I watched a Olivier Roland’s video  and I want to share this with you.

This is an interesting topic. How to sell information on internet (books or training) while being a beginner in the field ? This is cool, I’m a beginner !

It’s possible to do that by creating a website to give advice to people while being a beginner and staying ethics at one condition. This condition is to be at 2000% transparent. First, there are domain where it isn’t possible such as medicine or law. Some domain are protected, we must have the necessary diploma and that is normal. Apart from that, there are many domains where it is more free and unfortunately sometimes we see anything.

To understand the difference between an approach of beginner ethical and unethical, I will explain a real example and a fictional example.

Fictional example

This is a person who discovers that he can start a business on internet and he wants to have the blogger’s lifestyle. He decided to make a blog to explain to people how to make money on internet. The problem is that he never earn money on internet ! In his blog or in his YouTube channel, he’ll reuse information that already exists on internet but he never tested himself. He don’t use his own advise in his life. He doesn’t speak about his experience but about theories he has seen elsewhere.

Imagine that the website works. Now the only way for him to make money, is to explain to people how to make money with information based on theories. This is a big ethical problem because it makes a loop that closes on itself. It’s really not for a long term approach. It’s like having a blog about Kung Fu without winning Kung Fu competitions ?

Real example

Laurent Breillat of blog « apprendre la photo » ( in english: « learn the photography ») . Laurent Breillat is a photo enthusiast. At first, he went to chat with Olivier Roland because he wanted to make a blog about the photography but he knew nothing. He just had his new camera. Olivier Roland told him he could make a blog about the photography but the only condition is that he should not pretend to be the expert he is not.

Explain to your audience that you are a beginner like them and everybody will learn together to progress. This approach allows you to better help your audience because you’ll be much more connected to beginner’s problems compared to someone who has 20-30 years of experience and who doesn’t remember problems he had when he started. Laurent Breillat’s slogan for 6 years is : « Together and step by step » (sorry its slogan is protected).

You must understand that if you want to start in a field that is not protected by law, you must adopt this philosophy « Together, step by step ». Be transparent with your audience by saying that you are a beginner and build your expertise with the time.

It’s also the benefit, the approach with a blog. There are several ways to have a business on internet and with a blog, you don’t have the pressure of having to sell your first product immediately. You start slowly to build your audience, your community, your expertise and your credibility.

Create a blog takes time. It takes months, years to start making money with. But it’s cool to start as a beginner because there is a learning curve and you will develop your expertise much faster. Your brain will look for articles ideas and your community will challenge you by asking you questions or sharing problems. You’re going to structure your thoughts by creating content (articles, podcasts, videos), all that will accelerate your learning.

Laurent Breillat, today, has nothing to prove about his photography’s expertise. A publishing house contacted him to write a book because he build his credibility with his articles. All the world can see his articles. Now people invited hm in photography’s shows to make presentations and he’s paid for it.

So Laurent Breillat built his expert status with time and no one can claim that he doesn’t know of what he speaks.

This means that you can create your business on internet while being a beginner at the condition of being transparent and gradually building your skill, your audience.

How do you do to be transparent with your audience ?

-Steph