What if we told you that building your own personal brand equates to investing in an entirely different type of asset, with potentially life long payoffs?
Starting a business requires analytical thinking, determined organisation, and detailed record keeping if you have a hope in hell of lasting six months, let alone turning a profit. Once you’re established, keeping the show on the road is an entirely different battle, but can bring an enormous sense of pride and purpose to the day to day life of the business owner.
However, what happens to your position as an industry leader in the event that you sell the business, or for whatever reason, close up shop? Outside of your business, are you well known for your wealth of experience, thought leadership or even personality? If your answer is no, then it’s likely that you don’t have much in the way of a personal brand.
As a personal brand is a unique type of transferable asset that can stay with you during the course of your working life, it’s a good idea to start building one early – but what exactly is it, and where do you start when it comes to building one?
Unpacking The Concept Of A Personal Brand
In its simplest form, the idea of launching a personal brand is to help others in the most authentic way possible. Given that we live in the attention economy, many people are in need of valuable insights from others who have done the work themselves, but can easily spot a fraud or someone who’s in it for the wrong reasons.
Chances are, if you’ve spent a long time in a particular field, you’ve amassed a lot of knowledge. Effective personal branding not only harnesses that knowledge, but pair it with a unique point of view, an authentic personality, and a consistent content creation schedule that shares this knowledge with the world.
Love him or loathe him, one of the most iconic examples of a well executed personal brand is Tony Robbins. While he’s known for his unique take on financial self-help thanks to his prolific output of books, seminars, and other content, his personal brand is so effective because it’s him that thousands of people think of when they encounter this topic. Obviously, his charisma and sparkly set of pearlers haven’t hurt either.
On a grassroots scale, developing your own personal brand has the potential to generate more leads for your existing business, receive higher quality employment opportunities, grow their following on social media, and even become somewhat of an ‘influencer’ if that’s the end goal for the person in question – but where do you start?
Get To Know Yourself – While it’s okay to change as we grow older, the essence of good personal branding is showcasing the very core of yourself in a manner that showcases not just who you are, but what excites you, what you stand for and what you’re passionate about. In turn, this will help you to determine what you want to do with all of this information.
Define An Audience – If you want to become a thought leader within the hospitality industry, then it’s unlikely that long form blogs on your website about mining will really hit home with them. Instead, research the type of person you want to connect with, and use this to find the perfect platform to connect with them. For some, it’s a podcast, while for others, it’s LinkedIn.
Tell Engaging Stories – Keep in mind that a personal brand is not a resume, and audiences will not be interested in any content that doesn’t have your own personality infused with it. You’re the star of the show here, so when you’re creating content, try to craft narratives based on your own unique experiences that aren’t able to be found anywhere else.
Provide Real Value – Developing a personal brand to have your own soap box isn’t a good idea. While sharing your own experiences is a must, so too is providing a lesson, or valuable information that audiences can connect with and learn from. Reward their time with answers that they wouldn’t be able to find elsewhere, and don’t be afraid to ask questions.
Remain Consistent – It’s going to take longer than a month of posting on Instagram to develop your personal brand, so have patience, and above all, be consistent. Audiences need time to get to know you, but they also need a touch of equilibrium to know what to expect from you, especially if you’re trying to carve out a presence in a particular niche or industry.
If you’re trying to produce consistent, high quality content that’s both engaging and technically sound, some certainly find the process easier than others. Combining writing, graphics and back end metrics is no easy task, and it’s at this point that many budding entrepreneurs can come unstuck. Thankfully, outsourcing your content marketing needs has never been easier.
The Key To Good Marketing Is Great Content
Here at Content Hive, producing top quality digital content is exactly what we do best. We have itemised a list of digital content services, and allocated credits next to each of these. This means that each month, you can use your credits with us to produce digital content such as blog articles, social media posts, videos and even animated Instagram stories. By using this model, we believe that it enables us to produce high quality content with faster delivery times.
If you aren’t quite sure where to start on your digital marketing journey and would like to speak to a professional, why not book in a free discovery call with us at Content Hive today to discuss how we can get your brand buzzing online.
