One of the greatest changes in the 21st century is this shift we’ve created where people are a product in and of themselves. It might not always feel like it, but you are your own personal brand.
Whether you’re a recent graduate, a potential employee, or a business owner, learning how to market yourself effectively and what you bring to the table is going to play a huge role in your success.
It may seem strange to think about marketing yourself. After all, you’re a person, not a product. Fear not, because today we’re going to take a closer look at some proven and effective ways of marketing yourself that will help you succeed in all walks of life.
Why Marketing Yourself is Important
We live in an increasingly competitive world, where everybody is trying to stand out from the rest of the pack. Anything you can do to carve out an edge for yourself creates an advantage you’re going to need to leverage in order to achieve the heights you aspire to in your business and personal life.
Crafting a brand for yourself is one of the most effective ways to differentiate yourself, and it’s something that top companies have been using to their advantage for over a century. Branding is what makes companies recognizable and memorable.
Would McDonald’s be the most successful fast-food restaurant without the Golden Arches? Would Coca Cola be as ubiquitous without their iconic red and white can? Probably not.
Building your personal brand and learning to market yourself requires you to create your vision for the future, and then take the necessary steps to realize that vision. As you make progress towards your professional and personal goals, you’ll be adding equity to your brand in the process.
Just as McDonald’s wants you to associate the Golden Arches with a delicious burger and Coca Cola wants you to associate their iconic can with ice-cold refreshment, your personal brand should inspire others to associate certain qualities with you.
If you’re a lawyer, you’ll want people to associate your personal brand with trust and justice. Or, if you’re a contractor, you’ll want to market yourself in a way that inspires trust, quality workmanship, and reliability with your customers.
Regardless of your niche, by marketing yourself and creating a well-defined personal brand, you’ll be able to rise to the top of the pack, regardless of all the competition and noise that’s going on behind you.
General Tips for Marketing Yourself
Whether you’re a new graduate looking to break into your industry, a seasoned veteran freelancer, a business owner, or anything in between, these tips will prove helpful as you learn the ins and outs of marketing yourself.
Define Your Vision
When you’re concentrating on marketing yourself, you’ll need to define your vision, just like a business would with its mission statement.
Start by thinking about what you want to do and how you want to be perceived by others. Consider your values, your areas of expertise, and what’s most important to you. Finally, organize your thoughts and codify your personal vision.
Let’s say you’re an aspiring marketing executive who is passionate about endangered sea turtles. Your personal vision could be something like “to achieve excellence in marketing while demanding the best of myself for my clients and to use the power of marketing to spread the word about endangered sea turtles.”
Whatever you do and whatever you’re interested in, make sure that your personal vision is a reflection of who you are and what you seek to achieve.
Identify Your Audience
One of the first steps you’ll need to take to begin marketing yourself successfully is to identify your audience. Knowing your audience is crucial because it allows you to focus your efforts on the people who need your services and expertise.
If you’re a recent grad hoping to land your first job out of college, your audience is going to be potential employers, and the way in which you establish your brand will be entirely different than if you’re hoping to launch a career as a travel and lifestyle blogger.
If you’re still on the fence about how you’d like to market yourself, take some time to consider what you’re passionate about and what kind of skills you already possess. Start by thinking about how you can bring your passions and talents together to offer something special and worthwhile to your audience.
Once you have a better idea of who your audience is, you can start focusing your efforts on how to most appeal to that group.
Perfect Your Elevator Pitch
While much of the legwork that goes into building your brand can occur online, you should also master the art of the elevator pitch for times when you’re interacting in person. As you craft your personal brand, you’ll need to learn how to effectively communicate with your peers, thought leaders, and executives.
You never know who you may run into, so it’s critical that you have a clear, concise, and exciting pitch you can deliver at a moment’s notice. It’s a good practice to have multiple pitches prepared for different people or situations.
If you have some big ideas you’re interested in discussing; you should be able to deliver a clear and brief recap of each one. You’ll also want to have a pitch of sorts prepared for instances where you’re meeting someone for the first time. Be able to explain who you are, what you do, and what you specialize in as concisely as you can.
For business owners, your elevator pitch should lay out who you are, what you do, and why you’re the right person for the job. Every person you meet is a potential client or customer, so crafting a solid elevator pitch is going to be especially important when you’re trying to lock down new business.
Develop a Social Presence
Once you know the audience you’re marketing to; it’s time to develop your social presence to appeal to this audience. The first step in doing this will be to develop a detailed presence on the social networks where your audience spends time online. Depending on the audience you’re hoping to reach, the social networks you’ll focus on will be different.
Whether you’re a young professional, a current student, or an aspiring travel blogger, you’ll want to start with the basics; Facebook, Twitter, and Linked In. Beyond these networks, your niche may require you to develop a strong presence elsewhere. For example, if you’re an upstart influencer, you’ll need robust Instagram and TikTok pages. But, if you’re a pediatric oncologist, TikTok probably won’t be on your radar.
