Mark Bowness

Born ready. Thank you for having me on the show. Let’s go for it!

Mark Bowness

Firstly, the biggest mistake that the business owners make is they focus on selling product. Selling product is the key aim but people are sick of being sold to.

Mark Bowness

For example on Facebook, you see lots of different ads. There’s such a decline in people responding to these ads.

What people are desperate to do is to join a community of like-minded people that will go on this beautiful journey together in order to experience whatever the product is or the subject is. They want to belong to something and that’s something I understood at the very heart of it when I created Tribe Wanted.

Tribe Wanted was aimed at those that were in the corporate space, people doing a 9-5 job or 8-10 jobs. That’s all they were doing. They were living this corporate treadmill and don’t have time to build a social network.

I wanted to give them a glimpse of a difference of world. So at least, in that 200-acre island, they have the ability to log-in online in the day, in their lunch break and lunchtime to decide as a community what they wanted to do on the island.

Mark Bowness

It was all a bunch of beautiful people, thousands of people from around the world with the same vision; to build a social network online. There was a destination which is in Fijian island. It was all about building an eco-community. That was the essence when that started to go crazy.

As you mentioned, 200 media outlets. It was a primetime TV show in free countries.

I started to tap into what I call Movement Mission. I am building a movement around whatever the product is that we have and sell.

Mark Bowness

In respective of what your product is;

Mark Bowness

You can be a mom at home that has a mom and pop business and selling children’s clothes. It doesn’t matter what your product is but your goal should be to be a Thought Leader in that space, to be the go-to person on your product in your space.

I’ve created what I called the Six Pillars of Thought Leader Mastery. This now enables me to have 9 and a half thousands people in a group that’s growing rapidly. I have two groups I’m building.

For example, I now run a webinar to my group on Facebook and I can make $60,000 in sales on webinar. I want your audience to realize the importance of this and I’m going to give as much value as I can during this interview.

Mark Bowness

1. Movement Mission

You’re not just selling your product. It’s about the journey that you’re taking people on and where they are going to come in to buying your product.

If we go back to that mom’s and pop’s business selling children’s clothes, maybe they are a young or a first-time mom.

What is it around that product that they will be discussing and that there will be knowledge on?

One of the biggest takeaways I want for your listeners is that we create Facebook pages. Everybody does and therefore, we believe that we should do it. It’s that social media marketing process that we go through.

The reality is Facebook pages are dead unless you’re the likes of Nike and Coca Cola. If you’re in the big place, you have that leverage and you have those numbers. So Facebook themselves said when you post a status in your Facebook page, then it’s seen by a maximum of 17% of people.

So you do all that hard work to get people to like your page and then when you post a status, 17% of people as a maximum see that status unless you pay Facebook to boost that post and to reach more people.

Mark Bowness

Start creating a Facebook group. One of the beauties is that you build this community of people. They position you as a thought leader.

I create daily themes that people can talk and discuss about or concepts that we create.

One of the beautiful things is whenever somebody buys my products, they go into the group and they say, “I’ve just had a great session with Mark’s book / product. I enjoyed it. It was fantastic!” And everytime that happens, I get on average 4-5 people message me to say, “Mark, that’s great. This is awesome. That testimony was fantastic! How can I get involved? How can I buy this product?”

The old method is you have a testimony over email. So somebody has bought your product. They loved it. They emailed you and you might stick on your website but you still got to do the marketing to get people to your website.

But when you are in a group and other people have seen it, there’s a momentum that you’re building around what you’re doing. This testimony is live. People are engaging. That similarly, transformed my business.

Mark Bowness

In Facebook pages, you pay to boost a status. In Facebook groups, Facebook actively promotes your group for you for free.

You might see on the right hand side of Facebook, there’s a suggested group’s column. Facebook suggests groups that are in relationship to other interests you have. On average, I now have 60 people a day requesting to join my Facebook group.

Mark Bowness

1. You’ve got to position yourself in authority.

On the banner head, you have your face, your image, and your brand all over the place. You have these daily themes you created. The whole point is to become this go-to individual or the thought leader.

2. Make it a place of real value.

I call a Facebook group a lead magnet on steroids. The goal there for me is to add serious value.

The big mistake that people make is they spend all this time creating this amazing product and then they launch it, and they got nobody to launch it.

I reverse that so I might go with the build a Facebook group of 5,000 people and then I was going to launch my online membership site.

Mark Bowness

During that time, I added so much value. I created webinars. I added products, lead magnets that they could download. All the time, I was capturing database email address which is the goal to get email address to build your database.

