What is a personal brand and how brand yourself?
Imagine the room is filled with 100 entrepreneurs with a company exactly like yours. What would make you different?
You.
No one in the whole world thinks the same way you do, has the same dreams, goals, skills, and interests as you.
In this post, we'll cover...
➜ What is a personal brand
➜ What is the difference between personal and expert brand
➜ Why you should start a personal or expert brand
➜ How to get started with your personal brand
What is a personal brand?
Everyone has a personal brand. Your co-workers, stakeholders, and loved ones have a picture of you as a professional.
A personal brand could be defined as what people remember or say about you when you leave a room. The way you look, smell, feel, and communicate with people is building your personal brand.
Like it or not, people always have a picture of you.
Personal brand vs. expert brand
A personal brand tends to represent more things than an expert brand. At the very best, personal branding is good content marketing. It isn’t perceived as pushy or even marketing. For example, public figures or influencers.
The expert brand focuses on one theme. You are known for your knowledge and expertise in a subject area. For example, a photographer who specializes in photography in the dark.
Why brand yourself?
Building an expert or personal brand means choosing some of the topics that interest you. You will discuss these themes with your network. The network knows you as a professional in your field and will turn to you for that.
It is about showcasing one's own strengths and branding one's own professional skills. The impact of a personal brand is stronger than corporate brands. Why? People are interested in people. Consumers are tired of "perfection". They want to see the people behind the scenes. They want to feel a connection and relate to someone.
How is a personal brand created?
A personal brand is built when you share your own knowledge, views, experience, and thoughts with your audience.
Expertise comes from producing or passing on information and ideas that interest you. The topics are important to you, and that you believe are important and even helpful to others.
You can share articles, speeches, opinions, or materials produced by someone else. You tell your network what you think is important in your area of expertise.
At its simplest, personal branding is about sharing useful information about your area of expertise.
Besides conveying information, you can highlight your views based on your own experience. Or form an overview of a current topic, or even comment on a public debate. It builds an image of you as an expert and thus strengthens your expert brand.
Why should I build a personal brand?
Even the best expert will lose to the mediocre if he leaves no trace of himself.
These days customers, partners, employers, and employees are found online.
You may find yourself in a position such that you never have to look for a job or new clients. The job opportunities will find you.
According to the survey, 82% of consumers trust a company more if the company’s CEO and management team are active on social media. 77% would be more likely to buy from such a company. (CMO Guide to LinkedIn)
How to get started?
Be yourself
A successful personal brand can only be built around a real person. A personal brand is not a new identity. It’s extremely hard to maintain a backdrop for a person who doesn’t feel like their own. People recognize fake very quickly - the fake personal brands will never succeed.
To appear the same way in a physical encounter, we have to be genuine ourselves.
--> Take a personality test and get to know your personality type
Bring out the strengths
Highlight your own strengths and knowledge. We all have strengths and weaknesses.
--> Write down your 5 strengths, 3 things you would like to work on
Tell stories
Personal branding is also part of the so-called everyday life of ordinary people - wanted it or not. Many are sure to wonder if their own personality is interesting enough. Stop comparing yourself to the most well-known personal brands. What makes you special is you and your story. No one has the same thoughts as you.
Why do reality series do so well? In recent years have shown that people are interested in the stories of others. People care about ordinary people. They are more relatable and transparent than celebrities standing in front of their Lamborghinis.
--> Determine your why
How did you become an entrepreneur? Your story makes you unique.
Choose your own channel and show up
The internet today offers countless different opportunities for creating a personal brand.
You can create your own profile on social media or use blog posts to bring out the features you want. Everyone should choose the most natural channel for branding.
--> What is the most natural way for you to express yourself? Video, text, images?
Brand your profile
To make it easy to identify you in your channels, use the same profile and background images. This helps your audience recognize you and creating a finished image
Link the channels to each other and encourage people to peek into your other profiles too.
Determine the tone of voice
Digital communication always lacks sign language. Thus communication needs to be considered with particular care.
Think about which conversations you want to join and what kind of conversation you want to become known for.
Set goals
What do you want to achieve? Achievements can be leads, a wider network, getting customers, building authority and social influence
Select one or more social media you work on. Share articles, videos, thoughts, ideas, or research results from interesting speakers in the media of your choice. Comment on any material or thoughts you share.
Share your own thoughts, ideas, opinions, self-written stories, or blog posts. Or any materials you create, photos you take, or videos you take in your own media.
--> Think about your goals. Select 1-3 topics for which you want to profile as an expert.
Leave a comment if you would like to build a personal brand or you have branded yourself!
Cheers,
