Day 26. People’s impatience is driving me nuts.

People are too impatient. They want something and they want it now. They want results and they want it now.

I suppose this is a reflection of the times we live in. Everything is instant. The days of receiving a text message and replying the following day are gone. People now see that you’ve read their messages on Whatsapp.

How often do you get a message like this or some variation of it: “Why aren’t you replying to my message? I can see you’ve read it!”

This impatience is especially prevalent in business. Agencies who are pressurised by clients who want something now, impose this pressure on freelancers, and contractors. I’ve got a few short words here: manage your clients better.

Stop being a little bitch and bending over backwards. What they want is not always what’s best for them. Your job is to guide your clients and give them the best possible service. You should advise, not submit. You should steer not be steered. You should grow a thicker skin, instead of shedding it each time you receive a call from them.

Also, when you’re starting a business venture, or any venture, things don’t happen overnight. Your website isn’t going to instantly rank on the first page of Google when you’ve done a few SEO tweaks to your site.

In fact, it may will take months many months for you to even gain any traction. These on-page tweaks only account for about 15-20% of all SEO. The rest is all off-site optimisation like gathering a healthy amount of backlinks from other sites. And no I didn’t thumb suck these figures. I spoke to an SEO expert who gave me some advice.

Similarly, don’t think stuffing keywords into your posts is going to work. Those days are long gone. If you want your site to rank, be patient.

Submit your sitemap to Google so their little bots know to crawl your site, do your keyword research so you know what customers are looking for and launch a blog that provides your readers with valuable content. Content that they’ll love. Content that they’ll want to share time and time again. And maybe, just maybe you’ll start building up those backlinks (incoming hyperlinks from another site).

Why do I emphasise backlinks? Why are they so important?

Well, backlinks are like referrals, they let Google know you’re an authority. If there are more backlinks to your site about a specific topic Google starts to realise this and your website starts to rank.

Think of someone who gives the best massages. One positive recommendation increases their reputation and as more recommend them, their reputation increases even further (akin to increasing your Google rank). They become the go-to person for massages.

So what do you want to be the go-to person for? Whatever that is it’s not going to happen by being impatient.

“Impatient” is a lonely fool sitting there wishing he’d only listened.

Disclaimer: I don’t claim to be an SEO expert, but I’ve done enough reading to know what doesn’t work. If you want to do some reading yourself I’d suggest you follow Neil Patel and Rand Fishkin. They are gurus in the digital marketing space.

And hey – here’s a backlink for Neil and a backlink for Rand.

Cheers,

I’m out.

Day 15 – being average is okay.

I recently read an article by Mark Manson, titled, “In Defense of Being Average“. it starts like this:

“There’s this guy. World-renowned billionaire. Tech genius. Inventor and entrepreneur. Athletic and talented and handsome with a jaw so chiselled it looks like Zeus came down from Olympus and carved the fucker himself.”

Powerful don’t you think? Makes you want to keep reading. So I did.

By way of a bell curve, he explains how the majority of us are actually average at most things.

This is a bell curve for those who need a refresher (I drew this quickly, so excuse if it isn’t a piece of art):

You can apply a bell curve to any sector of a population e.g. those who are good at writing. Some, like Ernest Hemingway, are exceptional and will be in the top 20%, probably in the top 1%. Others will be terrible and in the lower 20%. And the majority? Well, they’re just average.

And that’s the reality, “We all have our own strengths and weaknesses”, Manson says. “But the fact is, most of us are pretty average at most things we do. Even if you’re truly exceptional at one thing — say math, or jump rope, or making money off the black gun market — chances are you’re pretty average or below average at most other things. That’s just the nature of life.”

Becoming exceptional requires dedication (assuming you have a level of talent, to begin with). Manson adds, “To become truly great at something, you have to dedicate time and energy to it. And because we all have limited time and energy, few of us ever become truly exceptional at more than one thing, if anything at all.”

But the sad thing is, it’s those top and low performers (extreme examples), that get the publicity. The media feeds us this information, left, right, and centre. Makes sense, because average isn’t exciting. Average doesn’t make for a noteworthy article. Average doesn’t draw eye-balls.

Unfortunately, this has created a new culture. Mansion highlights “…this flood of extreme information has conditioned us to believe that “exceptional” is the new normal. It’s an accepted part of our culture today to believe that we are all destined to do something truly extraordinary. Celebrities say it. Business tycoons say it. Politicians say it. Even Oprah says it. Each and every one of us can be extraordinary. We all deserve greatness.”

But if everyone is extraordinary or destined to be extraordinary, then no one actually is, right? Yet we continue to believe we’re all extraordinary and that being in the middle is bad. According to new norms, If you’re there, you’re failing at life. “So, we must compensate”, Manson says.  “Some of us do this by cooking up get-rich-quick schemes. Others do it by taking off across the world to save starving babies in Africa. Others do it by excelling in school and winning every award.”

Why do we do this?

We’re afraid to accept mediocrity. We feel that if we accept being average, we won’t achieve anything, we won’t improve, and our lives don’t matter. The problem with this type of thinking is that we’re basically saying everyone else is worthless.

But, Manson argues that greatness stems from the acceptance of mediocrity. “The people who become truly exceptional at something do so not because they believe they’re exceptional”, Manson remarks. “On the contrary, they become amazing because they are obsessed with improvement. And that obsession with improvement stems from an unerring belief that they are, in fact, not that great at all. That they are mediocre. That they are average. And that they can be so much better.”

Once you accept the fact that you’re actually average, a huge pressure is lifted. “The stress and anxiety of feeling inadequate will dissipate”, Manson says. “And the knowledge and acceptance of your own mundane existence will actually free you to accomplish what you truly wish to accomplish with no judgments and no lofty expectations.”

** If you hadn’t guessed it, the guy Manson was refering to in the first paragraph was Bruce Wayne.

If you enjoy writing and are serious about improving your writing skills, becoming a freelance writer, and want to earn more, I can help! Feel free to email me at nick@nickdarlington.com.

P.S. No, I’m not selling you anything. I’m not going to ask you to buy my book or even sign up for my course (I don’t have one) or weekly newsletter, I’m simply offering you help.

But remember while I can offer you assistance and support, you have to put in the work. No action = No results.

Cheers

Nick D