So when I got 5,000 figure and I launched my membership sites, I added so much value.

It was a no brainer for people to jump in and make that purchase because they already knew my content. They’ve already built that relationship with me. They’ve already seen that value.

So in 24 hours I made $45,000 from launching a membership sites.

Mark Bowness

It took me six months to get 5,000 people and there’s a clear strategy that I created on how to build a social network.

Obviously, I can’t show you but at the top of Facebook, there is that Facebook search bar where you can type in to find things.

You can type in the search bar the answers to these questions:

What is the go to place? Where is everybody buying? Where are your target audience hanging out online? Who were they going to? What pages are they liking?

So for me when I started, I typed into Facebook search bar “people who liked Tony Robbins.” My focus was coaches, personal trainers, and NLP hypnosis.

Mark Bowness

When you type that into Facebook search bar, it’s the most powerful way to build a social network and tribe and you then have a list of every single individual that’s liked Tony Robbins’ Facebook page. This is powerful as a marketing tool and as a research tool.

I messaged 20 people a day and I said “Hey. I see that we both have a passion to inspire people, to help people, and to improve and change their lives. I’ve created this Facebook group that will direct what I’ve said, what will give you value, give you free resources, and show you media opportunities. If you’d look to head over and join us, I’d love to see you there.” Twenty people a day, obviously that’s over 7,000 people a year. 20 people a day, you’re literally copying and pasting a message. It takes no time what so ever. That is the key that powerfully helped me build a social network.

Mark Bowness

Lots of people go to networking, meetings and they spend time travelling to networking events. Being at the event, coming away from the event and they might have met one or two people that they feel that they could build a social network with.

I spend time on Facebook in my pajamas with my dog on my lap, and a cup of tea in my hand, and I just add value.

Mark Bowness

I post once a day. I post this daily theme, encouraging people to ask questions, whether it’s mindset, motivational business, networking, or lead magnets. And I just jump every now and then and answer people’s questions, add value and builts of that community and conversation. Obviously, the people in the group carry on with their own conversations too.

Mark Bowness

It doesn’t have to be time intensive but if you invest in that, you will 10 times the profit of your business by building a hungry tribe.

Mark Bowness

Again, we’re building a place of seriously high value.

One of my groups is in personal development. It has over nine and a half thousand people.

1. Add value.

Mark Bowness

When you’re kicking off your group, I ask questions and then tag people. It might be a reflection on today’s news, I’d ask and tag individuals. I’d say “I’d love to know what you think about this.” So we’re bringing them in.

There’s kind of that respecting them as an authority and individual wanting to hear their voice and they’d come in and value. That’s how I kicked off that conversation.

Mark Bowness

2. It’s important to be very clear on having a real quality group when you build a social network.

I have a process if I go through 60 a people a day requesting to join my group. Maybe 50% of those are allowed in the group. It’s a group of high value. My VA now does it but we go through and look whose profile looks like spammers or look like they’re going to come in and just post in the group and disappear. I’m very clear on that.

Mark Bowness

I’m also clear on the fact that Fridays is the only day that people could post their own content.

There are loads of groups out there that have lots of people in posting their links and products but nobody’s listening, liking, and engaging. You don’t get that in my group. It’s a group of high value.

Mark Bowness

My Facebook group is through my personal account. You can only create a Facebook group through your personal account.

There are loads of groups out there that have lots of people in posting their links and products but nobody’s listening, liking, and engaging. You don’t get that in my group. It’s a group of high value.

Mark Bowness

One of the ways if you have your Facebook page to start guessing people into your group is launch your Facebook page and say, “Look, I’m creating this special group. It’s for those who want to go deeper and to the next level, for those who want to learn more and want more free resources. Head over now and join the group.” I post the link and then I boosted that as a status too to get as many people over to the group as possible it will go.

Mark Bowness

One of the other things I’m a big fan of is media mogul, which is one of the Pillars of Thought Leader Mastery. It’s about positioning yourself in the media and how that relates to social media.

Going to the media is about creating a story around you. It’s not about promoting your product.

Journalists will send you in the direction of the advertising departments. It’s about creating a story. Journalists want to share human interest story.

For example, recently, I leased again the same Fijian island at the beginning of this year and launched on the first of January a concept called, “This is Your Life Change.” I’m inviting six people from around the world on an all-expenses paid trip to this Fijian island. On that island, they’ll meet for two weeks a personal trainer, business coach, and life coach to come with a secret dream, a business charity or product. They will help turn into a reality.

I was at live on across Australia on this day on a TV show. That resulted in being in 40 media outlets around the world. We have three and a half thousand people apply. When people applied, we had a Thank You page, thanking them for their application. Then, we point them in the direction of the Facebook group.

