Saturday Discussion - Being "The Free Advice Guy"

Whatever your niche, in time, your community of readers will start to make contact with you through other means, most usually email.

Image: FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Many of those emails will be asking for advice or opinion, as you have carefully established yourself as an authority in your market place.

At first, it's a wonderful feeling, to have been sought out by someone purely based on your reputation. But then the number and frequency increases, and as much as you want to help everyone who reaches out, the whole process can turn into a huge time thief.

I'm still at the stage where I diligently answer every question, but on one day last week I ended up writing 27 emails to 6 separate people, as some came back with more questions, all basically dispensing free advice. Even at just three minutes per email, that was an hour and a half of my time used up. And that night I had a 1AM finish, so I could get "my" work done.

I can cope now, but I can see a time when I won't be able to. But I don't ever want to be the guy readers can't reach out to for help, or someone who has barriers to contact, or "Executive assistants" to take on that role.

This is an issue we will all face one day, so this discussion is about how we can cope.

I'm interested in some strategies and ideas to deal with this situation. What can we do?