Latest / The Life-First Solopreneur / 226. Why Human Connection Is Your Most Important Marketing Tactic As A Solopreneur

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226. Why Human Connection Is Your Most Important Marketing Tactic As A Solopreneur · The Life-First Solopreneur

• 0:00
  Carly Ries: In this episode, we share why marketing strategy, not tactics, is the foundation every solo business needs, how AI is shifting the landscape back to human connection, and five simple steps to create marketing that builds trust and drives action. So if you've ever wondered how to adapt to the fast changing world of AI without losing your voice or your audience, this conversation is for you. And if you tune in on YouTube, and I guess you'll hear this in the audio as well, you'll see this is a special episode unlike any other. You're listening to The Aspiring Solopreneur, the podcast for anyone on the solo business journey, whether you're just toying with the idea, taking your first bold step, or have been running your own show for years and want to keep growing, refining, and thriving. I'm Carly Ries and along with my cohost, Joe Rando, we're your guides through the crazy but awesome world of being a company of one.
• 0:51
  As part of LifeStarr, a digital hub dedicated to all things solopreneurship, we help people design business that align with their life's ambitions so they can work to live, not live to work. If you're looking for a get rich quick scheme, this is not the place for you. But if you want real world insights from industry experts, lessons from the successes and stumbles of fellow solopreneurs, and practical strategies for building and sustaining a business you love, you're in the right spot. Because flying solo in business doesn't mean you're alone. No matter where you are in your journey, we've got your back.
• 1:23
  Joe Rando: Hey, Carly. I'm sorry for the background noise. I'm calling in from Inbound, which is in San Francisco this year, and I just wanted to make sure we got in and did our podcast. But I'm in the hotel lobby, and it's a little noisy.
• 1:40
  Carly Ries: Wait, Joe. That is so weird. I am also in my hotel lobby at Inbound.
• 1:44
  Joe Rando: No way.
• 1:45
  Carly Ries: We should meet the first time.
• 1:47
  Joe Rando: Let's definitely meet up for the first time.
• 1:49
  Carly Ries: What? Oh my gosh. We are doing this podcast together in person, you guys. Joe and I have been working together for nine years off and on, and we've never met until this week in person.
• 2:04
  It is crazy. We are sharing this screen. Inbound is great this year. We actually can't wait to share all of our knowledge that we've had that we've received over. I was gonna say the past few days. We're just about to start day two.
• 2:16
  Joe Rando: Two, but my brain is exploding. I'm telling you. I'm like, it's been yes I told my wife yesterday was worth coming just for one session that we went to. Game changing stuff, things that I think can really benefit, at least a lot of our solopreneurs, if not all. And, we're gonna be sharing all this at our next Solopreneur Success Sessions, which if I was not completely jet lagged, I would remember the date and time, but I'll get back to you on that.
• 2:45
  Carly Ries: We'll put that in the show notes. But, yeah, day one was crazy. We've learned so much. We are gonna do some podcast episodes as well.
• 2:53
  We released, re released the twenty twenty four Inbound Recap last week. So if you wanna listen to that, you can because all that information is still relevant. We will be sharing our experience. But it's just been so fun to meet up with you as well. You're taller than I thought you would be.
• 3:08
  Joe Rando: Taller. Okay. you know, most people say I'm bigger than they thought, but, Taller. anyway, it's been fantastic to meet you for the first time after 2016. It's, like, nine years.
• 3:25
  But it's just the world we live in now. there are people that you get to know and become very close friends with that you never actually see in person for nine years.
• 3:34
  Carly Ries: It's so crazy. I was talking to my husband before he got off the elevator, I was like, I'm so nervous. Do I stand? Do I sit? What do I do?
• 3:41
  And he was like, you talk to Joe more than most people. Why are you so nervous? But just it's so natural, as we would have guessed. But you guys, we also have not forgotten that we are in the midst of our solopreneur success cycle series in light of our book coming out 10/06/2025, Solopreneur Business for Dummies, which kinda covers the solopreneur not kind of, it covers the solopreneur success cycle.
• 4:06
  Joe Rando: Yeah. In detail.
• 4:07
  Carly Ries: Yeah. And last week, we re released the overview. And so we're diving now back into the the planning phase, which we had to split into feels like a gazillion pieces because there's just so much that goes into planning. But today, I just wanna give a brief overview of marketing strategy, seems so relevant with Inbound. And also, I feel so validated after just day one at Inbound and, the state of marketing for people.
• 4:32
  I kept listening to sessions in the lens of solopreneurs. And I was like, oh my gosh, this book speaks to what they're speaking to. Because the reason for that, even though we wrote the book before Inbound started and before all these trends that we're learning about are coming out, is because we lead with strategy before tactics. And I think if you always have a sound strategy, you can pivot with technology. You can pivot with AI because you have a solid understanding of who your audience is, who your brand is, who you are as your voice.
• 5:02
  We talked about that in previous episodes just defining your branding and messaging. And if you can nail down all those pieces, you can pivot with the trends in technology.
