It’s an intentional effort to promote what you stand for as an individual and the values that differentiate you, all with the aim of building connections with like-minded people and potential customers.
You can showcase your personality, skills, experience, and behaviour — plenty of things that your ideal customer can relate to or find a more niche connection with you.
Of course, your company branding and marketing are important but personal branding is just another branch on the tree to attract more people to your inbox. It is a great way of personalising your company. And it also doesn’t have to be so hard!
In this insight we will cover, why personal branding is so important, how to start; and ‘what is founder-led marketing?’.
A few things we have learned from personal branding are:
- It’s not just about selling hard
- You don’t need to spend hours searching for algorithms — your content should resonate with the right people
- You don’t always have to change your messaging or personality for LinkedIn
- You don’t just have to share your company news — you’re a real person, share some personal stories to help your audience get to know YOU better
- Personal branding is all about storytelling
- Consistency is important
- You may not get immediate growth: it’s a journey
Why is it important?
As a business you want to be attracting your ideal clients, right? Every company will have target audiences and people they like working with. By developing a personal brand and conveying your personality and values, you will resonate with like-minded people who share these values.
These could be people to network with or potential clients. People who will support you and your company is the main goal. This again doesn’t just have to be buying from you but resharing your content and engaging with you, increasing your reach. We call these our ‘ambassadors’ – our crew that will actively engage with your content.
When people see your content or are researching your products or services, they will be considering: ‘Is this a person I can depend on, and could we work well together?’
By demonstrating your credibility and honesty, this can tighten the process, build trust, and ultimately push them to think ‘I want to work with this person!’ The mastery that is person-to-person marketing.
Sharing your industry knowledge can also be a great way to build trust with potential clients.
Before buying into something, people want to know they are in the best hands. Business is competitive.
So what’s their take on industry issues? Are they active in their market? This shows your dedication.
Personal branding is ultimately creating authenticity. People like to talk to people. Be yourself.
How to start:
LinkedIn is one of the most popular social channels used for businesses and personal branding.
Start by creating an account and completing a full profile. This includes a profile picture, headlines, and a summary about yourself. A strong positioning statement is also a great way to keep consistency throughout your messaging and personal brand.
Think of this as almost a value proposition for yourself. Define your goals. What is your focus on your personal branding?
A consistent posting schedule is very important. This doesn’t mean you have to post every day and spend hours and hours on content creation. You can start your personal branding from scratch and it will take time, if you want to build this, you will need to ensure you are active regularly.
2 times a week is a great start, and you can build it from here once you gain your confidence. As you progress through your journey you could break your schedule down into content types.
For example, resharing something once a week, a company update, a story from your week, or something you have learned.
Another great thing about a schedule is that you can also schedule content to post automatically. This means you can spend time crafting your content then using LinkedIn or another platform, input your content, set a date and time, and not spend hours every day posting content.
If you are struggling to fit this in your already busy business calendar, set apart 30 minutes a day. Spend this time either on social channels, engaging with people, creating content or just crafting some ideas.
Jot down a note of any ideas anytime. There shouldn’t be pressure to come up with something on the spot just because you have to post.
Post a mixture of content. Long, or short text. Photos and videos or reshared, user-generated content.
Be ready to fail. Failure is tough and of course, all of us want to avoid it!
Timothy Hoang develops influencer clients and likes to tell them: “You’ll never achieve the best branding until you fail a couple of times while pushing past your comfort zone.”
Not everything you post will always connect with everybody. Thus just demonstrates you are genuine in your own insights!
Follow successful examples and be active in engaging with people you connect with. Personal branding doesn’t just mean posting all the time. Comment and reshare other people’s content that you resonate with too- networking increases your reach as well.
What is founder-led marketing?
Quite literally: ‘a strategy in which the founder of the company is actively involved in the marketing process’.
This is a massive part of personal branding. Of course, it’s important for employees to build their personal brand — however, with the founder sharing their personal journey this builds credibility and trust, which could lead to faster decision-making.
Founders actively engaging with their customers through various channels such as social media, email newsletters, and live events, encourages a sense of community and loyalty that is really important in marketing.
Founders will generally have an existing and growing audience so it is really important to promote their business on their platforms too, not just your company platform.
Conclusion
It is never too late to start with your personal branding journey. The more you show off your personal brand the more you’ll give people a way to remember you.
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