That personal branding ‘stuff’ is for the big wigs of business, celebs or sports stars, right?!

Not anymore.  🙂 🙁

GULP!  I know.  It can be hard to accept that today we need to be our own personal brand to grow our small businesses.

We can’t continue doing business the way in which we’ve always done it.

We must learn and adapt constantly.  That will be our competitive advantage in business in the future. 

Developing our personal brand as an expert in our niche is ABSOLUTELY critical

if we want to be successful in business.

But don’t worry, creating your own personal brand isn’t about getting out there and having everyone in town and across the world know about you.  No!

Your market niche could be a small area of your local city.  For instance, if you live in London, you might only want to be found in (say) the Borough of Kensington.

Then again, you and your business might be able to serve customers across your city, county or state, and therefore, want to be found more widely.

You might be able to serve your customers across the country in which you live… or the world.

What is it for you and your business?  Who do you want to find you and where are they?

The question then is… HOW will they find you?

The key with personal branding is to promote YOU the owner of the business/the entrepreneur as the expert/authority in your market niche or industry.    

It’s about creating a marketing strategy for BRAND YOU – THE ‘go to’ person in your niche!

The digital world has made getting noticed a level playing field.  No longer are big advertising budgets required.  All you need is marketing savvy, consistency, and time.

In developing your personal brand marketing strategy, you’ll have to work out what platforms you want to use.

13 marketing platforms most in use today

Here are key marketing platforms that are in use today.  Which suit you the best?  Remember, a combination of on and offline strategies are important, and PLEASE don’t be on all of them.  You’ll be exhausted.

LinkedIn – a fully optimised profile is NOT NEGOTIABLE if you want to be ‘seen’ within the world’s largest business social marketing and sales platform.  Get to know how to maximise LinkedIn, including writing blog posts, doing advanced searches, participating in groups, creating your own group… and much more.

SEO/Keywords – a must for Google searches – what short and long tail keywords do you want to be found for on your website and other online media, and how will you be found?  Will you use organic reach, pay-per-click, YouTube keyword optimisation so you’re found in Google? 

Networking – always a must so long as you ‘do’ networking properly.  What will you do with the business cards you collect from the networking events you go to?  How can you give before you receive, and build credibility along the way?

Blogging – a fantastic option for many business people.  It enables you to share your knowledge widely.  Can you syndicate your blogs to leading blogs sites or online newspapers?  How about guest blogging too?

Webinars – they’re all the rage at present and are a great way to teach your target audience what you know. 

You Tube – videoing is the way of the future and a great way to ‘teach’ your knowledge too. 

Social media – pick the platform(s) that suit you and your business best (Twitter?, Business Facebook?, Instagram?, Pinterest?, Periscope?, Snapchat?, Google + etc). 

Public speaking – get on the stage if it suits you and your niche.  Public speaking presents a fabulous opportunity to get seen at local, national and international events.  They’re especially good if you can video the event and then upload the footage to your website and YouTube using your keywords.

Podcasting – also all the rage at present as listeners can download your podcasts, and listen in while commuting. 

Get published – write books, e-books, white papers.  Anyone can write and self publish these days.  Plus, if you’re good and you have a significant community following you, you may also seek out the traditional publishing companies to publish your book(s).  They’re always on the look-out for the ‘next best seller’.

Traditional media – TV, radio, magazines, newspapers, PR – it’s there for all if you’re considered an authority in your field.

Advertising and sponsorships – there’s still a place for this traditional marketing activity, depending on the nature of your business.

Email marketing – a goodie and a must once your prospects enter your email community.

Phew!!! … and so it goes on.

Excited?  🙂

REMEMBER… don’t try and appear on all platforms, otherwise you’ll never get any work done.  Select those most appropriate to your industry or niche.

And get help.  Get help in creating your personal brand marketing strategy and outsource some of the ‘doing’ activity.

Do all that and I promise, after a while, you’ll get known as the ‘go to’ person in your market.  Now, you’d have to agree, that would be exciting.  🙂

Did you see the Get YOUR Business NoTiCeD! FREE webinar?

The ‘Get YOUR Business NoTiCeD!’ webinar replay is still available for you to watch here.  I’d love to hear your thoughts.

If you’d like to join my Get YOUR Business NoTiCeD! live 8 week programme, please go here to learn more.  I’d be thrilled to include you in the programme to help you GROW YOUR BUSINESS.

Would some guidance from me be helpful to you? If so, please arrange a free 30 mins Skype strategy meeting with me. Here’s my calendar to make an appointment. I’d love to support you in some way to gain ‘seductive clarity’ in any aspect of your business or life.

