“After millions of dollars in revenues and a crazy journey, is there anything you regret along the way?” said the interviewer on the podcast. “I wish I started building my personal brand sooner.” replied the podcast interviewee whom I cannot remember.
While I cannot remember the podcast details, I do have this response burned into my memory. It is never too soon or too late to start building your brand, and not just your business brand, but your PERSONAL brand.
Imagine what happens when you want to build your practice without Saturday morning screenings or how you are going to keep income flowing if your body doesn’t allow you to practice.
We’ve seen it countless times.
At Full Circle we have built a business by helping people dig into their most authentic part of themselves, creating a greater level of success for themselves via coaching and retreats. Even though we continually build the Full Circle brand, every member of the team works on building up their own corner of the internet as an “intrapreneur” – an entrepreneur within a brand.
For instance, we have team members who have been featured in newspapers, magazines, popular podcasts, etc. which not only helps the Full Circle brand but builds the personal credibility of the teammate.
So what can you do today to ensure you are doing your best to build out your personal brand along with the business brand?
I have 3 steps to follow below:
Step 1. Build your internal foundation
This is the piece that is most directly related to your most authentic self and what we facilitate at Full Circle.
Take the time to find out who you are at the deepest level:
What are your values?
What are your passions and hobbies?
What is your unique style of personal expression?
Who are others that you look up to in your professional space that you can meet with and get inspiration from?
Step 2. Build your external foundation
Here is where we start to build out your digital assets.
- Everyone should have a great mini site that can be used to showcase who you are.
You can use me for a free one.
A great example is Aaron Agius - Help others in your chosen medium – the best way to build your brand is by being known to solve problems. Some people love to write… if that is you, perhaps consider answering questions on com.If you like to speak, creating a video course on Udemy or building out a series of YouTube videos would be ideal.
Alternatively, creating a profile on clarity.fm will position you as an expert and you can get paid for your time on the phone.
- Build digital credibility – it’s easy these days to be positioned as an expert once you know who your audience is and where they hang out.You can be a guest writer on Forbes.
You can get featured on podcasts such as the conscious millionaire podcast.
You can get interviewed for the news.
Step 3. Expand the Brand – The keys to this are consistency and call to actions
If you are building a video series, create a time and date that your videos go live. For example, a sales manager at a used car dealership in Moncton, NB has his “Troy’s Huggable Tuesday” videos every Tuesday morning that promotes “Canada’s most huggable used car dealership”. How can your brand tell a story?
Your content should also have a call to action that allows you to collect emails and build the tribe. You can also use private Facebook groups to do this and build a way to interact more intimately with your people.
Just like anything, you will have the most success if you have mentors in the field. Look at others in your space you can learn from and reach out to them.
Pat Flynn of Smart Passive Income when asked what 3 things he would do today if he were restarting to build his personal brand:
- Create free content that is obviously worth paying for.
- Create a product or software of my own that would serve my target audience by providing a solution to a very specific need.
- Give free, higher-level help to influencers in the industry to start to build those important relationships.
You’re going to think that you have no time for this, but trust me when I say your content strategy can be done in 1 hour per week once you get the rhythm built and put it in your Dynamic Time Schedule.
In recap, once you are clear on who you are and what your passions are, you can go deeper with what you are credible for, to talk about the things that hit the intersection of passion and talent.
Once that is defined, you can begin to create the digital assets needed to allow others to view you as a leader in that space. From there, get consistency with your content from videos to writing and continue to reach out to others in service.
If you want some help crafting what this can look like for you, get on the phone with the marketing team on their free VIP clarity line.
