What is a personal brand?
A personal brand is a person’s voluntary efforts in letting people know what they should be known for in a systematic manner through proper channels, consistently.
Online space is a great place to see various personal brands that people build.
Especially on social media, websites, etc, people post consistent content and attract an audience with their content.
A personal brand mostly has a person at the front who influences the crowd for various objectives.
Why is it important?
Personal brands become stronger and stronger day by day because of the human present in it.
The interaction is high when people see a human’s face versus a text or animation because of many reasons, one being human psychology.
People connect with people more with face to face interaction than with other forms of communication.
This is one of the reasons why personal branding automatically positions itself as an influencing authority because of the nature of human psychology.
If you run a business, it gets very easy to have a personal brand and promote your products versus not having a personal brand promoting your products.
You need to create strategic content for your personal brand and the rewards will be huge when you give enough time.
You will be spending less on marketing when you’re promoting your products, because of the posted content and accumulated followers all these days, say, on a social media platform.
Personal brands make business easy. It establishes you as an authority in your target field and helps you get clients and customers more easily when compared to a company which does not have a personal brand.
How to build a personal brand
- Find the right medium of communication that fits best to you. Nowadays online mediums are popular and easy to get in. So either its organic content on search engines or social media content, be clear in selecting your platforms.
- Post content consistently. Whether it’s audio, pictures, written posts, or video, be consistent in posting your content. Keep your audience updated on what’s going on with you and your business.
- Build a community. Provide value on all posts as much as possible. Interact with your community through comments, messages, and providing free content. Over time, you build trust and reputation which accelerates your business to new heights.
- Market it well: Personal brands at the end of the day are businesses or with an objective either personal or business related or for a cause. So marketing it well to the right audience through paid advertisement is important for someone who is seeking to build a personal brand.
Pros and Cons
Pros
- Fame: People recognize you and you get famous through the content production. People and businesses reach out to you for various collaborative purposes thus making you known to more people.
- Less marketing spend: You gradually spend less on marketing because your personal brand drives most of the sales.
- New project opportunities: People reach out to you for getting their project done because they see you as a trustworthy person and an expert in the respective field.
Cons
- Showing Up: You need to consistently show up often for people to not forget you. Posting content regularly online is one of the best ways to keep showing up for your audience so that they know you are active in the community/niche.
- Privacy: If you’re concerned with your privacy, then personal brand could be a little challenging. Also it won’t affect you much if you are purely in the business segment because people view you as a business person. So your privacy won’t be affected that much when compared to an actor who is well known because of the nature of their appearances.