Before you go on, here's a short gist for you. I had planned out this article since the beginning of this week, but it just seemed like all the forces were against me. From falling sick, to not having light. My generator didn’t respond as well. At some point, I almost gave up. However, you mean so much to me, and I value our relationship. Therefore, I had to show up for us.
"God when?" That's the song of most young people right now. Can you relate? The major desire is to become well known and rich. Some go even further to say this in their quest for the right life partner. Did you watched the speech Neo made for Vee last night? God When?! Most of us are more concerned about making the next viral tweet or video, than any other thing right now. Perhaps, we could take it further to say that some want people to know them for what they are best at. I am not judging. These desires are real and legitimately intricate to our very existence.
However, many young and vibrant youths seem to be frustrated and not making heads way at the task. This piece is specifically about making money from your talent, and how you could be doing it wrong by relying totally on your talent to become rich and well known. Surprisingly, many people fall into this category. You can tell, when you have conversations with such people and ask them why they haven't made it. You hear stuff like "I don't know how to do anything", "My skill sets aren't appreciated" or "It's not possible to make money from what I love to do." First, anything can be monetized if you can find a market for that product or skill. But you shouldn't go ahead to find a market when there are already existing hungry markets. To make money, give them what they want. Anyone you want though.
Like I said earlier, you could be doing it wrong by totally relying on your talent. Think of your talent as capital, as in capital for business or investment. Just like capital, I believe your talent is for the starting point. It gives you leverage and helps you know the skills you need to acquire to make a unique product. For example, let's say your talent is singing, that is the starting point. You practice to become better, then learn how to brand yourself and connect with your own fans with your unique message and style. All these things don't come with the talent of singing, you develop them, but you know what skills to focus on to leverage on that specific talent.
Let me paint a picture with myself. I always had the talent of persuasion. I could talk people into believing or doing things that I wanted them to do. Not on a grand scale though. My first ever encounter with a material that improved this skill was when I bought and read "How to win friends and influence people" by Dale Carnegie. It remains my best book till date. I had the talent, yet I didn't know how to monetize or develop it. I roamed on the streets of online courses, looking for what to do because I didn't think my almost manipulative talent could be monetized.
After a long list of online courses, I finally had a conversation with someone who helped me understand how to start from what I had. I pinpointed a couple of skills that could help me improve on the art of persuasion, and I decided to learn them (not at once) to build a full package. So I started with writing because I wanted to learn how to communicate better. After that, I learnt content creation. Both skills landed me a contract from which I earn money and finance my next level of learning process… sales and copy-writing.
I love how Joseph Don puts it,
"The money is not in your skill or talent, it is in the selling of that skill or talent that you have."
Basically saying that you won't make money from that talent, but from selling yourself as the best person with that talent. And as you know, you need to package it before you sell. Except your talent is 'garri'.
Identify the skill sets that will improve the talents you have. These skill sets, mixed with your raw talent, and the ability to sell, will make you more money than you can imagine.
Here is another perspective. Your talent is a cob of corn. Of course it isn't, but you get right? Stay with me. You can decide to boil it or roast it to eat. But it won't give you as much satisfaction as planting the seeds on that cob. Planting it will give you more cobs to eat from and also plant in greater quantity. Yes. That's your talent. It is your leverage to greater accomplishments, not what will make you arrive immediately.
Relying on your talent alone will leave you frustrated. Don’t get me wrong. There are people that have gotten worldwide recognition from their talents. But after the recognition, you can’t keep relying on the talent alone. Acquire what I call complementary skills. Even the ones you are referring to, they didn’t rely on just the raw talent. At the very least, they mastered it through practice, and developed it into a sell-able content. Or is it every human that can sing and tries to make it in the music industry that eventually makes it or lasts long? Think about it.
Are you stuck right now because you do not know the next step to take? Or are you frustrated because the things you have tried out didn't work? Or you simply want to get connected with the right people that you can learn from and start earning money or developing yourself. Click this link to my WhatsApp or send me a DM on Twitter. @EniolaOriolowo. Let's have a conversation and move you to the next step in your journey to success.
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