Networking with Vivien
Dipping my toe into the big blue ocean of digital networking, I took a courageous leap and direct messaged a solo entrepreneur whose posts I'd been following.
Likely this is a standard practice for most people. For me, I need to know the name of someone's first mentor before I'll set up a meetup. If I was to broaden my network to grow my business, then I'd need to step out of my comfort zone and meet new people.
That's when I came across an insightful post from Vivien Koh-Milburn, a "Top Copywriting Voice" on LinkedIn. She writes a weekly newsletter, called Why Our Words Work.
We're both members of the LinkedIn Group Internal Communications Best Practices. Her post talking about best ways to engage employees through consistent communications caught my eye.
Curious to learn more, I took a cyber step over to her website. A strategic communications designer, she helps business writers become better communicators and smarter marketers. I signed up for her newsletter.
Her insights engaged me. Vivien focuses on actionable copywriting and content writing techniques paired with the human psychology necessary to craft words for impact. Throughout her site she posts free resources helping writers hone their craft. Her own voice is one part fun, one part irreverent, and several parts smart. All skills I identified with and wanted to emulate.
Her honesty hooked me. When she set out as a solo, she believed that her diverse marketing communications expertise would quickly deliver a six-figure paycheck. She admits she was a bit smug. She'd done all the things - set up a website, posted on social media, sent out cold emails. Yet, the build of the business proved to be slow. Her story is one to appreciate. As any entrepreneur knows, the journey isn't linear.
Her story spoke to me. Maybe I was looking for navigational guidance, or more likely I was looking for a new friend to share my experience -- including the smug parts. Which ever the reason, I took a courageous leap and sent her a direct message and asked if she'd like to hop on a call to talk bout her techniques, and she agreed. Me: relief!
We talked shop. We celebrated, commiserated, talked about where we've been and where we're going; we talked about our families, and places we've visited, and I gained incredible wisdom on ways to describe the services I offer.
We did have one roadblock. Let's remember that not everyone lives in the U.S. Let's also remember that LinkedIn is a global platform. This realization came through clearly when I set out to sync up our time zones for the call.
Turns out this virtual coffee would occur at the beginning of her day and the end of mine - she lives in Singapore I live in Minnesota. Brilliance knows no boundaries?
No matter the distance, I'm grateful to have made the connection. Our conversation was an absolute joy, and motivated me to always be open to conversations with people whose work I admire. Â
And hey, should I ever travel to Singapore...
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