The upcoach podcast 10. The Long Game: Crafting Content that Resonates with Dorie Clark
We're thrilled to bring you a thought-provoking conversation with the brilliant Dorie Clark, a coveted trainer on Linked-in Learning and the mind behind "The Long Game," a Wall Street Journal bestseller. Dorie's wisdom shines as she shares her insights on the significance of content creation in a world where everyone’s competing for attention. She dives deep into how mastering the art of communication and language and pointing out the unique aspects of your work can make you heard above the noise.
We also discuss the development of writing skills and building credibility. Dorie generously shares her journey - from selling a bike on Craigslist to writing for the Harvard Business Review - and offers invaluable insights into harnessing real conversations and turning them into compelling written content. She also sheds light on the crucial roles of preparation, luck, and networking in creating opportunities. Get ready for a thrilling journey into the realm of thought leadership, making this episode a must-listen for consultants, coaches, and anyone who’s ever dreamed of making their ideas heard.
*The upcoach podcast is produced by Ventures FM.*
Episode Quotes:
Communication coaching with Dorie
The work that I do is about communication and helping people get their ideas and messages out more effectively in a loud and crowded world. We all know that the best marketing is having people come to you because they know what you're about and they like it. And so, figuring out how to break through is one of the things that I'm most interested in.
The better way to come up with content ideas
There's two different ways to come up with story ideas. We often try to do top-down and say, "Oh, what's a brilliant idea? What's a marketable idea?" And when you do that, you just get so stuck. But what I think we often need to do is do bottom up. Start with your lived experiences of the things. Real people, what are they asking you? What did you say to them? What was the experience that is out there? And almost always, you can literally get content ideas and write entire articles based on the advice that you give in your coaching sessions. You just are letting it go into the ether. It's benefiting one person. But if you learn to start meticulously capturing, "Oh, wait, I told them four things. Here, let me write them down," at the end of your sessions, that is article ideas between now and the rest of your life.
The best thing about communication coaching
I would say that one of the biggest things above and beyond, just the emotional gratification of my being able to help people. So many of my clients come to me with a really specific desire that they feel frustrated because they're smart people, they have good ideas, they know they have good ideas, but it's always go paging through the magazines and seeing other people's bylines and saying, "Oh, I could have written that." That's such a maddening feeling over time. And so, to actually be able to surmount that and to crack that code and to have you be the person who is actually in those blogs, those websites, those magazines is really powerful.
One of the most powerful credibility builders
If you do something as an individual, everybody's like, "Well, yay, good for you, but maybe you're special or different in some way," right? Maybe you're the outlier. Nobody takes it seriously. But if you are able to help a lot of other people do it, then they begin to say, "Oh, actually, there may be a system, there may be a methodology, and that means it might be able to help me."
And so, for me, that's very validating in the sense that there actually are some specific principles that you can show people and it enables them to break through in a way that may have been much more difficult if they had to figure it out by trial and error.