By John Turner, the founder of SeedProd, the most popular coming-soon page solution for WordPress used by over 800,000 websites.
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When a new business owner launches their first website, they don’t think about personal branding. The thought process most people have is: “People aren’t interested in me; they like my product.” While it’s true that consumers may like your product, that doesn’t mean you won’t benefit from building a personal brand.
Personal branding is the process of building an online presence around a person instead of a company. Business leaders across all industries use their brand identities to connect with other experts, find new work and act as social influencers.
If you’re interested in creating a personal brand to advance your career, stick around. Today, my goal is to show you several steps you can take to grow your personal brand and put yourself in a more advantageous spot as a professional.
Let’s get started!
1. Get to know your audience.
The first thing you should do is figure out who you want to be as a brand. For example, do you want people to know you as an email marketing guru? Understand what you want to do with your personal brand before getting to know your target audience.
Much like businesses, personal brands have unique audiences. If people turn to you for email marketing advice, you can assume that your target audience consists of new business owners looking to secure their first leads.
When you take the time to understand the people you want to reach, you’ll have a much easier time creating compelling content and offers. The best way to grow your personal brand is to build rapport with your visitors. This step is much easier to accomplish when you know the goals and pain points of your audience.
I suggest developing customer personas that identify the various segments of your audience. You can use this data to create content that’s designed to appeal to specific segments.
2. Amplify your social media presence.
Social media plays a significant role in getting to know your target audience. However, there’s much more to developing a successful social media marketing strategy for your brand than customer research.
If you want to show the community that you’re an expert, you have to be there to answer questions. One way to amplify your presence is with live video events. You can host a livestream every couple of weeks where you talk to your subscribers and answer questions.
You’ll find that these events encourage potential customers and clients to get involved with your content. Before long, you’ll start to build connections with other high-profile experts in the industry. Once you have the option to partner with other big names, you can expect to see your personal brand growth skyrocket.
Social media is also an excellent place to grow your audience by hosting games and giveaways. My brand has expanded its channels exponentially by hosting giveaways offering popular products and software. Remember to create a rule that asks participants to share for a chance to enter, and you could see your followers double overnight.
3. Create a website.
While you’re growing your social media channels, I suggest creating a website. Your followers will eventually want to learn more about your personal brand. If they don’t have a website to turn to, you may miss out on potential business opportunities.
You don’t have to build a complex website, either. It’s possible to grow your personal brand with a few basic pages. You’ll want to include a contact page so people can reach you if they have questions about your brand or the work that you do.
I also recommend creating a blog so you can start generating leads and publishing helpful community content. You can build your reputation by creating highly engaging blog posts that address the pain points and goals you discovered about your audience. You can take your published posts and share them on social media for even more engagement.
4. Diversify your marketing channels.
Finally, you should expand your marketing channels if you want to grow your personal brand. Social media channels and your website will help build traction, but you need a way to consistently connect with prospects.
Email marketing is one of the oldest and most effective digital marketing strategies. You can easily create segmented campaigns that allow you to build trust with your audience. This strategy can help you find consumers that are genuinely interested in what you’re offering.
I’ve also had tremendous success with push notifications. Visitors that want to see when I publish new content will gladly subscribe to alerts. As a result, I’m able to connect with people who may have otherwise left without engaging with my personal brand.
There are plenty of other marketing strategies to choose from. Over time, you’ll start to discover where your audience spends their time. Use what you learn to grow your lead lists and continue growing your personal brand.
