Building Your Personal Brand
A few coaching clients have asked me if I can teach them about building a personal brand.
I'm always flattered when people ask me this because the truth is I've only been actively building my personal brand on LinkedIn for 18 months.
I don't even have any other social media accounts besides LinkedIn.
Anyway, all that to say, I not an expert in personal branding or an influencer.
But I do create content and post daily on LinkedIn. That is what I've done to "build my brand."
I can't deny that it has created a big impact on my career and huge outcomes for my business, even in this short time.
Short list of what has happened since I started posting on LinkedIn:
Pivoted my career from sales to career coaching in under 6 months
Asked to speak on 6+ webinars, including one with Twilio
Landed 33+ coaching clients
Generated ~$85k in revenue
4 founders approached me to join their company
Became friends with some of my favorite leaders in the industry
Dozens of people messaging me saying they landed a job just by following my content and implementing the tips 🤩
There are many more, but these are some of my favorite highlights.
It has been a game-changer for me and I now understand why so many people preach about building your brand.
My plug for doing it is that it just works. 👍🏽
I get that it's not for everyone, and honestly, I never thought it was for me either.
But it does really help you take control of your professional narrative and tap into a sea of incoming opportunities that you never knew existed.
If you are job hunting now or in the future, building your personal brand can significantly help you be found and stand out as a candidate. If you do it well enough opportunities will come to you! Facts. 👈🏽
The truth is: I was super scared to start posting on LinkedIn. I really thought I could never do it because I'm private and it would be too vulnerable.
But I also had a strong urge to say something, so I pushed myself out of my comfort zone and just started. 🗣
And I'm really glad I did. I definitely would not be where I am today professionally had I never started.
So if you are thinking about doing it, go for it. If I can do it, so can you!
Below are my tips to get started posting and building a personal brand.
Tips for brand building & posting on LinkedIn
Educate, Entertain or Inform
Be consistent
Have an opinion
Stick to 1-2 topics
That's pretty much it. There isn't any magic involved. I learned everything about how to do it from watching how others do it. Pay attention and copy people.
Let me break it down a bit more.
Educate, Entertain, Inform:
The way to create value for others is by giving them actionable advice, being entertaining or informing them of something valuable. You could do this on any topic and likely have success. TBH if you are funny you could really make a splash on LinkedIn, it's such a stuffy platform and people are dying for relief, just sayin.
Be consistent:
Find a cadence of posting regularly. Want to post once a week or every day, great! Just be consistent. Build the habit and stick to it. If you only post every once in a while you won't be remembered as easily.
Have an opinion:
Be yourself and have an opinion on your chosen topic. Many people won't tell you this but having an opinion helps you find your tribe. Put your authentic voice out there so your people can find you!
Stick to 1-2 topics:
The way to build a consistent brand is to become known for a topic. Talk about one or two overarching topics for optimal success. You want people to think of you when that certain topic comes to mind. For example, I only really post about job searching tips in tech, that's my niche.
Tips for efficiency and lowering anxiety while posting:
Use a tool like Hootsuite to schedule posts in advance. It's free.
Spend 60-90 min. per week writing and scheduling posts for the whole week or month.
Recycle and reuse content every 3-4 months. People need to hear it on repeat plus it reinforces your brand.
Set your LinkedIn profile to private so you can't see when people look at your profile. It's stressful and distracting to be aware of this info.
Don't spend all your time mindlessly scrolling. Go in, respond, engage, and leave.
Only use LinkedIn on your computer, never on your phone.
Don't track any analytics. Controversial I know.
Be generous. Make deposits into relationships before asking for withdrawals.
These are my personal habits and approaches that work for me. Since I don't have a lot of time (ya girl has 3 jobs 👀) I need to be effective and efficient.
The bottom line is people will definitely look you up online, especially while you are job searching, why not take control of your narrative and what they see.
If you want to start building your brand and add it to your job search strategy I highly recommend it. You can def do it!
That's the ☕️. Hope it's helpful.