“While you’re waiting to find out whether you’re one of the six, head over to our group. Engage in our community. Learn from our free resources. Let’s add value together.” Of course, they’ll also get an auto respond emailed in coercion to go to the same place.

So very rapidly, we built a fast group of three and a half thousand people.

Mark Bowness

It’s bridging the gap between the traditional and social media. People don’t simply see you in the media but there’s an end goal of bringing them back into your community, engaging them in your Movement Mission and ultimately, selling products, taking them on that journey and they’re basically with you for life.

For you to position yourself in the media, I have 2-day intensive courses on this. I teach people what they can do if they’re a business owner or a business coach. Maybe your concept is you’re going to have a business owner that you’re going to transform their business in a space of a week.

Mark Bowness

So you get in the media. It’s a free story, free thing for them to apply to. They come in to your community, they apply, and then they join the group.

Mark Bowness

First, start media attention grabbing story.

Journalists are interested in human interest stories like how your story improves the lives of their readers or viewers.

Secondly, focus on local media first when building your media profile.

Mark Bowness

Every single local media including your local newspaper, TV, and radio are interested in what the residents of their community are to or want to gain coverage in your local media. It’s easier then to take that same coverage, links, scanned copy, and go to the national newspapers.

We build this beautiful process where we go to local media, we get coverage there. We then take the concept to the national media and then we go to international media.

Journalists love the fact when another journalist endorses their story or cover their story. That’s a great process to go through when you want to build a social network.

Mark Bowness

One of the other key pillars of Thought Leader Mastery and it all beautifully ties into as we’ve talked about building your Movement Mission on your Facebook group, inviting people into that Mission, going out to create a media attention grabbing story, going out to the media.

Mark Bowness

One of the beautiful things I love is a pillar called Lead Legend. Utilizing the internet and Facebook, it’s about generating as many leads as possible.

I want your audience to think about what low level products they can create. A product might be an online course that costs $97.

It’s not about the amount of money or generating as much money as you possibly can. It’s about inviting people into a product funnel in a way that covers our marketing expenses to get as many leads as we possibly can.

I talked to different people and all they’re interested in is how many people on your database, what are then to you running, and how many leads do you have.

Mark Bowness

That database is the key. Focus on how you can build your database.

One of things that I do is create a low level product. I look for opportunities online. In my groups, sponsoring emails that go out to similar target audiences to generate sales for $97 product. Once somebody bought a product at the low level, it’s easy to sell them further into the product funnel.

I want your audience to think about how they can be creating as many leads as possible. So we do that through the Facebook group. We do that through the media and going out to the media and having people apply and feel the media attention grabbing story. We do that through creating opportunities to get as many leads as possible online.

All the time, you’re inviting people back to your Facebook group. You’re bringing the attention back to your Facebook group. No matter where people find you, they’re going back to the group. The attention and energy is in that group and people are going crazy. They love your work, thus they position you as a thought leader and all of a sudden, you see your business grow exponentially as a result.

Mark Bowness

Absolutely.

I’m sure a high number of your audience will be in that mindset of Facebook Page.

I want every single one of your audience members create a Facebook group. They can find me on Facebook. If they have questions about how to build a social network, I’d love to answer any questions they have and then create the opportunities for people to come back to your group and keep building your tribe.

Mark Bowness

I’m now looking at global events. As a result, I’ve positioned myself globally.

As a result of this stuff that I’m teaching you, I had Tony Robbins’ organization contact us because Tony Robbins love what we were doing, love what I’m doing. How can I get involved? How can I add value?

I’ve also talked with the Hay House, a traditional book publisher, with regards to publishing a book. All because they’ve seen what it is I’m growing and building in this movement of people that are so passionate about what I’m doing.

If you understand these principles on how to build a social network, then apply them to your business. I guarantee that you will see that exponential growth.

Mark Bowness

That’s just three aspects of the 6 Pillars of Thought Leader Mastery.

Mark Bowness

You’re not just a business owner. You’re not just a coach. You have lots of other businesses, different people with different styles of businesses. I want you to start in your mind; positioning yourself as a thought leader, acting like a thought leader, behaving like a thought leader, sharing information as a thought leader, growing in confidence in who you are and what you do.

You’re not simply trying to figure out business. In your own way, you’re trying to improve or change the world or add value to the world in some way.

Once you start acting as a thought leader and resonating at that level, the doors will open.

Mark Bowness

Thank you so much for having me and I look forward to being invited to all of Facebook groups of your listeners.