreach.
“I thought I had to have a lot of clarity before I could start reaching out. What I learned was by doing outreach I get clarity because I’m getting feedback and I’m moving forward. It was about learning through the outreach and not just getting results.” Hannah Fitzgibbon
“I learned there was more to outreach than just pitching and getting something in return. It taught me about the next path I need to go down and the next thing to try. I also learned I wouldn’t have been able to do this without accountability.” Amy Angelilli
Here’s some advice for overcoming your resistance to outreach:
As you’re starting out, allow yourself to get excited about your idea and your mission. Don’t focus on results, enjoy having an amazing conversation with them to build trust.
Again, to build trust, you need to give before you can receive! People want to feel understood. They want to feel you actually care about them. Don’t try to “sell” in your first interaction! Focus on sharing and celebrating your mutual interests.
Hold yourself accountable. Ask someone you trust to be your accountability partner or someone who is also trying to start a business!
As Hannah indicated, even if you don’t have it all figured out, it doesn’t mean you can’t talk to people about your idea.
In fact, your idea will become more refined, more figured out and more clear with each and every new person you meet.
Are you serious about creating work that matters and on your terms?
Ask yourself this question at the end of each day, “Did I meet anyone new today who is interested in my business idea?”
How fast do you think your business will grow if you keep responding, “No” to that question?
Good luck with your outreach!
Check out our Outreach Mastery Community of Practice to help you accelerate your outreach.
