You probably heard it before: “ if you want to reach them – teach them”.

One of the best ways to attract clients to you (instead of chasing them around and paying tons of money for inefficient commercials)  is to gain their trust and admiration. When you become a teacher, and expert, someone they can rely on to guide them through the maze of choices they face – someone they trust.

You will gain not only their respect but their loyalty as clients. They will choose you above your competition because they feel that you are the best address to buy from.

It might sound difficult to achieve, but with a little work and some simple actions you can become the next expert in your niche and save yourself a lot of money and trouble by attracting exactly the kind of clients you always wanted to have.

The key is, to position yourself as an expert in your niche. Doesn’t matter if it’s travel, retail , insurance or any service or goods you might want to offer.

In the old days of offline marketing you would probably go about it by giving a lecture, give away a book you wrote, do one on one consults with clients. While these old methods still work, they are more expensive and time demanding than doing it over the internet.

The goal is to teach your clients why they should buy, how they should buy and how to avoid making mistakes while making a decision to buy.

In the Internet and social media age, it’s becoming easier and easier. Here are some ideas on how you can do it online, simply and for free:

  1. Write a helpful article and submit it to multiple “article directories” – websites that collect articles and allow people to use them for their own websites or newsletters (with a link back to you, as the author!)
  2. Write an ebook and offer it for free
  3. Write a blog (it could be your own blog or as a guest writer in someone els’s blog)
  4. Record a helpful video and upload it to your website or to other video websites like youtube
  5. Record a podcast: an audio or video recording that people can download to their mp3 player or computer and take it with them wherever they go. You can upload your recorded content to website like iTunes or to your own website.
  6. Host an online radio show: no… you don’t have to be a “real” radio host. These days anyone can be a radio or a tv host online. Check out websites like www.blogtalkradio.com , http://www.livestream.com/, www.ustream.com
  7. Host a question- answer sessions online through a forum (find a forum where your customers hang out)
  8. Host a webinar – it’s the online version of a seminar or lesson. You can do it either with live video or let the participants see your computer screen where you wither explain something or show them a presentation. You can also make it interactive and allow them to ask you questions, answer polls or allow them to chat to one another. check these sites out: www.gotowebinar.com , www.talkfusion.com
  9. Join the conversation: through out the internet people are asking questions that you might be able to answer and contribute to the dicussion on your area of expertese. People ask questions in forums, tweeter, facebook, and many other social media sites. Look for the sites that most apeal to you and have the most activity and just join in.

For all of those ideas there is one golden rule: pay it forward. Give your clients something valuable, teach them something, help them out. The more you do it, the better.

Please share with us more ideas you have on information marketing.