How can you use personal branding to differentiate yourself in sales prospecting?

Personal branding in sales prospecting it's not about self-promotion but rather demonstrating how you can genuinely assist prospects in addressing their needs and achieving their objectives.

A simple way to create a personal brand that can help with prospecting is to create a consistent message. One that is not tied to the product or service you sell, but to the outcomes you are committed to helping prospects create regardless of the organization you work for.

Personal branding plays a pivotal role in sales prospecting by setting you apart from the competition and drawing in prospects who connect with your unique message and approach. Becoming an authority and trusted advisor in your niche or industry positions you for success, potentially leading to inbound leads.

Sure it helps you stand out, but first and foremost it builds TRUST. People trust people they know. If you build in public and operate in public, people feel like they get to know you. My advice is to just get started creating SOMETHING. Heck, I started using TikTok to make videos about the ideas and strategies that surround my product. Are they perfect? Absolutely not. In fact some of them are pretty stupid. But at least it's not a bunch of cardboard sales tips in a wall of text on LinkedIn.

More people pay attention when more people pay attention. A personal brand is one way to get more people to pay attention to your message and expertise. It positions you are someone that the industry trusts, allowing your prospect to borrow from that trust to be willing to have a conversation with you.

Creating a personal brand that is tied to your organization or the product you sell can be risky. If you leave your current organization or industry, the brand and reputation you've built may not translate to your new career, industry or company. A long-term strategic way to build a strong personal brand that's not tied to a company or product is to focus on a message that centers around the problem you solve or the outcome you create. Then the product/service you sell, and the organization you sell it for, become a tool for that transformation. It also demonstrates your proficiency in using various "tools" to create very specific outcomes for prospects.

Create great content that's pointed directly at your ICP. I started filming TikToks and directed them at folks we're trying to sell to. Have already generated several leads from this.

your personal brand should shine through. It's a powerful tool for generating leads, understanding prospect needs, and building rapport and trust.

When it comes to measurement, keep it simple in the beginning. Are your numbers going up? Keep going. Look at basic top line metrics like follower count or engagement to see that you're headed in the right direction. Once you know that you are on the right track, you can get into more complex analytics that may be provided by social platforms or even purpose-built third party tools.

From a social branding perspective, you don't have a following. Identify 10-20 thought leaders with a decent following (1k-10k followers) that also embody a brand that you identify with. Find posts they created that you can add additional context to, and if they agree, they will repost, reply, or somehow interact with your commentary. Their audience will then see your contribution and follow you as well. Do this consistently and watch your following accelerate. The hard part is that it is very slow in the beginning but it accelerates over time.

Sometimes people overcomplicate this. Good personal branding for a BDR can be as simple as adding a bright background to an otherwise boring headshot in your email footer (Canva makes it easy). Good personal branding for an SDR can mean speaking and writing differently than other reps and adding a dash of humor to your outreach. The idea here is to find simple ways to stand out and build your authority, visually and vocally. :)