The world is a noisy place today. It seems everyone online is shouting about something.
Have you been marketing yourself or your business but you've failed to break through in the way you'd hoped? Or do you want to start your own thing but you're worried how you'll get heard?
How do you get noticed when you have something genuinely interesting or useful to offer the world? How do you stop people seeing you as 'just another person who does X'? What should you do when you see people who have no more ability than you attracting press and winning impressive projects & deals?
Shouting louder and more frequently isn't the solution.
And while each new marketing guru claims to have the answer, you might have discovered yourself that the 'marketing rabbithole' is bottomless. The further you go to try to learn the latest marketing hacks, the more there is to do and the longer your to do list becomes. It never ends! You're overwhelmed - and you're starting to feel like you're spending more time doing marketing than you spend doing the thing you actually care about which is the work.
Despite this, some new businesses still break through quickly and become the goto brand or person in their field. How do they do this?
By thinking like a pioneer.
Becoming a pioneer means taking what's different about you, your passions and obsessions, your challenges and life experiences, and using them to create something no one else can - a unique brand and business that generates word-of-mouth buzz, exciting media coverage, and a steady flow of clients.
How?
Let me work with you one-to-one and in a small group in The Pioneer Programme to make it happen for you. Right now this might seem far-fetched from where you sit but I've achieved all this multiple times - creating the Scanners Night event in London that got featured in the Daily Mail and multiple magazines, writing the book Screw Work Let's Play that defined its genre, was recommended by The Sunday Times and translated into 10 languages, and creating the online programme The Screw Work 30 Day Challenge with over 1300 participants generating 100s of 1000s of pounds in revenue. And I've helped many clients to do the same - to quit their jobs, become famous in their field, attract press and TV coverage, and make their mark on the world. Now I've distilled everything I've learned into The Pioneer Programme.
"I have taken many marketing courses. They are all very good at giving you all sorts of stuff but for some reason, they (almost all of them anyway) seem to fall short of actually giving you the 'meat'. With John, I managed to get the mind shift I was looking for - a way of thinking, of understanding situations. My way of looking at things has changed and that is what a great program is able to do. It feels like I have reinvented myself :) And this happened because John is a natural at copywriting - something I aspire to become one day!" - Michel
The Pioneer Programme is not just a powerful course but a mentorship with John himself. And that includes online small group sessions and private consultations with John over video conference call so that we can co-create your new business & brand.
The Pioneer Programme starts whenever you decide and you can take part from anywhere in the world.
"The Pioneer Programme provided the structure, accountability and social support I needed to keep going. Making this career change was both exciting and terrifying... There's a lot of different aspects to running your own company and John gives you the essentials in the areas that make the biggest impact...
Without the course, I don't think I would have had the bravery to go it alone. Thank you, John and team." - Mary
YOUR VIRAL BRAND
Don't make the mistake most people do of creating a me-too business very much like everyone else. In the Pioneer Programme I will help you create your own Pioneer Brand so that you stand out and become the go-to person for a the thing you love doing (and charge accordingly).
More than that, you have the chance to spread a powerful message or idea and actually impact the world in a meaningful way – you get to leave a legacy.
YOUR 6-FIGURE PRODUCT
A brand only has value when it is closely tied to a product, programme or service that generates real revenue for you. That means something that will break through and make a minimum of 100k over its lifetime.
That's why I will be helping you create a product & an offer, based on your new brand that will sell - and sell easily. Otherwise branding becomes just a theoretical exercise that doesn't move you forward (ie you have a cool name but you don't have a real business).
YOUR 20K PLAN
Most people waste a colossal amount of time on marketing without any strategy. On the Pioneer Programme I'm going to be helping you create a simple personal plan to generate sales quickly, and build your brand without the overwhelm. You'll know what you need to do - and what you don't need to worry about - to generate your first 20k of sales that proves your new offer really works. And you'll have a simple strategy to establish your brand and build your following at the same time.
"Competition is for losers" – Peter Thiel, PayPal co-founder
VIRAL BRAND
I walk you through finding the unique message, niche & brand inside what you do so that you stand out, get remembered, and win press coverage.
