You Don’t Have To Be The Guru You Just Need To Be Their Guru

You don’t have to be THE guru. You just need to be THEIR guru.

For the most part, the majority of us are pretty respectful of the mentors and gurus who have taught us. We may have read their books, been to their seminars, or seen them on TV. We may love the information that they teach and have multiple resources from a multiple of mentors and gurus on our shelves. But when it comes time to teach what we have learned from these mentors to others we get hung up. We freeze in our tracks. “What could I possibly teach to others. I’m still learning!”

That is true. But it shouldn’t stop you from building your business helping others.

Answer me this: Have you ever been talking to someone and you shared a tid bit of information you learned that seemed so basic to you but just absolutely blew away that person you were talking to? You probably learned that information years ago. You may have found it in a book that you picked up off a bookstore shelf years ago. To you it’s old hat. To that person it was a revelation.

This is where I find most solo-service-preneurs get hung up. They have this mental hurdle that restricts them from growing, from charging the big bucks. And that’s because they feel that the person they just talked to could easily learn the same thing that they had learned. “It’s so simple,” they think. But here’s where things change…

You Are a Guru Filter

Let me give you a couple of examples. As most of you know I am a competitive bobsledder in my spare time. I love it. It makes all the drudgery of work seem worthwhile and it makes me work long hours so I can play and maybe go to the Olympics. Now, in the process of learning how to bobsled I needed to learn how to sprint. There are a thousand sprint coaches out there that I could go to, but I’ve managed to find a local guy here in Calgary who is a sprint coach. Now he is my “guru filter” he’s passionate about sprinting. He loves it. Reads a ton about it. Goes to lectures by other coaches some of whom coach Olympic level sprinters. Here’s the kicker…I don’t have time to do all that stuff. Sure, do I need a sprint education? You bet I do. Do I have time to start reading from scratch to figure out who all of the gurus are and who will apply best to me? Not in your life. So that is why Bill is my track coach.

Whether you are a personal trainer a lawyer or a coach. An architect, a marketing expert, or a physicist. You are immersed in your field. You have people who you look up to in that field, but to most of your friends and future clients you are on a rung somewhere between them and all of those gurus you look up to. You are just as good to them as the gurus are to them. And in a lot of ways you are better to them than the gurus. For those guru’s may be talking over their heads. You have gone through what they are going through and you can help them lead the way.

In The Land Of The Blind The One-Eyed Man is King

This is a fantastic saying that I can’t remember where it came from. You see. In the grand scheme of things the guru can see with both eyes. And you probably perceive yourself as having one eye compared to that guru you are inspired by. But compared to you, most people are blind. And you, with that one eye, can help lead the way.

I was at a conference a few years ago and was sitting in an audience listening to a speaker. After the speaker was done my wife and I met a guy in the same audience who had just heard the same speaker and he asked me a question that the speaker just covered. I was a little shocked that the guy had actually asked the question and thought it was a joke because in my head I was thingking, “Is this guy serious? Wasn’t he listening?” So I answered the question using the answer that I had just heard from the previous speaker. This guy was blown away. You would have thought I just solved all of his life’s problems. I felt great that I had helped the guy but in the back of my head I was still thinking, “Dude, you need to wake up.”

All of our clients have issues in their lives that lead them away from others and help them migrate towards us. And that is what I call…

Your Attractor Factor

Why do some people like Wayne Dyer and others hate him? Why do some people hire my friend and speaker Ruben Gonzalez from www.OlympicMotivation.com and pass on Kerri Strug? Who knows. But what you need to know is that each one of these people have a different Attractor Factor. I know a lot of people who loved Wayne Dyer before he got all bald and bare-footed on people. I know people who love Ruben’s story of being a three-time Olympian and others who probably would only hire a four-time Olympian.

We all have a different story to portray to people. And for each of us there is a market. My friend Ruben is inspired by hundreds of speakers who have come before him. But that doesn’t stop enough people to hire Ruben to speak that he makes a fantastic living from speaking. And the same goes for you. There is a market who needs YOUR services. There is a market who wants YOU. And not that guru over there. That is why, you must remember that you don’t have to be THE guru. You’re just looking to be THEIR guru.

Jonathan Edwards is an Olympic athlete and the Chief Visionary Officer of www.TheBusinessCalledYou.com. He helps solo-preneurs, coaches, trainers and other skilled service professionals build their businesses so that they can break out of the dollars for hours trap and live the lives that they’ve imagined. You can go to his website and receive a FREE audio CD titled “How I Turned My Passion Into Profits and Escaped The Dollars For Hours Trap and How You Can Too!” He lives in Calgary, Alberta Canada with his wife Michelle where they also own www.CushyLife.com the number one luxury bedding and drapery company in North America.

Tags: Small Business Marketing