Become a Credible Authority on LinkedIn with Trevor Young

TRANSCRIPT

Michelle J Raymond: [00:00:00] A global greetings to everyone. That's joining us for another episode of The Good for Business Show. And every week I tell myself, I'm not gonna say I'm excited to have my next guest, but you know what? I'm not gonna do it. I'm excited to have you here this week, Trevor Young. Thank you for joining me.

Trevor Young: Thank you, Michelle. I love that intro. That is just just the best, the fact that we can now do this with the tools we've got and, you're creating a live TV show, still blows me away. I've been in the space for a very long time, but just the fact that the tools are getting better and better, and you can sit, in your office at home and bang that out.

It's fantastic.

Michelle J Raymond: LinkedIn lives are just amazing. And I love the fact that I can take the LinkedIn live and I can turn it into a podcast and all other different ways. It's just one of my favorite LinkedIn tools. Now I have you on the show this week, because we're gonna talk about what it is to be a "Credible Authority", which is a term you coined and I've been talking to a few guests like Ashley about what's a thought leader? What's a subject matter [00:01:00] expert? What's an influencer? So we're gonna talk about Credible Authority and maybe how that fits in. But I wanted you on this show because LinkedIn newsletters are another one of my favorite tools.

Like I absolutely love the long form content that's coming out. I think it's all super high value and your newsletter grabs my attention every single time. So I will most definitely be sharing the link for that newsletter in the show notes and absolutely encourage all of the listeners to go and check it out because you will learn something every time it will expand your mind and make you consider your own views and maybe you'll learn something like I do. So for those who haven't come across you, Trevor, who are you? What do you do? And who do you help?

Trevor Young: Okay. So I've my background's been in PR for too many decades and I've been in this content social space since 2007, when I first started my blog PR Warrior, which still I published two today and [00:02:00] just really evolved over the journey, loved the fact that, being in PR for a very long time, you had gatekeepers to get your story out there and now we can obviously become our own media channel and get it out there. So that's been my mantra for since kind of 2007, 2008 now. I'm at a point now where I do content, I call it content led communications strategies.

And then I coach and advise and cajole entrepreneurs experts, emerging thought leaders on how to build their thought leader brand out there in the marketplace. So taking the knowledge of people where they're running, they're all running businesses. They're all always progressive thinking. They've got the street cred, they've been around.

They're, progressive, as in they're generous, they want to get out there and share their ideas with the world. And really my thing is to package them up. To do that and help them articulate their story and their message and teach them along the way. So while I'm coaching them, I'm teaching them as well, which I'm really liking.

Whereas going back to consulting, it was more about [00:03:00] execution on behalf of clients. So nowadays I don't. Really do the ex for one client. I do, but I don't really do the execution.

Michelle J Raymond: I love it because it does take a bit of coaching and conjoling to take someone who may have expertise and bring them out from the background and turn them into what we call, a thought leader potentially.

And it doesn't happen by accident. It's a quite calculated process I think in starting out, I think there's a process that we need to follow. So I'm keen to understand your thoughts on this and how it's evolved over time. But let's start at the very beginning. It's as I said, a term that you've coined, which is called Credible Authority, how did you come up with it and why did you come up with that?

Trevor Young: I just needed something to package up I've I liked the idea many years ago, I come up with the idea of connected brand and that was a business that was really connected with its audience and its people and creating deep connections with the community.

And I felt that having a handle on something I could then really focus in on [00:04:00] what that person or that company looks like. And so the, To me, a Credible Authority really is a genuine and I stress genuine, trusted expert or thought leader on a particular subject or topic area, but importantly, they have a heightened level of expertise within their field of endeavor.

Now, the critical thing is I think that people listen to and take note of what it is, they have to say that means they're believable. And I think perception plays as big a role. So it's one thing to be good at what you do. It's another thing for people to perceive that. So yes, you need the runs on the board and, I think that's table stakes today let's face it.

So it's how people perceive you. Are you recognised not just brand recognition, but recognised for who you are and what you do and what you stand for. Are you respected? I think that's really important. Respect runs through everything that I teach. And are you sought after and sought after in many ways, to speak to, for your comments, for your ideas, for your [00:05:00] expertise.

So it's it is that package of being good at what you do, but really being able to share that and articulate that with the world.

