How to Build a Personal Brand

People can’t buy from you if they don’t know who you are… so be MEMORABLE and build thought leadership with a strong personal brand. In this series, I'm dishing what it takes to experience the success I've built with a personal brand...

I didn't WIN the thought leadership lottery or fall into a treasure trove of the right connections. I took calculated, intentional steps forward...

We’ll cover everything from goal setting to building differentiators so hold on tight over the next few weeks as I dish the goods for personal branding, thought leadership and social selling.

Here are some statistics to bring the demand for authentic relationship building through online channels:

• On average, employees have 10 times more followers than their company's social media accounts.
• Leads developed through employees’ social media activities convert 7 times more frequently than other leads.
• Sales reps who use social media as part of their sales techniques outsell 78 percent of their peers.

How to Level Up Your Personal Brand

Tip 1 Define Your Goals: WHAT

Before launching any new endeavor, it's important to set actionable goals. A Harvard Business study revealed amazing statistics relating to goal setting and success. The study found that:

• Those who have goals are 10x more successful than those without goals.
• Those with written goals are 3x more successful than those with unwritten goals.

Think about it... When going on vacation, you don't just get in the car without packing for different weather, timing your departures and arrivals as well as which roads to take and hotels to stay at... right?

Without a GOAL or TARGET of where you want to go, it's impossible to craft a strategic plan to get there.

So why aren't you planning goals for your career?

My Goals?! Book me for...

• Keynotes
• Workshops
• Consulting

Now you try... what are your goals?

Tip 2 Understand Your Voice: HOW

People buy from people they like, know and trust. A strong personal brand amplifies the results of your sales goals. Consistency and clarity withing your brand (creative assets, messaging, etc.) builds trust and credibility. Your voice matters, it's how people hear your messages and emails when they read through them.

What is your voice? What do you want people to hear, think and feel when they hear your name?

Tip 3 Outline Your Values: WHY

Strong reputations connect with underlying values which amplifies authenticity. With a growing demand for more personal, real and relatable content on social media, marketing yourself authentically is what will truly help you stand out from the crowd.

Outline 10 important operating principles and star the top three most important pieces to you. Mine? Gratitude, Differently-Abled, Family, Grit, and Grace. Through these values, I was able to define myself as a "bubbly and blessed, marketing obsessed" working mother and warrior of chronic illness.

Tip 4 What Are Your Differentiators?

What makes you different from your competitors? Is it your upbringing? A story of adversity? Your education or professional experience?

Understanding how you stand out from the crowd will help encourage potential clients to work with YOU and not your competitors. An effective personal brand doesn't put down others. It simply attracts the right traffic to you. The more your brand differentiates itself, the more targeted clients you'll have!

Think of your personal brand's differences as a magnet to attract those ready-to-buy leads. What are three things that make you different from the rest?

Tip 5 Bring Your Personality to Your Brand

I absolutely hate anchovies, sauerkraut and fish eggs (YUCK!) and it still boggles my mind how many people LOVE that stuff. It's just like your personality. Not everyone is going to like you. That's the truth of the world.

But that doesn't mean you should dull your flavors down. Those that love you will be hooked. When building your personal brand, think about who you SERVE. What does the perfect client look like to you? Which flavors will attract them?

So do you dare to be that blue moon ice cream with rainbow sprinkles? I took that double-dog dare and turned it into a career. I've been called "a bit much" for my sparkly jacket and bubbly attitude, but the other side of the coin respects that individuality, enthusiasm, and expertise.

Build your brand with confidence. Stand for something, or you'll fall for anything. Don't dull your personality back. Be incredibly, uniquely you.

What are the five keywords that describe your personality?!

Tip 6 The Professional vs. Personal Balance

Maintaining balance while building your personal brand with professionalism is an art. Authenticity and vulnerability are also delicate pieces to the personal brand puzzle that require tact and grace to keep the balance in check. So how do you know how much personal information to share? Should you keep your personal brand separate from your professional brand? How can you construct harmony with both tracks?

You are unique and your story can be a strong magnet to attract the right traffic to reach your career objectives. Just make sure that each story mentioned highlights the benefits of working with and paints a strategic picture of success around you. Highlighting failures is excellent as long as you can share the solution in the same thread.

Tip 7 Clarity

Make sure your messaging, offering and solutions are clear. Do your friends and family asking you what you do every holiday celebration? If your loved ones don't understand what you do, you may need to rework your messaging!

A great exercise that you can practice with a few colleagues is the elevator pitch! Go to a building with an elevator and take the ride up and down a few floors which is just enough time to practice your pitch in a clear and concise manner.

Tip 8 Consistency in Your Personal Brand Messaging and Exposure

Consistency is incredibly important for your personal brand and digital reputation. Whether you show up every day with your own unique content, or you show up to engage (like, comment, share) your community's content, it matters. Consistency is key to generating brand awareness and when your prospects see your name and brand all over social media they'll recall you when they are further into the pipeline and ready to make their purchase.

For example, if you create a world-renowned recipe for chocolate chip cookies that keep your customers coming back for more until one day, you decide to throw dried cherries into your batch, you'll likely surprise and upset your loyal audience. Stay consistent but flexible enough for experimentation.

