Do you know who your influencers are?

If you met with them face to face, what would you do?

You have one minute.

Do you know who they are? Do you have a  list? Written down? If you were given the chance to have a cup of coffee with them or even just had a minute at a conference, do you know what you would would say? How could they help you? Or an even better question to ask: how could you help them?

Within a narrow window of dropping off a rental car early on a Sunday morning and my son’s 14th birthday early on Sunday afternoon, I drove and hour and fifteen minutes each way for an event mostly because an influencer would be there and I wanted to hand her my new book.

I had a hard copy for her, I got a pen from a waitress, and I handed it to her. We all had to leave so I had maybe two minutes. I used them wisely.

I started with how I could help her with her book. She had said only minutes earlier than her book was going to be coming out soon. I looked for ways I could help her. For example, she’s going to publishing in Dutch, but wanted to publish in English (I know translators). I also said that I know how the self-publishing market works in the US and that I could help her with that. She was then asking me when we could meet to talk about it all.

See what happened there?

I turned the tables. I offered to help her with something and got her excited about meeting with me.

DISCLAIMER: I really enjoy helping people. It’s to the point where it’s more fun or more enjoyable than getting help from others.

Yes, of course, she’ll help me with the promotion of my book. But how it worked out (I hadn’t planned all of this when I walked into the cafe), I could help her which made her even more interested in helping me.

It’s just that simple.

Who can you help today?