• 5:13
  Joe Rando: Well, absolutely 100% true, but the other aspect of that that you mentioned, but I think that has been really, really leaned into in this Inbound conference is that it's people first now. AI has had the kind of opposite impact that you might have thought, you know, just kind of, pondering the concept. It's like we are not convinced by anything anymore, video, audio, but if it's real people, if we know it's real people, that's what people are craving. And we've been saying for a long time now that for most solopreneurs it's not about search engine optimization. It's not about, inbound content marketing.
• 5:51
  It's about building direct connections with people and networking and getting to know people that then come to trust you. And that's just it that's now true exponentially from what it was maybe five years ago.
• 6:05
  Carly Ries: No. Absolutely. And it's funny because we kind of follow I don't wanna say methodology. That sounds so, stoke. I don't know.
• 6:13
  But we do, we were inspired by Jay Acunzo. We've had him on the show. He's one of those people who's always just like cut the fluff, get back to the story, speak to your audience. And so we kind of put together based off of some of his, thought process as well as our own, like, essential steps that solopreneurs can take for an effective marketing strategy, which is build trust, create resonance, establish desire, inspire action, and then wash, rinse, repeat. And it's funny because I can say this out loud now.
• 6:48
  Inbound just, developed a marketing loop. And it's funny because looking at our five steps, it's basically a loop. It's do that and then repeat. Do that and repeat. But again, at the heart of it, it's that human connection.
• 7:01
  And I think that is many experts think that that's how you connect. You get a hold of your audience now. It's no longer just an SEO player, analytics, or this. Like, we've done that. We've exhausted a lot of traditional playbook steps that we've discussed and that they've been discussing at the conference.
• 7:22
  And it's time to kinda go back to the beginning and just establish who you are. Once you know who you are, once you know who your audience is and put those steps in place, that's when you can dive into the tactics. Do you want, AEO is a new thing that they've been talking about instead of SEO, AEO, the AI engine optimization, which is a tactic. But the thing that I wanna make clear for solopreneurs that's different from all the marketing advice out there is that how solopreneurs attract leads is so different from big companies, and they really do need to hone in on that one on one connection. So even though AEO is a tactic that they can certainly start implementing, for solopreneurs, it still just goes back to the basics.
• 8:05
  Tell your family and friends what you do so they can be your lowest hanging fruit. Get involved in local groups. Have one on one communication on social media. Don't just post it and forget it. Like actually interact and build these relationships.
• 8:17
  Again, nothing has changed for us because of the strategy that we recommend. But it's just really doubling down on that human connection then figuring out the tactics that will work best for your business based off of that.
• 8:29
  Joe Rando: You know, it's one of the things that I've been saying about AI is that it's almost taking us back in time. You know, until the nineteenth century, the only things that we could rely on for information were basically handwritten by humans. It was you know, something written down, something something that they painted. And then we developed photography. We developed audio recording.
• 8:56
  And then, of course, video recording and we documented things. And there was some ability to manipulate, but it was pretty minimal. we could pretty much trust you know, if you had a film of somebody saying something, could pretty much say, well, they must've done that. It's out the window. And now we're back to pre nineteenth century where it's all about trust again. It's all about who you trust and who you don't, because you can't trust anything you see anymore. It's getting so good now. So solopreneurs in a sense have an advantage now because they've always had to kind of work that way.
• 9:29
  They've never been able to say, well, you know, we're a multi billion dollar corporation. It's always been about building one on one trust with people that are your customers. And companies are gonna have to learn how to do this. These big companies have not been focused here. And as solopreneurs, we have that down.
• 9:46
  That's what we do. So it's a real opportunity to, gain ground because, you're a number of steps ahead of a lot of these bigger companies that you might be competing with.
• 9:58
  Carly Ries: Yeah. Absolutely. But that's all I have for today. Just a reminder that AI is a tool. It's a tactic.
• 10:03
  It is not your strategy. So nail that down first. And, we're so excited to share everything else that we've been learning this week.
• 10:09
  Joe Rando: I'll say one more thing about AI, because it's obviously all that's being talked about. Not all, but a lot of what's being talked about here. And that is think about AI like a rise and tide. If you're let's say you're a copywriter.
• 10:21
  Now all of a sudden AI is doing what you do. Well, how do you build on top of that? How will you build your business in a way that taking advantage of that AI is something that that you can do. And if you think of it that way, maybe you become a really good prompt engineer for doing copywriting, in which case now you can do much more work than somebody that's just using AI straight out of the box. And so there's just ways to take what's happening and changing and seems to be approaching on your work and take away some of the painful stuff and some of the boring stuff and try to do more of the cool stuff.
• 11:02
  So just a thought on that.
• 11:04
  Carly Ries: Love it. Well, listeners, we are, in our next episode, we'll be talking about the sales process as part of the solopreneur success cycle. But that's what we have today. As always, thank you so much for tuning in. Leave that five star review.
• 11:15
  Share this episode with a friend. Subscribe on your favorite podcast platform. And we'll see you next time. And we'll be virtual again. oh, no.
• 11:22
  Not next time. Next time we will be. Woo. Have a good one. You may be going solo in business, but that doesn't mean you're alone.
• 11:31
  In fact, millions of people are in your shoes, running a one person business and figuring it out as they go. So why not connect with them and learn from each other's successes and failures? At LifeStarr, we're creating a one person business community where you can go to meet and get advice from other solopreneurs. Be sure to join in on the conversations at community.lifestarr.com.