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Tip 9 Create a Collaboration Station to Build Your Community

92% of individuals trust online reviews, even if it is written by someone they don't personally know. That's why collaboration is powerful.

We are so much better and stronger when we come together as humans and building your digital reputation is no different! Collaborations provide the opportunity for you to connect with like-minded community members and influencers alike to continue to grow your own community. How can you collaborate? Co-authored blogs, podcast interviews, video interviews, etc.

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Tip 10 Social Media Audit and Analysis

If one thing is certain, it's that each social media platform has its own unique audience. Take TikTok for example... the average user is only 15 years old! That probably isn't the best fit for Financial Advisors or Estate Planners to advertise... in reverse, those industries may be more focused on a LinkedIn strategy where the average age for a user is around 45, contemplating retirement in the following 15 years.

If you are planning on building a strong personal brand strategy, you need to evaluate which are the top three platforms for you and your voice. Where is your audience hanging out at? From your top three, choose your favorite that brings in the most momentum and perform a more organic/native strategy (meaning posts must be uploaded in the application itself vs. pre-programmed through an automation tool).

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Tip 11 Community & Social Selling

How important is a community to you? If you prioritize building and maintaining strong relationships, you will see the payout. Because here's the thing... people buy from PEOPLE, not businesses.

Developing stronger, deeper relationships makes you more memorable for brand awareness. A community should be at the center of your process as it is your core audience and prospect pool. Get connecting and build REAL relationships!

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Tip 12 Build Strong Connections

People buy from PEOPLE, not businesses. Have I made myself clear yet? In this tip, I cover the importance of what comes after building your community... establish deep connections and adding to that "sticky factor" of you sticking in their memory for when they have a need for your services. I challenge you to take two calls each day to get to know a new connection! You'll be surprised at the end of the year how much your community has grown.

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Tip 13 REVERSE Pitch!

How many times have you received a cold sale and direct pitch in your social media messages? Take advantage of that open door and reverse the pitch!

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Tip 14 Network!

Once you know who you are and the market that you serve as well as what makes you unique, it's time to network and build that community! There are many networking events that have evolved over to the digital arena via zoom access lately. Check out your local networking opportunities and start making new connections today!

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Tip 15 Engage

Engagement is building its buzz as a new buzzword in social media as it is arguably the most important factor of social media growth and establishing thought influence. When building a social media strategy, you should be in your community to serve and offer engaging value. What does that mean? Providing thought-provoking comments on content and ask questions to stimulate conversation! I suggest that your engagement should be 75% of your overall time spent on social media.

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Thanks for reading!

Stay tuned for the remaining tips!

Tip 16 - Join Podcasts!

Everybody loves FREE stuff... so being on a podcast is FREE exposure in building your personal brand and a strong digital reputation. When you are a guest on podcasts you dip into audience pools for further awareness and increased potential clients! Podcast hosts are continuously looking for guests to have on their show. You can use different tools to search for relative podcasts and apply to speak on their show. Here are two resources to play with:

?? PodcastGuests.com

?? Matchmaker.fm

Tip 17 - Speak Up!

What's better than FREE PR? PR that actually PAYS you to make clients! When I was first asked to be a guest speaker I was absolutely mortified... until I started making thousands of dollars per speaking engagement while scoring new clients!

Before COVID-19, clients made from speaking engagements amounted to a solid 30% of my client database and the paycheck home from the presentation was a massive bonus. This enabled me to travel and speak in other countries while also establishing a global client base.

Master your pitch, turn it into a presentation, and start speaking actively and often! You'll be surprised how many folks love your content but still want to outsource the tasks to you...

Tip 18 - Connect with Thought Influencers

Nobody is out of reach on social media. You can get in contact with some of the most influential people in your industry via comments and connection requests. This may also open the door for potential mentorship or collaborations. My suggestion to you is to create a list of 10 industry influencers that you want to connect with and follow. Reach out to them with a custom connection request based on this challenge, right here. Feel free to name drop me if we are already connected ?? Next, monitor their content and engage with their followers to build your own community.

Tip 19

Tip 20

Stay tuned for more and follow Chantel Soumis daily for regular updates on how to master your personal brand, build thought leadership and leverage social media for ultimate results.

ABOUT CHANTEL SOUMIS

Chantel Soumis, Founder and Creative Director of Stardust Creative is on a mission to help small organizations smash through sales and marketing expectations on a shoestring budget. Trained in digital marketing by some of the brightest minds in marketing, Chantel brings unwavering optimism to clients across the globe. She’s built a following of 46k on LinkedIn as a brand thought leader and a voice for diversity and inclusion as an advocate for the differently-abled community. Chantel has worked with many Fortune 100 clients and has been published in publications such as Thrive Global, Huffington Post, Forbes and received international honors.

Just three months after launching her business, she generated over $1M in revenue-generating opportunities, emphasizing the power social media and the impact a strong personal brand can have. Learn more at ChantelSoumis.com and LinkedIn as well as @ChantelSoumis on Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter.