This month’s digital influencer is writer, entrepreneur and highly sought-after speaker, Josh Steimle. The founder of Influencer Inc and former Forbes columnist gives us an insight into his marketing world.

Where did your story begin?

I identify primarily as a writer and my love of writing stems from my mom who read to me a lot as a child. If you want to be a great writer, you need to read a lot.

How did you become so influential?

In 2012, I went to my friend Cheryl Snapp Conner to get help for my marketing agency, but she suggested I try writing for the big business magazines. She helped me get an article into Fast Company and introduced me to an editor at Forbes where I got an ongoing column. I wrote 164 articles for Forbes, and over 150 articles for other publications including Mashable, Time and Entrepreneur. 

 This led to a book deal, a TEDx talk, and other speaking engagements. It generated millions in revenue for my agency, so it fixed that problem too.

Do you have any golden rules/mantras for life or work?

I believe in daily affirmations and some of my favorites are:

Someone out there needs to hear what you have to say.

Nobody can deliver your message the way you can.

Nobody cares what you have to say until they know how much you care.

What advice do you have for others who might want to duplicate your success?

My next book is going to be called The 7 Systems of Influence. The systems are:

1. Vision: Your dream, your big idea, the impact you want to see in the world.

2. Genius zone: The overlapping experiences, skills, and expert knowledge areas that make you uniquely able to turn your vision into reality.

3. Audience: Figuring out your ideal audience and how to connect with them.

4. Content: Identify the right message for your audience, and the best channel to deliver it to them.

5. Action: Transform plans into actions.

6. Collaboration: Increase your influence 1000x by collaborating with others.

7. Love: If you don't care, your influence will be negative and short term.

What are your three biggest tips for building an audience?

First, it's not about building just any audience, but finding your ideal audience. Follow these steps to find your ideal audience:

1. Make a list of every individual, group or organisation who might be interested in what you have to say. 

2. Choose the audiences that are must-haves.

3. Play around with different combinations of groups until something makes you say: "Nobody can help this group like I can; I can OWN this audience."

Then sleep on it and make sure it keeps resonating with you

What are your favourite tools/software?

Gmail and Google docs. Seriously, my entire empire runs on those two products.

What do you feel is the next big trend in social media and content marketing?

I think the next trend is people leaving it. They will log on to take care of something specific, and then log off without hanging around. To catch their attention, you've got to create outstanding content they want to share. Great content always wins.

Learn more about Josh’s work or buy his books on joshsteimle.com and follow him on Twitter.

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