Be helpful – Great advice from Chris Brogan

Recently, I was listening to one of my favorite podcasts, The Read to Lead Podcast, where the host, Jeff Brown, had author Chris Brogan on the show.

Jeff asked his guest, “If you had to narrow all the business lessons you’ve learned down to one idea or theme, what would that be?”

I absolutely loved Chris’ response. Here’s what he said:

Be helpful.

What I find a lot of people doing is they create their business on the side of the page of who I am, what I know, what I think I want you to think about me, and all these sorts of things. That’s never the way to get business.

All the money I’ve made in my life, every single dime, has come from being helpful to someone else. Business is the service of others.

What do the people I serve really need? Take your ego out of that picture, and that’s when the magic happens. That’s when the money starts pouring in.

I know I have made this mistake in the past. For example, I recently decided to change the lesson make up policy in our business. Originally, I had set it up so that it worked for us. However, it became a recurring confusion and irritation point for our clients.

We tried everything. Changing the wording, explaining it more clearly up front, and on and on. The problem, however, persisted.

I finally decided it wasn’t working and changed the policy so that it was more helpful and easier to understand for our clients. It has proved to work better for them and for us which is a win-win.

As Chris Brogan put it so well, “What do the people I serve really need?” It has been confirmed to me again that being helpful is indeed the best approach to business.

I encourage you to check out the Read to Lead Podcast. Subscribe to it in iTunes here or on Stitcher here. Like I said, it’s one of my favorite podcasts right now.