Focusing on these key areas to have a brand that is genuine, unique and built to last.
Have you heard people talking about building a brand or creating a personal band and started to wonder what really goes into it? I know I did at first, espeically when I began to notice that I never really focused on building a brand. I went straight into creating content and trying to run businesses without understanding that the brand is the foundational piece.
So, when I began learning more about what goes into a brand I felt so much freedom in that idea. Mostly because it helped me to realize that there are actual, practical steps to building a brand. And when you get into it you learn exactly how it informs everything else that you do in business.
Who are you?
The first thing you want to do when building your dream brand is to start off with your brand identity. Without this, it will be nearly impossible to reach your target audience. A large part of your brand identity has to do with the way you speak, the way people relate to, and the vocabulary that you use.
For some of us, this may look like being a soft-spoken person who does not speak in Ebonics or this could be someone that might be louder and more relaxed with their speech. Either voice is fine. What matters is that it comes naturally to you.
A part of creating your brand identity is also getting to know your people.
What is it that they are struggling with?
What are their concerns?
What do they want to know?
These questions are something you should ask yourself. Maybe you do not know what problem your audience is having trouble with at first, but by engaging with them and listening to their feedback, the problem will become clear.
Something my audience is always wanting to know from me is what kind of apps, microphones, and other electronics do I use in my business. By engaging with my audience, I can solve that problem for them by recommending products I use with an affiliate code (we will talk more about this below).
Your brand identity is key.
If you do not know who you are, then your content will not flow, so before jumping into creating a product, figure out what your brand identity is first.
How Do You Reach Them?
I am sure you have heard the phrase, "Video Content Is King", and it is. Video allows your audience to connect with you on a much deeper level, but you do not have to share only videos to appeal to your audience. Graphics, vlogs, magazines, and pictures are all different visual content you can share with your audience to show them who you are and give them a better understanding of your brand.
Podcasts are more audio than video, though there are video podcasts out there.
This is another way of bringing your audience behind the scenes and allowing them to connect with you in different areas. The neat thing about podcasts is that your listener is completely engaged when they are listening to you.
The next question you need to ask yourself is, what kind of visual content do you want to make?
Will you focus only on pictures? Or will you do a combination of video, graphics, or pictures?
Let's Talk Strategy
The Third step into creating your brand is creating a content strategy that works for you. How many times have you been told to post three to five times a day? This advice is great for someone that has a team, but for someone that is just starting out as one person show this can be overwhelming. Posting three to five times a day may not be feasible when we get into where to post. Does this look like posting your content on Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, YouTube, etc., all in one go? Or does this look like cycling through which content is posted where?
What you need is to have a cadence.
Your content cadence needs to work for you. No one else has your skills, your family life, your time, or your resources, so your content strategy needs to be feasible for you and not feasible for someone else.
You also need to ask yourself if your audience needs the same content from you posted that many times in one day, spread out over the week, or even on a weekly basis. Perhaps on Monday, your audience needs encouragement to get their week off on the right foot, and maybe on Tuesday they need a laugh, or maybe on Friday they need strategy to help them plan for next week. By working your strategy and looking at your analytics, you will be able to identify what areas need tweaking and what it is that your audience needs from you.
By developing a cadence to your content strategy, you will not burn out or go ghost on your audience because you will not be putting out content irregularly or haphazardly. The last thing you want to do is not be consistent, have great content, and then have your audience forget about you because you post so infrequently. Or on the flip side, you post so frequently that the content may come off as too repetitive and your audience no longer sees the value.
As you are creating a content cadence, bring in some collaboration! Too often, as entrepreneurs, we can get so caught up in what we are building that we neglect to network with others in our space. It is so important to develop relationships with not only our peers but with those connected to us.
Make it Fun!
Try to get a bingo using the collaboration bingo card below. This will give you some fun ways to collaborate with people that you may not have considered.
By networking with others, you will be able to reach their audience by doing podcast interviews or having them mention you in their stories. You also want to gather testimonials for your products or services, participate in collaboration, and, of course, posting content on your platform will build audience trust.
You never know what could blossom from a collaboration, so get out there and network!
Selling Without Being a Sell-Out
The final piece of building your dream brand is deciding what is for sale. Some of us can miss this part if we are too focused on getting our views up, getting people to share our content, growing our followers on social media, or growing our email list. Growing your community is wonderful, but you need to have a place to send people to. By considering who your audience is and what they need, you will be able to create a product or service that will meet their immediate needs.
Are you going to provide them with an ebook, one-on-one consultations, group coaching, or suggest products and/or courses they can purchase by clicking on your affiliate code? Your audience will tell you exactly what it is that they need from you and your brand identity is going to tell you how to deliver that product to them.
This may take some trial and error as you test different marketing tools and get product validation, but by going through these steps, you will have a brand, a product, and you will know how to market your product.
Building a brand is not complicated, but it does take time and intentionality! By following these steps you will be well on your way to building a brand that will stand the test of time. And if you'd like this work done with you, that's where I come in! Sometimes you can grasp these concepts with a little clarity and other times understand but may be struggling to execute the strategy. Listen, I get it!
Getting Unshy was created to serve the people who have all of these amazing ideas, but can't seem to follow through on them out of fear. My gift is to guide those who are stuck behind the scenes, but know they were called to be in front of the camera (literally and metaphorically). You can work through those fear with me, while building a brand that represents you well.
You can find out more by filling out this form and we can talk from there!