I’m sure there’ve been plenty of people who’ve swung from a chandelier (actually or metaphorically) to get noticed. 

It sounds like a lot of fun, don’t you think. 🙂

Think about all the weird, wacky and very visible things Sir Richard Branson did in his early years as an entrepreneur to get noticed as ‘Richard Branson’ which of course was inextricably linked to brand ‘Virgin’.

Even now, Sir Richard can still be seen doing things that are ‘out there’ to get his message across.

Richard Branson has always understood the importance of personal branding and standing out from the crowd to get noticed; to interrupt the marketing ‘norm’… and to get loads of free advertising along the way.  Very clever!

We don’t all have to be like Sir RB

While we don’t all have to be like Sir Richard to get our personal brand out there, we must do things differently to all the others who compete with us in our market niche.

What’s your chandelier swinging equivalent to getting noticed as an expert in your industry or market niche?

While company branding is important, people buy from people, so as business owners and entrepreneurs we must have a strong personal brand.  And delightfully, technology has made standing out as a personal brand a lot easier for everyone.

Get YOUR Business NoTiCeD – FREE Webinar

If you’d like to learn more about how to Stand Out and Get YOUR Business NoTiCeD, please join me at my FREE webinar, Thursday, 20 April at 8pm BST/9pm CEST/ 3pm EST, where I will be sharing my thoughts on how you can grow your business. You can register here.

My 10 Top Tips To Get Your Business Noticed

Here are my 10 top tips to get you noticed in business.

1. Be clear (and passionate) about why you do what you do!

I know that sounds quaint, but if you’re not passionate about why you do what you do, then no-one will care who you are or what you offer.

Why are you in business?  What difference do you want to make in the lives of your customers? Once you’ve got that ‘why’, let your customers and prospects know.  They’ll feel your passion and they’ll like you for it.

2. What is your market niche?

Who is your perfect customer?  If you don’t know that your marketing will be lost – it’ll fall through the cracks.  These days, we MUST specifically niche our market… and then go after it with all our messaging.

3. How are you different?

What’s unique about you – and the products and services you offer?  Get that message nailed, and quickly.  Otherwise you and your business will be just like the rest of your competitors – offering more of the same.

4. Get personal

Let everyone see the real you and your personal style… not the air brushed ‘plastic fantastic’ version of you.  People buy from people.

We like failure and success – we like ‘warts and all’ people… not gods and goddesses who can do no wrong.  Not everyone will like you, but those who do will be loyal to you and your style.

5. Get seen – pick your marketing platforms

There are so many ways to get ‘seen’ in business that it can be exciting and overwhelming.  Work out what suits you best and go for it.  Remember, you must be seen online and offline regardless of what your business is.

Work out your marketing platforms, and exploit them with a carefully crafted strategy and actions plan – one for you and your personal brand and another for your company’s brand.

6. Grab your keywords

Google rules the world – or at least the SEO world – so we all need to know what keywords we want to be found for…. it’s an art and science;  get help to nail this part of your personal and company brand marketing strategies so that you’ll be found for YOUR keywords when they’re ‘Googled’.

7. Capture your leads

What’s your system for capturing leads as they come to you?  It’s called an email list (or community or tribe).  Get that sorted and you’ll start growing your prospect list… so long as you nurture them and demonstrate your expertise and authority in your niche.

8. Nurture your prospects

Seldom will people become customers on day one.  Create a personal and business branding communications strategy that takes your prospects on a journey with you.  How can you communicate with them to consistently demonstrate that you are an expert or authority in your field?

9. What’s your business model?

It’s no good having people on your list and not doing anything with them.  Work out how you’ll take your prospects from followers to customers.  How can you package up your knowledge, products and services to add value to your prospects so they continue to get to know, trust and respect you as the industry expert?  Then how do you take them to paying customers?  Your business model is the key to your success.

10. Do the work – persistently and consistently

Building a brand – a personal or company brand – takes time, so you have to keep at it.  Keep going, even when the going gets tough, and all of a sudden that hard work will pay off.  I promise.

Well, that’s it.  10 personal branding tips to GET YOUR BUSINESS NoTiCeD.  Personal branding is for everyone … not just celebs, so embrace it – see yourself as branded and stand out in your market niche.

Get YOUR Business NoTiCeD – FREE Webinar

Remember to join me to learn more about how to Stand Out and Get YOUR Business NoTiCeD, at my FREE webinar, Thursday, 20 April at 8pm BST/9pm CEST/ 3pm EST, where I will be sharing my thoughts on how you can grow your business. Please register here now.

Have a great week.

With love, Adèle x