Why The Label ‘Professional’ Is Bunk – Cat Paz

So Crisp Podcast

Here’s the truth: we’re in business because we have a product or service that leads. We probably know more about that particular thing than 90% of the rest of the regular population, and 100% of our ideal clients or customers.

We. Are. Professional.

In our ideal clients and customers eyes, we are the experts.

We’re the bomb diggity.

So, when we get too worried that our brand sounds a little too much like a human voice, we backtrack and become an echo of someone else’s brand.

Which isn’t memorable.
Which isn’t enticing.
Which doesn’t convert.

And this was the brilliant conversation that started when Cat Paz invited me to come on her radio show to talk about About pages. Cat is from Kalahari Business Advisors and as an accountant and literacy educator, she’s probably held to one of the highest standards for this label.

“Professional.”

The Crisp Takeaways

* Yum *

“I often hear this word said in a negative way. Often it is on this lake business weaponry to get people to do what you want or simply fall in line for their own benefit but at the detriment of your own. 

When I have had the word professional said to me it is usually when I have not done something in a way that it is perceived to be done. I’ve rarely heard the word professional used when I have done a great thing! Normally people say thank you.

So, it got me wondering what professional means to me.”

3:17 – It really kills our creativity. It kills what’s unique about us, because we then don’t show up as ourselves. 

5:12 – I mean, when I was at uni, you know, you’d get guests coming in to talk about what they do as accountants, and they could tell they’d get the charismatic ones, because the rest were somewhere in a cave. And, and then, but they all wore the dark suits, the really tailored look. And I thought, this is what I want. 

8:02 – So you’re kind of walking in this road where you don’t believe in what they’re doing. You don’t believe in what they’re saying? You know, it’s a different set of values as well. And it’s like, but then how do you how do you survive that if you don’t honour yourself? And that’s what I was finding I was attracting clients that were not people I liked particularly.

This episode is brought to you by the Crisp Copy Class self-guided course – for women ready to write bank-making copy on a bootstrap friendly budget. 

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