Become LEGENDARY: 4 Tips to Build a Legacy and Share It With The World!

 Become LEGENDARY: 4 Tips to Build a Legacy and Share It With The World!

"I want to reach my potential, impact my world and leave a legacy" Seth Buechley

Becoming legendary has everything to do with building a legacy, not leaving one.

Although many of us want to leave a legacy, Daniel Budzinski, The Dreamcast Podcast, reminds us that we do not need to die to leave a legacy, we build it while we are alive! Budzinski continues by stating the legacy comes by building a team  and giving them strategies and resources to be successful. The important thing to remember is "Don't talk about it, BE about it!" Build your legacy to help not just yourself but many people you come in contact with throughout your life. That's what becoming legendary is all about. 

There are a variety of tips to build a legacy, however I will share four of the most important tips I have discovered in over 40 years of being an entrepreneur. The four tips are develop a team who are loyal and support your vision for your business; be consistent in your mission for you business and keep it at the forefront of your business plan; provide the tools and resources to your team to help them carry out your vision and mission; be strategic in the developing your team to market and promote yourself and your business in all arenas!

Develop Your Team

Develop a team who is loyal and support your vision is no small fete. As a small business owner since I was  18 years old, this has been one of my greatest challenges. I went on hiatus several times with my nonprofit, Essence of a Lady, Inc, because I felt the team I had did not support my vision. As I reflected on the challenges, it reminded me of Ian Prukner, a very successful financial service agent, who stated, "loyalty is earned, not given and people give their best when they are appreciated." This is very important to remember, people will not just give you loyalty, you must earn it. Your actions, not your words, will allow people to become loyal to you. People show loyalty through their actions also. After participating in a webinar on nonprofit funding, I realized leadership began from the top and the board had to set the example.   Now, our board shows their level of commitment through their fiduciary actions. Each board member commits to an annual donation and certain number of volunteer hours each year. As we continue to restructure during the pandemic, I am strategic about the board members invited to support Essence of a Lady, Inc. One of my favorite slogans is "TEAMWORK makes the dream work!"

Be Consistent About Your Mission

In order for the world to know your mission, you must live it. Consistency is the key! For over 25 years, I did not understand how important consistency was to success. Sure, I had a mission, but I was not living it, therefore I was not effectively sharing the mission with the world. Everyone could see my passion about supporting women who supported girls but one day, I had an epiphany. I realized my team, myself and the world was not clear about Essence of a Lady's purpose, vision and mission. Parents thought the program, Young Essence Ladies...Learning (YELL!) was the business and Business associates and other nonprofits thought Essence Ladies (E'Ladies Network) was the business, not a program. I began to re-brand the organization about five years ago. I made sure everyone, from the board of directors, down to the parents and youth we support knew the name of the nonprofit was Essence of a Lady and the mission to educate, mentor and empower youth through the philanthropy of adults was clear and concise. All the speaking engagements, etc included or name, mission and vision. I rewrote the business plan to clearly state our mission. It has made all the difference. Now, people know our name and our mission.

Brand Your Business Through Your Target Audience

Branding your business requires all information about it to be labeled for clear understanding. It's about longevity and consistency. Your team must have all the tools and resources available to ensure they share the mission with the world. Red Bull and 5 Hour Energy are perfect examples of successful branding, although they took different approaches. Red Bull research the best place to market their brand in 2009. They met with NASCAR promotion and decided to sponsor a sports car driver although they were fore warned it may take some time before they saw results. Red Bull owner took the leap of faith and today they are known around the world because several of the cars they sponsored won races. 5 Hour Energy did not have the money that Red Bull had so they went directly to the skateboard industry and gave it away to skateboarders. The key to both products' success was their consistency of branding their product with a certain market for the long term. The same is true with nonprofits. For over 30 years, we have targeted schools and community organizations to recruit youth to provide mentoring programming and recruited professional and entrepreneurial adults to provide philanthropic (time, talent and treasure) support. After over 32 years, the partnerships established with these groups allows us to continue the mission of Essence of a Lady because of lifelong relationship and name recognition. 

Be Strategic in Marketing and Promotion

Talent, experience and expertise allows you to become an expert in your business genre or industry but strategic marketing and promotions helps get you in front of the right audience to build a business successfully. With the world wide web and social media domination, advertising has required us to make a paradigm shift to stay relevant. I had to learn how to use each social media platform by learning how each could be used effectively based on its purpose. LinkedIn is for professionals and it is content driven. Facebook is the most popular social media platform which allows you to establish groups for direct marketing and promotion opportunities but still connect with friends and family socially. Instagram is photo-centered, however many people have built successful businesses with consistent posts and promotions. Twitter is popular among stars and famous people. Clubhouse is a disruptive social media platform where audio is used to create rooms where people from all walks of life are developing audiences to share information, then move them to other social media to build a customer base. The key is to figure out which social media platform works best for you based on your purpose of marketing and promotion of your products or service. Whatever social media, digital marketing, or print marketing you use for your business, consistency is still the key to build a loyal following. Essence of a Lady has been at the fore front of marketing and promotion for over 20 years. 

Now, after providing businesses a platform to market their products and services to the parents, youths and business owners within our network of support, we are re-launching our Females are Fabulous Media, Marketing and Magazine division of Essence of a Lady, Inc. Our goal is to help women become legendary by leveraging their business globally. We know that when you know how to develop your team, be consistent in promoting your mission, brand your product or service to the targeted audience and are strategic in marketing and promoting your business, you experience unparalleled success and leverage your business, which means you build a legacy and ultimately become LEGENDARY!! 

For more information  on how you can share your wisdom on our Females are Fabulous platform, go to www.eladies.org and become a philanthropist; then www.femalesarefabulous.com to share your story of success with the world.

Dr. JoAnn Ajayi-Scott is a professor who provide instruction for graduate students in writing and public speaking, publisher of blogs and magazines, and philanthropist to nonprofits and community organizations. Her ultimate goal is to create a community of entrepreneurs providing products and services to other women in one place. You may reach her at www.joannajayiscott.com.