Being visible is a muscle
The workplace isn't a meritocracy, a 2021 social media trends report and thoughts on building demand for a product your audience doesn't yet know it needs.
Many moons ago, when I worked in agency-land, I once received this feedback in a 360 performance review:
“Beth needs to be a bit louder, as in letting everyone know what she’s working on”
For the uninitiated, a 360 review is the type where you get feedback from everyone you work with in an anonymised format. In this case, I was pretty sure I knew who this had come from, and it was one of the agency owners.
I was horrified.
Did they think that I wasn’t working? That I was - lazy?
I’d always prided myself on a “head down, get on with the work” attitude and in a busy agency, where I rarely had one-to-one time with the owners, there wasn’t much opportunity for me to give updates on what I was working on.
This stumped me for a long while and at 23, I was too inexperienced (and mortified) to go and ask for more clarity.
As I got older (maybe a bit wiser) I’ve realised what they probably meant.
Many of us go into the workplace expecting it to be a meritocracy. That if we work hard enough, the results will be obvious and we’ll be rewarded. Particularly for women, who are conditioned to not make a fuss or to say anything about our progress that may be deemed as arrogant. As a result, we keep ourselves quiet and expect that everyone will know how hard we work simply because we are working hard.
But here’s the thing I’ve since learned: the workplace is not a meritocracy.
If you want everyone to know what you’re working on and bringing to the table, you need to spend conscious time and effort making that work visible.
I’ve since taken this advice to heart and have become much better at “managing upwards”.
This meant getting comfortable with taking up space and asking my boss or client for a meeting, to listen to my presentation or to hear about results. This is in no way a boasting opportunity, but if someone is hiring me to do a job then I need to be obvious about what steps we’re taking and what results we’re achieving.
I’ve learned that being visible is a muscle, and a muscle I use even more so when I’m freelance and there are no “rules” around how often we communicate.
This means that I regularly request check ins with my clients to discuss what’s been done, even when they might not request them with me. I create presentations, either written or as a quick video created in something like Loom, to present new ideas or pre-empt what they may need next.
Not only does this often lead to further work but it helps me flex the muscle.
People are busy and it’s not that they’re not interested in your work, you just need to be the one leading the conversation.
When was the last time you flexed your visibility? I’d love to know if you find this easy, or have to make a conscious effort.
Yours, with empathy,
Beth
Marketing disciplines explained: how to build demand 📣
I’ve been researching a marketing method lately that in the SaaS world we call demand generation.
And it’s made me consider what we mean when we want to build “demand”.
One thought that came up, was that it may mean building demand for your product or service even when your audience may have no idea that they need it.
An example to illustrate.
How many of you have a stainless steel water bottle? A Chilly’s bottle, a Klean Kanteen, or perhaps just a non-branded one from Amazon.
Do you remember what you used before you had that? Like me, you might have been buying plastic bottles from Tesco. Until suddenly you realised that plastic bottles = bad for the environment and bad for your health (hello BPA toxins).
Do you remember how you learned that? It might have been from a government campaign on protecting the ocean, or from a group for social good. It probably started that way.
But it’s more than likely your need for a stainless steel water bottle and the education on why you needed one, came from a brand selling stainless steel water bottles.
This is how a product got introduced to the market, made a statement, attracted new customers and took off as the “standard”.
Often, we rely on selling a service that’s already out there, just our own version of it. Rarely do we try to build demand for something which doesn’t exist yet (or at least not in the public lexicon).
But sometimes, thinking about how to educate your target groups on something that’s missing, is the best way to get creative with your marketing ideas. Rather than leading with the way it’s always been done, it helps us to think of an angle and new pain point, then look to solve that with our product or service.
It brings a little creativity back into marketing, something I’m sure we could all use a little more of.
Links 📚
This report is a snapshot of the Gender Equality index in 2020 across the largest European countries. Four interesting pull outs included:
Norway, France, the UK, Finland and Sweden completed the top five when it came to closing gender equality gaps (although we still have a long way to go for it to be "equal")
Only 6% of companies had female CEOs
But women made up 33% of company boards
TLDR; the gap is closing, but very slowly and as of yet we don't know how COVID will reverse or affect this
This article on 7 racist slurs to drop from your vocabulary was hugely eye-opening and a great quick read for further anti-racism education 🙏
I’ve always followed Slack’s attempts to get into Enterprise with interest. This read on their launch strategy is filled with tips on how knowing your customer helps you to build a unique offering
Interested in social media and digital trends? Then you’ll want to checkout the latest report on digital behaviour from Data Reportal. The shocker for me was how the average social media user now spends 2 hours and 25 minutes on social media each day, equating to roughly one full waking day of their life each week 😱
Stay in Touch…
I’m testing out LinkedIn at the moment by sharing tips on SEO and content marketing. If we haven’t already connected please send me a request and I’d love to see you over there 🙏