Michelle J Raymond: Because it's not just for, I wanna be a thought leader, right? There's gotta be a goal. There's gotta be an outcome. There's gotta be something attached to it because otherwise why bother , like it's a lot of hard work for no reason.

I like the idea of having that goal out there.

Trevor Young: Yeah.

Michelle J Raymond: That's gonna drive your behaviors. And I've often seen in workplaces where I've been, that there's been the person that got promoted, at a rate that just made your eyes water, and then the other person who you actually sat next to and thought this person's amazing and they go nowhere. And so I think we see that even more so online. There are other people that are out there who may not actually be the experts. And as you and I were talking just before the show started, the world's best kept secret. That are, hiding in the background. How do we encourage those hiding in the background to, come out?

Trevor Young: Yeah. And [00:06:00] it's really not easy. Sometimes. I think we look at imposter syndrome pursuit of perfection being afraid of technology and not wanting to change. The people who have been in the game a bit are, forties, fifties now. And they're the ones we want to hear from that's the thing with me is I wanna hear from these people I want to, their take on everything.

I don't necessarily need your five tips to do this or whatever, although they might be helpful. I want more rounded conversations and I want more thought provocations and that side of things. And there's some people that, you and I and probably any everyone watching or listening.

They've sat down with someone and thought, oh, this person is brilliant. I'm just having such a great conversation. And yet that person is invisible online. And I just think the world will be a better place if we have these sort of these credible authorities out there being comfortable and in, in sharing their ideas, exploring these ideas in public becoming their own media publisher.

And it's something you evolve into. I think, anyone who's started a blog, anyone who started a podcast or done a LinkedIn life, you go back to your first LinkedIn life, [00:07:00] Michelle nervousness, no, one's gonna turn up. No, one's gonna listen to me. We all suffer from that. We all do it's but it gets easier and easier as you go along.

I've hated public speaking for years and years and years. And now I'll speak anywhere, but on stages and stuff. But I did 50 talks before I went professional in speaking, and I just started off with panels. And so it's it sounds lame, but you've just gotta do it. Cause the more you do the better you get and you find, your first blog post, your first articles. That'd be terrible. They won't be what you really want them to be, but you will evolve your voice. You'll find your voice just by doing. And sometimes the easiest way to start is doing comments on LinkedIn. That's don't lurk participate. That's a t-shirt there don't look.

Michelle J Raymond: It is

 Get off the benches. It's time to participate. And my friend, Michelle Griffin, who's in our audience today. Personal branding strategist. Has a really great quote that, she said in [00:08:00] another episode that we were recording and she said, "Action breeds clarity". So the more that you take action, the clearer you get, the better you get.

So Trevor a secret, my LinkedIn live started and I've shared this before, but they actually started because I signed up for a digital marketing course when I first did my business, because the imposter in me said, I couldn't dare train people to use LinkedIn if I didn't have a piece of paper. So the very first assignment came through and it said record a five minute video.

And I forget what the topic was, but it was five minutes. I had a meltdown. That course is still in the cupboard behind me. I haven't pulled it out. I freaked out that there was no way I could talk for five minutes on video and record myself. That was 18 months ago. Now people don't imagine Michelle, you do LinkedIn lives your own once a week, guesting normally once a week, potentially more, I'm on multiple podcasts. [00:09:00] I do all this stuff, but that is not where I started 18 months ago. And I like to share that evolution with people because they see this now and exactly what you said. If I go back to my first live, I forgot to press the go live button.

Not even joking on that. We spoke for 15 minutes. Then I went, where is everybody? And had to go back and start again.

So let's talk about your Credible Authority method

Trevor Young: Okay. I'll walk you through. And I think I like pulling together methods. Or a framework, it evolves over time. It takes, you know, it's a distillation of a lot of things. And if you can get it down to one page, then it's it.

It's looking good. But yeah. So the four pillars of that empower your voice. That's really the preparation phase, getting your, the mindset, and your positioning, right? The foundations getting everything in place before you burst forth with too much enthusiasm. So that's number one, empower your voice.

The second one is enhance the credibility of that voice. [00:10:00] This is about building an audience and getting out and being a little bit more participatory in the online world. And so we focus here on content and channels and this whole notion about becoming your own media channel. Third part is when we are getting serious and we're getting out there and extending the reach of our voice and our story and our message.

So we're trying to magnify our presence. And so think of this as amplification and third party endorsement and growing your sphere of influence. I put under this like earned media. So that's. Media relations, influencer relations, being on other people's podcasts being, writing opinion pieces for the, your trade journal, that sort of thing.

And that's extending the reach. And then the fourth one really is the end game, really for a lot of people where the rubber hits the road extract value from the profile and the reputation that you have built in the marketplace. This is capitalising on all your work. And we're looking here at commercialization and opportunity and profiting from your personal brand.

The [00:11:00] people don't have to do everything within this framework, but what I've found is really important. And my very heavy areas of speciality are the yes, positioning in the first one, but really the content and the channels and the earned media is where my bread and butter's been, but it really dawned on me, people need to understand that there are roadblocks mental roadblocks that we have to get across, get over and to identify those within themselves and to try and burst forth with those. And also the positioning. That's probably the hardest thing that people have to grapple with over time because they get too hung up on themselves and maybe it's, they can't position themselves because the imposter syndrome kicks in.

And then at the final one, which is really. How do I capitalise on that? I've spent quite a few years now examining and going through it myself as well. There are people who are probably been in a more traditional advisory role or running a consultancy or an agency and just the tools and the tech and the platforms to get out there and scale our business and create the type of business that, we want [00:12:00] to, whether we want to grow a million dollar micro business with a little bit of virtual assistance and freelancer help or, cut back and run a business that suits our lifestyle. And so it's really that part about is really opening people's eyes to what is possible and challenging yourself to think a little bit broader

Michelle J Raymond: I'm looking back at my journey. So I'm the accidental entrepreneur. I had no intentions of setting up my own business. I quit one night decided the next day I would never work for anyone else again. So then I went on a journey to work out what my business would be, which took around six months. While I almost destroyed myself trying to come up with the perfect idea. That was not fun, but it was there in front of me all along, helping other people get more out of LinkedIn, specifically helping businesses. But then that turned into, oh, can I just get any old invoice from any old person, any old how, because I needed a confidence boost and then it wasn't until a little [00:13:00] bit later, a few months in that I realised no one else was talking about company pages.

So I would be the company pages person. I can't say I ever set out to do that. All this foundation work that you talk about, I skipped over that and have had to come back, and just really look at it. And, there's times when I didn't want to be the company pages person, because everybody didn't like company pages.

It was lonely. I was out there by myself. I doubted myself you've mentioned imposter syndrome a couple of times. And I think she lives on my shoulder most of the time. And I just get faster at, brushing her away. For me holding on to that, and I think when you have you know that vision, like you said, when it's a step where I'm going, then it became easier to hold onto.

Trevor Young: Yeah.

Michelle J Raymond: But hardest thing I've ever done

Trevor Young: But why I go through that with people too, is to, if they get a little bit of clarity in their thinking and no one ever gets it right. First up, you. Always evolving. But the [00:14:00] fact is that you are trying to I like to use the phrase nail your colours to the mast. What's that one big overarching idea or theme or concept or philosophy that, you would metaphorically die in a ditch to defend and, that takes a while to come for some people.

Whereas some people it's a burning desire. It's really about highlighting that. And if that, that can imbue everything that you do, we know that, values and philosophies and the way we think is really a good way to differentiate us in the marketplace, but then it's really, what are your

call your flags in the ground. You've gotta stake out your intellectual territory because you've gotta be creating content about stuff that is going to resonate. Not necessarily going to resonate, but it's going to stamp you as someone who knows what they're talking about in this space.

And that's where it was great to hear and watch. Actually watch your interview with Ashley Fauss the other day. And I subsequently had a, an interview with her on my podcast Reputation Revolution, this whole thought leader versus expert thing is something that I've been talking about grappling with for some time [00:15:00] now.

And it was great to, to hear other perspectives on that. But at the end of the day, it probably doesn't matter. Which one you are, but if you do identify with one or the other, it's gonna make life a little bit easier from the content you create, because you do have those experts who, deep expertise I'm gonna educate and teach, and I'm gonna have best practice.

And I am the go-to person for this thing. Whereas, people who probably gravitate more towards thought leader and they probably don't say I'm gonna be a thought leader, but I think you can certainly aspire to this side of things. They'll have ideas over here and here and join dots and look the danger then is you become very disjointed, but you've also gotta give yourself permission to explore those ideas in public. It's how you bring it back to a cohesive narrative and evolve over time. And that's probably the key thing. So that's what I help people is to grapple with that, cuz I've had to go through it myself plenty of times.

And now it's good to be able [00:16:00] to sit down with people and challenge them on their thinking.

Michelle J Raymond: Things have evolved in digital media land, as you've said in your career, do you think it's possible in 2022 for people to be seen as a thought leader without having a digital presence as part of that? Is it an option anymore?

Trevor Young: Oh, it's not an option I'd take. No, look I, I see there was I coined a phrase many years back called the new thought leader and the new thought leader was the person who came outta nowhere. Not didn't come outta nowhere, they did create that digital presence and they built that personal professional, personal brand that really resonated.

It came back to because they went out and did that, the old school thought leader didn't really do any digital stuff. And they're still around. They probably have a digital presence now, but they're the ones that probably were an author and a speaker, that's what they do.

We see them and they pontificate from on high. The difference between the old and the new, I suppose is the digital thought leaders, [00:17:00] they bring people along for the journey and that's where the digital side is. They build that community. The older school people. It's how, when's my next media appearance, when's my next big stage to speak on. And whenever you see a lot of those guys, a lot of 'em are guys, people, crossing over to social media and stuff. It's often about them. This is where I am. This is what I'm doing. This is my new book whatever. Hopefully people have yep. Beat the chest and hopefully people are now grasped that you can, a digital presence means more than just being the focal point, but bringing people along for the journey and that's what thought leadership today is all about. So yes, you do need that digital presence because you need to build that audience, interact with that audience and share your platform with with your people, with your village of support, your digital neighborhood.

So I think, yes, I think you do, you. Absolutely.

Michelle J Raymond: I think that's maybe the difference between a subject matter expert and a thought leader is that community piece, I think one is happy as you said to preach. [00:18:00] And thou shall worship me from the stage and then the others are actually there to empower others.

To follow them potentially or inspire them to come on that journey with them. And so I can see community is such a big part of it. You can't do it by yourself. That is the one thing that I have learned on every level. I cannot do this by myself. It may be me that you see. On, LinkedIn live or it might be me that you see or hear on a podcast.

But from that perspective, I can't do it without the community behind me on, so many different levels.

So talk about LinkedIn, as it's my particular weapon of choice. I love LinkedIn as a platform. How do you actually use LinkedIn to build credibility?

Trevor Young: I think certainly LinkedIn is one of the most important platforms. Along with Twitter, I'm a big Twitter fan. If you are going to build visibility and influence. For a professional personal brand. I think what I mentioned earlier about nailing your colours to the mast and understanding, the lanes or lane or lanes that you wanna play in.

I think that having an idea [00:19:00] of that's good because that will help you reinforce your message again and again, and. I think if you are going to cover so many topics that you'll actually muddy the waters a bit and people say, oh, I'm not sure what this person is good at, then that can hurt your credibility over time.

So I think the earlier you can get into The clarity of thinking about what, how you want to be showing up. I think that's, those topics and areas that you want to be known for. And if you can, that big idea or that concept or that philosophy that you will die at a ditch for to defend.

I think that's really good. I mentioned before Ashley Fauss from Atlassian, she's fantastic at, it's not just about putting up content and that's being on the, in the feed and doing LinkedIn lives like this and, producing videos, little micro videos and putting them up and all of that stuff is really important and you gotta have a consistency to that.

Showing up is more important than, getting it perfect. But I think commenting on other people's posts is a really good [00:20:00] strategy and doing it strategically, doing it with heart, doing it with generosity. And Ashley does that. She does that better than most people. I think, she always fronts up and has great comments in other people's posts.

And she's always sharing the love and highlighting other things and and furthering the conversation. That's, it's not just about, getting 'em to someone's post. Oh, great. Post. Mike Michelle, great post loved it. It's can you move that conversation further? And, provoke thought if necessary.

And then I love that also the take people behind the scenes of your business, of your life, of everything. I talk about. There's four types of content, there's utility content, which is that useful, helpful educative. That's the really expert where experts sit really well, your leadership content explores ideas, et cetera.

And then there's just, the human content and that's behind the scenes. And I think we all should be doing that at some point. I won't get in the debate of how much behind the scenes we should get. [00:21:00] How much we should open the kimono as they like to say in the classic.

