You Don’t Have a Product Problem - You Have a People Problem

I’ve got this one friend who’s absolutely my business bestie.

Whenever we get together, we talk business (amongst other things) until we’re all talked out - it's great having somebody to swap wins with, share rants and the occasional “what the hell are we even doing?” moment with.

One thing we talk about everytime we get together is how much we both detest the clickbait promises clogging up our online worlds:

You know the ones…

“Follow these 3 easy steps to make £10,000 overnight.”
“How I hit six figures doing these 2 things.”
“Build a course and become a millionaire!”

We’ve all seen them.

Here’s what winds me up most: they all leave out one very important detail - an audience.

Because yes, it’s easy to build a course and make £10,000 overnight if you already have thousands of engaged followers waiting to buy.

But for everyone else? The hardest part is building the audience in the first place.

It’s so rarely a case of “build it and they will come.”
As lovely as that sounds, most people build something brilliant… and hear crickets.

So if you’ve got a great product but no sales, the first step is asking whether you have a people problem or a product problem.

Spoiler: it’s usually the people.

Building an audience feels hard because it is hard.

It’s slow. It’s not instant. And it takes consistency and vulnerability - two things most of us weren’t exactly raised for.

If you were born before 2000, putting yourself “out there” can feel terrifying, embarassing and wholeheartedly unnatural.

And if you’re anything like me, you’re probably a chronic lurker - you consume everything, nod along silently then vanish without a trace.

The problem is that the creators you follow make it look easy. You see the “overnight success” stories, not the years of groundwork. So you assume you’re failing when really, you’re just in the middle bit. You're in the hard.

Showing up when it seems like nobody is listening feels awkward and like a waste of our time which is limited as it is. That's why lots of people get stuck in a rut of constantly tweaking their offer, hoping and wishing the answer to their problem lies in their checkout page.

The truth is, building an audience isn’t the side mission, it’s the main quest. It’s what turns your ideas into income.

And whilst we're at it, it's time to redefine what 'success' looks like because

It's so important that we also redefine what success looks like because being online can make us think we have to achieve ridiculous feats to be successful but actually, having 100 people who are engaged and ideal candidates for your product is always going to be far better than having 1000 people who are not.

How to actually start building your audience:

• Make content with a purpose. Every post, email or story should educate, inspire or make someone feel something.

• Talk about your ideas before they’re ready. The messy middle is relatable.

• Share behind-the-scenes. People buy into people.

• Engage with the humans engaging with you. Comment, reply, start actual conversations.

• Pick one platform and go all in. You don’t need to be everywhere, you just need to be consistent somewhere.

Growth takes time, especially if you’re new to being visible online and still finding your groove. Most people give up just before things start to click. That’s the sad truth.

The good news is, if you put in the work now, your future self will thank you. You're laying the groundwork. When you've built trust with your audience, selling stops feeling like selling.

If you take one thing from this: grow the audience first.

Because you can build the most beautiful offer in the world but if no one’s listening, it’ll just sit there collecting digital dust.