In this video blog, Liz Harr will be sharing seven secrets on how to develop a personal branding strategy.
TRANSCRIPTION:
Hi, in this video blog, I’m going to be sharing some secrets on how to develop a personal branding strategy. It’s something that I talk to a lot of professional services executives about, whether they have their own show and they’re flying solo, or whether they are in a large firm and just need to cultivate a brand around themselves as an expert.
So, it’s something that we talk to a lot of people about in professional services. Now there are seven steps that I’d like to share with you when it comes to crafting a personal brand strategy. First and foremost, you have to start from the ground and figure out where you are. And what I mean by that is, determining where you are today, where you want to go, helps you figure out what you need to do to get there.
Do you aspire to be a global household name or do you want to break out of regional territory and become a national player? Those are the types of things that are really important in figuring out. And then on top of that, understanding your competition will be a layer on top of those goals and helping you figure out where you sit versus where you need to be.
Now, once you figure that out, then you’re ready to think about your expertise platform. It’s really difficult, in fact, almost impossible to craft a personal branding strategy around being a jack of all trades. So, figuring out how you are specialized and how to talk about that is the second step that you would take.
Then you need to think about your audience. Now, think about the roles that your decision makers play within their own companies. Who are their influencers? The influencers is another real important audience that you want to think about as you’re crafting your personal branding strategy and figuring out whom to be visible to.
Fourth is to figure out, what are you going to talk about? What are you going to be an expert in? This is, of course, your angle. And I think the best way to do this is to think about the services that are important to you and your firm as you grow and scale. You may have 12 or 15 services, but which are the ones that you think are really important to your growth?
And then, over on the other side, think about the things you know from your research, and from the dialogs you have with your audience, about the things that are important to them, the things that are keeping them up at night. It’s the intersection of the services that are important to you and the things that are important to your audience, the intersection of that that helps you identify those finite set of issues around which you should be speaking, writing, and networking.
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Fifth is, know your skills. If you do some due diligence and look at your real strengths, be honest about your weaknesses, this helps you see what you’re coming to the table with. Do you love to speak but you get writer’s block when you have to put nose to grindstone and write a piece of thought leadership?
Well, this is very helpful to know when you’re crafting your personal branding strategy because you may want to do things like what you’re watching today, a video blog, if you enjoy speaking, but you don’t like writing. So, knowing your skill sets is really critical. And I don’t want to get too far to the end, but it helps with the final step. Before you get to that final step, once you’ve thought about your skills, then you need to think about what tools do you need to allow this personal branding strategy to really come to life?
What do you need on your website? Did you find that your audience likes to learn digitally, and so, webinars, or podcasts, or video blogs would be a good way for you to start educating and letting them know about your expertise? Then you would want to invest in those types of tools. Once you have figured out your audience, you’ve done an honest assessment of your skills and you’ve thought about what tools you need to bring your personal branding strategy to life, now you need to do it.
But you likely won’t be able to do it on your own. This is not a largely DIY type of scenario. In some cases, because of your skill set, you’ll find some natural places where you can take this on and do it on your own. In other cases, you may need to consider outsourcing some of the skill sets. Depending on the goals that you have for your firm, you may want to hire and groom these skill sets organically.
But you’ll likely have a mix of DIY, with the outsourcing, with the hiring, and build a team that helps you bring this to life. Some of the skill sets that you’ll be looking for, you know, it isn’t just about writing, it isn’t just about speaking, what about the design that goes behind anything you publish?
What about the design on your website? What about measuring analytics and using metrics to see how far you’re mapping towards your goal? Those are the types of skills that you want to surround yourself with as you’re building your toolkit. So, if you found this helpful and want to learn more, I’d encourage you to go to our Visible Expert Course in Hinge University.
Hope to see you there.