Beyond the “big” social networks, there are tons of smaller networks that cater to specific niches. You may be able to leverage these networks to great effect if the people who use them fall into your niche. But, even if they don’t, it’s still a good practice to claim pages on these fledgling platforms. You never know which one is going to become the next big thing.
Sites like Namechk and Knowem allow you to search to see if the social profiles and web domains you’re interested in are still available. Knowem, in particular, even allows you to secure these multiple pages at a time right from their site.
Registering domain names and social profiles across a variety of different platforms is a smart practice because it allows you to control your brand and your story. Even if you have no intention of building your brand on that particular social network, by owning the domain or username, you’ll be able to prevent others from taking it. Plus, you never know if that fledgling social site you created a profile on will take off.
Once you’ve secured your various social profiles, identify which ones you plan on developing an immediate presence on. Then, you can get to work on adding content to the pages you need.
The first thing you’ll want to do is to ensure that your social profiles present a clear and detailed picture of you so that when people visit your profile, they’ll see a reflection of the personal brand that you’re crafting. This concept may be at odds with your existing social media profiles, which you’ve created long before you were focusing on marketing yourself.
If you’re like most people, and you have social media profiles you set up long ago, you might want to consider using those pages exclusively to keep in touch with family and friends, and creating new pages specifically for your professional purposes.
This way, you’ll be able to keep business and personal separate, and you won’t have to worry about clouding your professional vision with cat pictures from your Aunt Sally, or wall posts from that weird roommate you had in your freshman year of college.
When you create your social pages, start by including as much relevant information as possible. Be sure to include information like your education and employment history and any academic or social organizations that you belong to. Outside of the basics, you’ll also want to add some of your personality to the page as well.
Once you’ve set up the framework of your pages, curate content for your pages that’s relevant to your audience, and be sure to add your own commentary to it as well. Doing so will help you get the conversation going on your page, which will further enrich your social pages.
Network Online
One of the most effective ways to put your social media profiles to work for you is to use them for networking purposes. Sites like Linked In and Facebook are exceptionally effective networking tools, and they can help you build your brand while also imparting you with knowledge in the process.
From the start, these social networks will put your profile into networks automatically based on the school you went to, your hometown, your current city, and more. You can also find hundreds of more networks for practically every imaginable niche. So, whether you’re an aspiring travel blogger, a lawyer, or a recent graduate, you’ll have no trouble finding additional networks to join.
It’s also quite easy to create your own networks. As you meet more like-minded people, you can create your own networks filled with the people you know. These networks can be especially helpful for sharing ideas, learning about new opportunities, and gaining some new knowledge from your peers as well.
The best way to establish yourself and your personal brand within these networks are to make sure that you’re bringing something of value to the table. This concept brings us to our next point.
Become a Member of Trade Organizations
Becoming a member of trade organizations is a great way to maximize the amount of bang you get for your buck. By being a member of a trade organization, you’ll open a world of networking opportunities for yourself with other professionals who are in your industry.
Chances are, many of the members of a particular trade organization are important gatekeepers who could help you to further your career. At the very least, the members of a trade group are sure to have similar interests and experiences as you, so you should have no trouble finding some great people to add to your professional network.
One of the most important aspects of marketing yourself is establishing yourself as an expert within your field, and one of the ways you can establish yourself as such is to be recognized for your achievements. Trade organizations represent one of the easiest ways for you to be recognized as an authority in the industry.
While not every industry has a trade organization, most industries do. These organizations are considered to be an authority in the field, and your membership signifies that you’re a trusted member of the industry and someone who possesses expertise on the topic. By associating with these organizations, you’ll be able to generate social proof and an air of legitimacy.
Write Constantly
Arguably the best way to establish yourself as an authority within your industry or niche is to write and publish your work often. As you become more established, you’ll have opportunities to publish your thoughts on platforms with authority. Until then, publishing on your own blog, Linked In, or even within your networks can be a great way to establish yourself.
One thing that’s important to remember is that while you want to write as much as possible, quality is far more important than quantity. Be sure that anything you’re taking the time to put into the world is useful, well-researched, and valuable to others.
When you do write, let the world know! The worst thing you can do is spend the time and effort to write something of value and then not market the fact that you’ve published it. Use your social profiles to link to your writing once you’ve published it, and be sure to also share your work with the relevant networks that you’ve joined.
Speak Publicly
Public speaking is usually pretty low on the list of things people like to do, but it’s an incredibly useful skill to hone, and it’s also a great way to establish your brand. When you market yourself, it’s important that you create the impression that you’re an authority in your field. Public speaking engagements are a perfect way to position yourself as a trusted source.
As you establish yourself, people will seek you out for speaking engagements. But, you’ll need to get your start somewhere. Offer your services to local organizations or clubs for free, and be prepared to present some of your writing as evidence of your expertise on the topic.
