8 Tips to Communicating Your Brand
I recently gave a presentation to a group of professionals about career-changing, starting a business, and communicating during a pandemic. It was a whole spectrum of communications-related topics, and it went really well. I used to present all the time in my former life, so it was great to get back on the stage under my own company.
I wanted to share one area that I talked about--communicating your brand on both the personal and organizational side. I'm simply talking about getting the message about your brand across on digital (and even non-digital) platforms. To really delve into identifying your brand...well, that's a whole different post.
Some of these tips are no brainers, but I think the important takeaway is that they apply to both personal and organizational branding.
1) Be super clear on your audience, your message, your brand. This is key whether you're communicating your personal brand or your organization's brand this is key. This quote from Branding Guru Kaye Putnam captures this message perfectly:
To bring a strong brand to the market, you need to nail your messaging. And, to nail your messaging, you must have clarity – on your values, your points of differentiation, the particular space you occupy in your market’s ecosystem. - Kaye Putnam, 5 Essentials to Building Brand Trust
2) Don't be afraid to reach out to people. Reach out to both people you know and those you don't! People love telling their stories, and (most) people love helping others. This goes without saying, but make sure you're reaching out to the right people. If you're a business trying to strengthen your brand, reach out to your customers or your potential customers. If you're trying to work on your personal brand, connect with people that have your ideal job. But, be sure to have your story clear or people won't know how to help you or partner with you.
3) Do your research (including competitive research). Don't try to reinvent the wheel. There are TONS of free resources out there. See what your competitors are doing. Go to your preferred platform, type in your title/product/service, and peruse people/companies in the same space.
4) Have a strategy and analyze what's working. This is important for personal branding just as much as organizational. Treat it as you would in any project.
5) Mix it up with the content. When it comes to posting on behalf of your brand, provide a mix of content--from pictures, links, quotes, videos, lives, shared content, and your own content. Show people that you are a valuable resource. Quick tip: if you don't have a website or a blog set-up, you can post your original articles on LinkedIn.
6) Follow protocol (official and unofficial). Abide by the rules of the platform and listen to the experts on best practices. For some helpful hints on best practices, feel free to take a look at my previous blog post on social media misconceptions.
7) Aim for engagement, not number of followers. We talked about this in the last blog post, you want to engage with the right people. when people are engaging they are getting to know you. When they get to know you, they start to like and trust you (hopefully).😄
8) Be memorable. This is something I will always advocate. Be memorable (in a good way!). Because that is how you make a difference.
One mistake that I made in my career was not being super clear on my personal brand. So people did not know how to help me, and I felt stuck. Once I was able to find clarity in my personal brand, articulating it clearly became much easier. From there, everything flowed much easier.
Do any of these resonate with you? Let me know in the comments.