But Joyce Ong from the Tax Nuggets Academy is go and check her out. She is the bomb in this. She is so much fun. Takes people behind the scenes shows her. Set up she's all about making tax training fun. She hates PowerPoint and she's she's leading the charge of death by PowerPoint.

But it's when she goes to an event and she talks about the stories behind the event she goes really transparent and tells people how much money she's making off her new venture. So people might never want to train for tax , she's building a really nice following and I think she's fantastic.

She's just terrific. And a great example of showing your personality and differentiating yourself really in a compelling way, by having those behind the scenes stories.

The fourth part of content is more your your brand content, which is the, the stuff we have to do to promote our services and our products and our events, et cetera.

I think if we [00:22:00] know the kind of where we want to, we wanna push the boundaries of thought in, in our areas. We wanna bring people along for our journey and we show a bit of behind the scenes and a bit about ourselves. I think that's a pretty good winning and comment on other people's posts and be an active participant, not on the the sidelines.

I think that's when LinkedIn can work really well for you as per any social channel to be fair.

Michelle J Raymond: I always talk about, that behind the scenes, the good to feel, that kind of let us in behind the Wizard of Oz curtains, that's our ability to declone ourselves from all the other people offering the same subject matter expertise.

So for me, it's declone yourself. Show us what makes you different? It's really important. And I think what happens is on LinkedIn people look, outside their lane, have a look at what everyone else is doing. And then, not intentionally, but one day, I think over time you realise, potentially you've become a version of yourself that you don't recognise anymore because someone said, you should do it this way.

And someone else said you should do it that way. [00:23:00] And ultimately it becomes a chore and a challenge for people to create content that inspires them because they've all of a sudden realised I'm not me anymore. And it's for me about creating your digital twin. And this is what I encourage people to always make sure offline and online are exactly the same. Otherwise they give up, and that's the thing that I'm out to change. Either. They're people that give up or those that can't get started because they're trying to be something that they're not. Now we are going to wrap up, but we're not gonna do it before you actually have a special announcement for the show and I'm gonna make you do it because I know that you've been beavering away in the background over a, a period of time even come to Australia to finish off this special project.

So it would be silly of us after we spend all this time talking about your Credible Authority to not do this announcement. So here's your chance, what's going on.

Trevor Young: Oh, thank you. Thank you. Yeah. And it's really, it's been, it is something that I've been literally beavering away at. I've created what I call the Credible Authority Academy.

[00:24:00] And you asked the reason why I like credible authority. I got the.com for that. So it's credible authority.com and anytime you can get the.com, that's usually the decision made. And it's where I will all the things I talk about. I've only got one product there at the moment, which is a masterclass, which is like an introductory to the whole thing .Five videos and all the downloads, just to give people a feel for what it takes to become an influential thought leader today. And to build that professional, personal brand that people in a strategic and sustainable way, but one that people will respect and eventually I've got an online community ready to fold into that, to for ongoing support, 'cause I think it's the guidance and the accountability and the support that people need. And to go on that journey with other like minds that's the goal. So that'll be called the Credible Society. And then there'll be another program down the track.

So it's kinda like an ecosystem of training and support, but it's credibleauthority.com. Thanks Michelle. Be interested to know what people think. Cause I've just, I literally have not even thought about [00:25:00] launching it yet. I was gonna do it next week. And the website's finished. I've built the website and been in the back end of it and oh, it's there if anyone wants to go on and if there's any mistakes or whatever, please let me know.

Michelle J Raymond: I absolutely love it and I wish you every success for the new projects, because I know you have, as I said, been working hard in the background to share your amazing knowledge of which I'm very grateful.

You helped me be better. You helped me learn and expand my thoughts with your experience and your views and your way of sharing your knowledge, so I highly encourage people. As I said, at the beginning to go, I will share the details of Trevor's newsletter. I will also share the details of the podcast as well.

Because if you like this podcast, you're gonna like that one just as much. So next week I'm actually gonna be talking to MJ Peters about customer research 1 0 1. I think too many people are jumping in doing content and putting stuff out there without actually doing the work upfront, to work out. What does their ideal client actually expect?

So I'm really looking forward to [00:26:00] having that conversation to everyone that's joined us here live, or is listening to the podcast. Really appreciate you guys joining in and look forward to next week, Trevor. Thank you. It's been amazing. Thank you.