You don’t have to limit yourself to in-person events, either. You can offer your services as a guest on podcasts or webinars, or record Youtube videos where you speak in-depth about the topics of your choosing. In fact, given that these types of events have lower stakes than speaking in front of an audience of hundreds of people, they can be a great place to get your start.
Go On The Record
One thing that will go hand and hand as you do more public speaking and writing within your area of expertise is the opportunity to go on the record as a source. Similarly to public speaking, you can’t expect to start fielding calls from Time Magazine right when you begin building your brand.
But, as you publish more of your work online, you’ll start to receive inquiries from local and niche publications. These opportunities are a great way to continue to cement yourself as an authority in your field, and they’ll help you build your brand further.
Build a Website
Thanks to companies like Wix, Squarespace, and WordPress, it’s easier than ever to develop a professional quality website for yourself. Once you create your account, you’ll be able to choose from a variety of templates, many of which are designed especially for the niche you occupy.
Your personal website is a fantastic place to house all of your work. Most website builders have a built-in blogging feature where you can share your thoughts, post your long-form work, and curate other important information about your area of expertise.
The beauty of designing a website is that it allows you to frame your brand in a way that you aren’t able to with your social profiles. With websites like Facebook or Linked In, there’s a rigid framework that every profile on the site must adhere to. Plus, these sites aren’t designed from a self-marketing perspective, so they don’t allow you to shine the spotlight on yourself in the same way that a personal website does.
Securing your website is especially important because your personal website and the content you publish to it belongs to you and you alone. When you publish on social networks, the social network is the owner of that content, and ultimately, they can control the conversation surrounding that content.
But, when you use your own website as your primary content hub, the ball is in your court. You own the content, and you control the conversation.
Don’t Overlook SEO
Whether you’re building a site from scratch, using a template, or working with a web designer, you should focus on SEO from the moment you begin conceptualizing your website. SEO stands for search engine optimization, and it’s the process by which you optimize your website to gain more organic (free) traffic to your site.
By optimizing the SEO on your site, you’re signaling to Google and other popular search engines that your site is a trusted authority in the field, and the people that visit your site are likely to find what they’re looking for by visiting your page.
Learning the ins and outs of SEO is a full-time job. Thankfully, there are plenty of companies that allow you to automate many of the most important SEO processes you’ll need to engage in to optimize your site.
Once it’s ready to go live, use an SEO plug-in to audit your site and suggest changes you may have overlooked. These small changes will make it easier for you to rank higher in Google and other search engines.
Write Guest Blogs
Writing guest posts on other industry sites is a great way to get your name out in the industry, and it can also give your site a powerful SEO boost, indicating to search engines like Google that you’re an authority in your industry.
The idea of a guest post is that you write a piece of content and publish it on someone else’s website. In doing so, you’re providing valuable content to the owner of that site while also exposing yourself to their audience.
By linking back to your own site, or any products or services you’re promoting in your post, you’ll be able to start building links to your website, which is a powerful signal of authority in the SEO world.
If you’re interested in guest posting, start by compiling a list of the different websites and industry publications that are authority sources in your industry. Then, check these sites to see if they have any formal policies regarding guest posts. Many of these publications will have a “write for us” page on their site or at least some contact information you can use to reach out.
If you can’t find this information, you’ll just need to get a bit more creative with your approach. Use Linked In or Facebook to try and track down people associated with the site or publication, and reach out to them to discuss the possibility of guest posting on their platform.
Harness the Power of Advertising
After you have the framework for your personal brand in place, you’ll want to consider advertising yourself to expand your reach and get your work in front of a wider audience.
Advertising isn’t something you’ll want to get involved in until you’re confident that other aspects of your personal brand are already in place. Make sure you have your socials and website in order, and that the people who visit your platforms will have plenty of engaging and valuable content to read.
One of the reasons why we recommend avoiding advertising until the other aspects of your brand are built out is that it can get expensive, and you want to make sure that you’re getting the most bang for your buck. You wouldn’t want to be spending money to have people visit a half-built website or social profiles with limited information and content.
Depending on your niche, you should have no trouble finding an advertising platform that fits your personal brand well. Most platforms will allow you to advertise on a CPM or CPC basis. CPM advertising will provide you with a set number of ad impressions for a set price, whereas you’ll only be charged when people click on your ads if you advertise on a CPC basis.
The best type of advertising for you will depend on the goals of your advertising campaign. Most individuals who are concerned with brand building advertise on a CPM basis to ensure a maximum amount of exposure, even if it isn’t necessarily converting into views and actions taken on your page.
This guide to advertising your personal brand is a great place to turn if you’re considering dipping your toes into the advertising pond.
Final Word
In this day and age, learning how to market yourself is a critical skill that can pay major dividends in your personal and professional life. Whether you’re just starting out on your career path, or you’re an established veteran that’s looking to expand your professional reach, building a personal brand can help you to stand out from the pack.
Building a personal brand isn’t something that happens overnight. But, if you take the time, make an effort, and follow the tips on our list, you’ll be well on your way to establishing yourself as a thought leader within your industry.