6-FIGURE PRODUCT
Let's create one thing that you would love to do & that others will be eager to buy. And when you've done that once, you can do it again!
COPY THAT SELLS
Discover the secrets to describing what you offer in a way that makes it irresistible to buyers - without being cheesy or salesy.
MAKES SALES - FAST
This will be a session with lots of interaction to go through how you can get sales and generate revenue quickly to prove your offer
20K PLAN
Let's create a simple checklist of the minimum number of marketing tasks to get your first 20k of sales and keep scaling from there.
YOUR NEXT STEPS
We finish with a celebration and a chance for you to choose your goal for the following month and map out your ongoing strategy.
I've been doing sustainability consultancy & bespoke training development. I've been invited to speak at events and I've even started career coaching for sustainability professionals. I'm pleased to say that it is already profitable for me with a gross income close to £33k. Thank you John, because a lot of the ground work was done in the Pioneer Programme. - Virginia
The Pioneer Programme is not just a powerful course but a mentorship with John himself. And that includes online small group sessions and private consultations with John over video conference call so that we can co-create your new business & brand.
The first consultation is to nail down your VIRAL BRAND & niche - what's the thing you'd most love to help people with and how do you position yourself as the goto person for it? I'll work it out with you in our first call.
The second is to nail your 6-FIGURE PRODUCT - the thing that's actually going to make you money! This is where we get into the detail of what you can actually sell - and people will be more than happy to buy. And we also work out the best price you can charge for it.
John is bestselling author of two books translated into ten languages and his advice has been featured in numerous newspapers & magazines.
John's entire career has been in innovation - Senior Managing Consultant at Deloitte, special effects software developer for Disney, independent consultant to the BBC. He is founder of The Ideas Lab, has run one-of-a-kind sell-out events for creative people in London for 12 years, and created programmes with 1000s of global participants. Whether it's technology, consulting, or business coaching, John has proved himself as a pioneer.
"The Pioneer Programme provided the structure, accountability and social support I needed to keep going. Making this career change was both exciting and terrifying and having people alongside you having done it and others going through it keeps you going when the fear sets in. There's a lot of different aspects to running your own company and John gives you the essentials in the areas that make the biggest impact. This team is hugely encouraging and I have been exposed to people from all walks of life and industries I would not have had insight into without this programme. Without the course, I don't think I would have had the bravery to go it alone. Thanks a million for believing in me John, when I wasn't 100% sure in myself." - Mary Doyle, Rocket Girl Coaching "I found my 1:1 consultations with John on the Pioneer Programme extremely useful for moving past points where I felt stuck. John has a real knack of looking at your jumbled up thoughts that are all over the place and then summarising them concisely." - Sarah Rogers-Hart, Kids Screw You Up "John helped me right from the start to narrow down all my ideas to focus on the one that really excited me. He helped me take it further from a concept to being something tangible and used his network of contacts to help provide direction and guidance in a completely new area for me. John has a wealth of experience related to starting up businesses and helped inspire confidence for me to keep going with my new venture." - Sanjay Sony, Naturalworks Nutrition Bars "Working with John gave me a real confidence boost and a clearly defined plan that produced my first four figure executive career coaching sale. His ongoing support and advice have proved invaluable." - Amechi Udo, Career Change Strategist "John gave me inspiration, opened my mind to more ideas, and I left the meeting with a concrete plan of what to do next. He helped me to package my ideas and my unique selling points in a way that doesn't sound 'salesy' which is something very important to me and why I chose to work with him in the first place." - Adele de Caso "Working with John helped me dig out this formerly 'crazy idea' that I was secretly excited about but too scared to actually do. John encouraged me to launch it as a play project which was a blast and I really got to experience the value my 'crazy idea' brought to people! Without John's no-nonsense straight-talking input Colour the City may still be a 'crazy idea' in the back of my cupboard - and I'm so pleased it isn't!" - Debbie Warrener
your fingerprint and that really works
"Trust in the Pioneer Programme process. Put the work in and you will make & get results." - Sarah
© 2019 The Ideas Lab London - John Williams