Building Your Brand The Right Way
An important step in creating an online marketing income is something that a lot of people shy away from and it is the reason they fail. You must build a brand. Many people here this and think, “Oh my god, how do I do that?”, or they worry that it’s something that is going to take more time, more money and slow down their success.
Nothing could be further from the truth. It took me a long time to learn this but after picking a niche, which you can read about in my “3 Tips To Picking A Niche” article here, branding is the next important step.
What follows are 5 musts of building your brand. These are not necessarily steps, or in any particular order. These represent the foundation of a solid brand. Let’s jump into each one and break them down a little more.
You Must Be Authentic
You hear that word around a lot, authenticity, and you wonder in an online world of the Metaverse, NFT’s, digital currency and social media, why that would matter. I am here to tell you that it does. The truth is, that no matter how digital the world becomes, people still need to be able to trust people
In fact I would say that trust is becoming even more necessary now in order to be able to sell anything! People are more suspicious, more frugal, and trust far less than they used too. It is mostly because of a lack of authenticity in sales people that this has happened. It’s time to show people that it’s ok to trust you.
Part of being authentic ties into must number two which is where we are headed next.
You Must Be Congruent To Your Niche
Your message, your niche, your content, your values. Those 4 things are what I refer to when I talk about congruency. Take the time to know what your message is. Make sure it aligns with your core values. If you are out here to do it right, you are out here to make this a way of life. A way to earn a living, and live life on your terms.
When you choose a message and a niche, they have to match up. And I don’t mean line for line. For example if you are messaging that your desire is helping others, you can still promote a product like email marketing or list building. What you have to do though is market it in a way that shows you will HELP people get it done.
When You create content for the internet, make sure it lines up with both your niche and your underlying message. On my Facebook page, which you can follow by clicking HERE, I use hashtags to convey what my page is about. I use real life experience as object lessons on how they relate to internet marketing. Post things that show you are real. Personally I post videos of my dog, cuz we all love dogs!
Be sure to search your core values, and ensure you choose a product that is relevant, and works, and can be worked into your message as a marketer. Your message as a marketer has to remain consistent, but that’s the next must.
You Must Convey A Consistent Message
Once you design your message, you have to ensure that no matter how many times you say it, or how many different ways you say it, it remains consistent. You can’t start in one direction and, if it isn’t getting the results you want, change messages completely. This is not to say you can’t rebrand yourself. As both you and your business grows it will bring your brand into laser focus. That growth will result in a natural and smooth transition to improving your brand.
Messaging is so important that Google, Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, and a host of others use your messaging to decide how often or not your things get shown to other humans! Keep this in mind and ensure that, even if your message is different or controversial, your message is consistent. They are more likely to reward consistency.
You Must Speak Or Write With Authority
This is probably one of the most misunderstood and underutilized tools on the internet today. I see, siphon through, discard, report and reject so much internet garbage it’s a wonder I stay on it as much as I do. What you need to do before you ever put fingers to keyboard, or turn on your camera is become an expert in your field!
An express expert, what is that? It means is that you lock yourself away for about 2 weeks and you eat, sleep, live and breathe a specific topic. Once you have done that, you will assuredly know more than 99 percent of the people on the internet. This gives you the knowledge and authority to write or speak on that topic.
The best part about this is the fact that you have taken the time to siphon through all the BS to get to the nuts and bolts of a topic. Now you are able to present it in full to a hungry audience of people that don’t want to do that work! I think what you will read next is the biggest thing that people miss when they look at building a brand.
You Must Understand That YOU Are The Brand
My mentor the other day said something to me and really made me understand what this statement means. You are not selling anything else but YOU. The content bridge between your opt ins, or your prospects and what it is you are promoting is YOU. Show them that you are an authority, and that you can be trusted.
We do this by building a relationship with our prospects, and I don’t mean having them over for tea. I mean an online business relationship that shows them you are the expert. It shows them that you are succeeding; using the tools, or solution to a problem, that you are promoting. It also shows them that you understand their pain, what it is they need. That thing that is eating at them that made them opt in to your list in the first place.
How Important Is A Brand Anyway?
I could probably go on about this for a long time. How do you choose anything that you buy? Are there items that you purchase regardless of price or inconvenience to go and get it? Why is that? It’s because you trust that brand! That is the thing you have to get into your mind set. If people see you as THE BRAND, and THE EXPERT, then they are going to come to you when they need what you have for them.
Take the time to become that expert, and build your brand properly the first time! It is much harder to come back to the internet marketing world and rebuild yourself if you had a bad reputation before. In order to be trusted, you must remain trustworthy and be straight with people, even if it pisses them off. The reality is, they have to trust you, but they don’t have to like you!
I hope you found value in this post. Comment, like and share this content to people you know! Thanks for being here, and Stay Hungry.
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