Do you know who you are and what you stand for?
(I hope the answer was yes, even if you hesitated and had to think about it.)
But the real question is…does anyone else?
They better!
Think of the web as a giant grocery store.
Which aisle is yours? What shelf? What makes you stand out? Make sure your “packaging” clearly communicates your value to attract like-minded people by answering one question in seconds…
Why they would spend their valuable time and resources on YOU?
The door is closing on people who are not authentic, who lack integrity and who simply are uncomfortable with the concept of transparency. The effort to stand out, to be heard, and to be unique is more difficult than ever.
Personal Branding Has Exploded
Are you an original thinker?
Is your voice unique?
Do you have the right words at the right time to solve your readers problems?
The web has leveled the playing field for individuals just like you!
Maybe you don’t know who you are yet. Or perhaps you don’t like who you’ve been and are ready to reposition yourself and break out into a new direction—that’s awesome—clap, clap I cheer for you!
8 Simple Branding Rules
If you can apply these 8 simple branding rules, you will quietly declare to the world, “Hello, this is me, and this is what I care about. I shine because I do this one thing better than anyone.”
(If that makes you uncomfortable, you must ask yourself this -If you don’t believe you are the best, why should anyone else?)
#1 Build Your Brand Authority By Having Integrity To Build Credibility
No matter what, always say what you do and do what you say. Never be someone you aren’t. Most important, make sure your commitment of time and resources is sustainable.
If you begin building your brand by answering every email, responding to each comment and never leaving a single tweet unanswered, that’s great. But know you will need to scale your time as you scale your community.
# 2 Build Your Brand Affinity By Always Showing People You Care
If you don’t care about them, why should they care about you?
A big divide exists among the “gurus” about returning follows with a follow on Twitter, who to accept as friends and just how much you give vs. what you get.
I believe if someone takes the time to ask me an intelligent question, make a compelling comment on my blog, or reach out via any platform with a genuine interest in my mission, I help them the best way I can.
However, this happens to be who I am.
I know plenty of bloggers who still manage to rock, even though they’re introverted in their communication style or even incredibly private. That’s okay; be who you are, but be caring in all that you do, no matter how you do it.
#3 Build Your Brand Reach Through Collaboration & Engagement
Be collaborative and helpful with the content you create and make it easy to receive and share. Reward the people who are interested in what you do by engaging with them, even when nothing’s in it for you.
Don’t just show up when you release a book, or need help. Help them first, with no expectations—when nothing’s in it for you (no agenda), you’ll reap the benefits of reciprocity in no time.
Jonathan Fields, blogger and author of Career Renegade, recently told me, in an interview regarding his successful yoga business in NY, he was surprised by the number of people who crawled out of the woodwork for help or a job, yet had never done anything to contribute to the system he worked hard to build.
The people Jonathan felt most loyal to were those who showed up in the beginning, taught free classes, participated in other classes, and added value to his community—he almost felt obligated to help these people.
#4 Building Your Brand Identity Through Context To Build Credibility
Context is relevancy. Understand what is important to your community and solve their problems before they even ask for solutions. By being thought-provoking and making them think about concepts they haven’t considered, you are positioning yourself as a meaningful resource to your audience.
#5 Consistency Is Key To Successful Brand Promotion
Popularity is vanity. Results and sales are sanity. It’s up to you to decide how crazy you can afford to be.
If you want people talking about you, they must be thinking about you. It’s an organic process, not a pay-per-click campaign. Think of yourself as getting to page one in their minds the same way you work to get Google to put you in that spot on their search results.
Consistency is your secret weapon to long-term success.
Create your editorial calendar and pick the social media hot spots you can devote your efforts toward. Depending on your audience, this could be Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube, forums, other blogs…it’s up to you. The web is your oyster!
(Warning: If you try to do them all, I can promise you’ll water down your results and yourself.)
#6 Your Brand Experience Must Wow Them Enough To Keep Them Coming Back For More
Are you funny? Poignant? A contrarian? Switzerland?
It doesn’t matter what you are, as long as you know who you are, but be smart when choosing how to present yourself—and always be compelling.
I know a man who is one of the best writers I’ve ever met. But I also know other writers who are pretty darn close, and it comes down to personal taste, which means it’s harder to get noticed.
He’s an exceptional artist. And he’s funny. LMAO funny.
Upon my suggestion, he started tying his unique ability to illustrate his ideas to his words with a dry, wit-filed voice—and began to gain real traction.
You can too!
If you are good in front of the camera, do a video blog. If you are good with graphics, become great at telling stories through infographics (90% of the world are visual learners).
If you can tell a story better than anyone, do that to make your point!
Give them something, anything, they can’t get anywhere else. And even if they can, make sure they’d rather get it from YOU first.
#7 Brand Promise Is All About Clarifying What You Stand For
Never, ever, for any reason, break your promise.
Ever.
Think of Domino’s promise when they started. Did they claim to have the best pizza or price? No. They focused on a quantifiable service.
Domino’s promised to get your pizza to you in 30 minutes or less or it was free.
Which do you think was the real brand promise?
Think about it; if you were counting your pizza to arrive in 30 minutes, and it took an hour, causing you to be late for your son’s basketball game, does getting your money back mitigate the fact they broke their promise to arrive in 30 minutes?
So even though the promise of getting the money back is enticing, the real hook was the value of getting your pizza on time, every time.
#8 Defining What You Don’t Do Is Critical For Proper Brand Positioning
The smaller your budget, the more important it is to focus. Like most entrepreneurs I’ve never seen an opportunity I didn’t like. And while many looked “affordable” on paper, the intrinsic value of time and the opportunity cost of happiness must factor into every decision.
Try this simple exercise. Take a sheet of paper and create 3 columns as follows:
Want To Do Will Not Do Willing To Give
Now make a short list of what you wish to accomplish. Identify what you’d love to do. Do the same with the “will not do” column.
Did you notice that the will not do seemed easier once you thought about it?
Statements like, “I don’t want to be an employee,” or, “I don’t want to work more than 30 hours a week,” come easily to most.
Now carefully list what you would be willing to trade (i.e. sacrifice) in order to get what you want.
For example, if you needed 10 more hours this week to complete a project, where would it come from? Will you write less? Abandon the gym? Will you toss “date night” to the curb?
Without this 3rd column, you end up trading from your “will not do” column, which many times is the reason you wake up one day feeling like you sold your soul to the devil.
Once you have applied these 8 rules of branding, you can connect the dots and say exactly who you are, what you stand for, what you do and don’t do—and what you promise as a benefit for the value you deliver in 3 minutes or less. It’s your “elevator pitch” and your differentiator to build your brand BIG enough to be a “crowd-burster.”™
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