How to Build a Memorable Personal Brand on Twitter

From Hubspot, Wendy Marx offers terrific guidance on how to build your brand on Twitter.  She recommends following the leaders in your industry, defining your brand, and sharpening your profile and provides actionable takeaways.  For example, she writes:  

Step #4: Create and curate great content. Repeat.

Tweet negative things and you’ll be seen as a naysayer. Tweet helpful, insightful content and you’ll grow your reputation. If there’s a common thread among those with impressive Twitter brands, it's that they all post a steady stream of valuable content.

“You can’t tweet enough,” urges Schaffer. This doesn't mean that you should aim for 100 tweets a day, but if you're seeing positive engagement, keep it going.

The lesson? Find your rhythm. For example, Michael Brenner, author and CEO of Marketing Insider, says he tweets every hour typically from his smart phone while reading. “I’m a big fan of email newsletters,” he says. “I scan the headlines and if I read the article, I share it.”

While it’s tempting to rely solely on curated content, if you’re serious about building your personal brand, try to post some original content. “The fuel of social media is content,” says Schaefer. “I devote an enormous amount of time to creating original content on my blog which then becomes something I can deliver on Twitter that is helpful and unique.”

Smith says she likes to spotlight up-and-coming bloggers and experts that not many people are tweeting about. “I want to give people a leg up and not just share the same super popular blog posts others were sharing,” she says.

Actionable Takeaways:

1. Don’t share content without identifying the source or the author, says Schaffer. Don’t simply say via @HubSpot or @HuffingtonPost. Take the trouble to also identify the author, who will appreciate the mention.
2. Tweet with an image whenever possible. Posts with images on social media are 40X more likely to get shared. “I tweet 100% of my tweets with images,” says Schaffer.

Read the full story at How to Build a Memorable Personal Brand on Twitter

6 Personal Branding Secrets from Drag Queens

From Fast Company, Gwen Moran offers six fabulous lessons about personal branding gleaned from drag queens.  Gwen provides these two to start:  

1. DEVELOP YOUR PERSONA

Huba recommends thinking of the brand you wish to develop as your "alter ego," just as many drag queens develop big, bold personas.

"You craft your persona with intention. It has to be authentic, but it also has to stand out and stand for something. You need to develop a fully rounded character," Huba explains. Answer those questions about yourself as a first step."If you're a good drag queen, you think about a 360-degree view. Who is this person? What is their name? What is their backstory? What are their personality traits? How would you describe them?

2. DEVELOP "EVERYDAY DRAG"

We live in a visual world, and when people see you, they form immediate opinions about who you are, Huba says. Drag queens know this and dress the part. Huba changed her personal style to help make her more confident in various situations and better project the way she wanted other people to see her. She worked with a department store stylist and found a few pieces that made her feel great about herself. The stylist told her that she wasn’t dressing "as fierce as you really are," she recalls.

"No one had ever called me fierce, and that’s what I wanted to be," she says. It’s a new take on "power dressing," where your clothes match the persona you’re building.

Read the full story at 6 Personal Branding Secrets from Drag Queens

Personal Branding: 10 Steps Toward a New Professional You

Dorie Clark says that the Internet is Your Resume.  People will find out more about you online than they will through almost any other means.  It is important to manage your personal brand on the internet so that anyone who googles you gets the best impression of you.

Rose Leadem has shared the following infographic the provides 10 basic steps to managing your personal brand on Entreprenuer. These steps are a great way to get started.

 The infographic was developed by Mel Carlon of Delightful Communications.

12 Storytelling Techniques For Creating A More Powerful Brand

From Forbes, Forbes Coaches Council shares its recommendations for storytelling techniques for building your brand.  They write: 

1. Use The Word That Most Describes Your Brand Repeatedly

If your brand were one word, what would it be? If you’re telling a story about your brand, bring each peak and valley in your story back to that one word. Use a powerful word that artfully describes your unique brand. Use something emotive, as people tend to remember how you make them feel versus what you say. And, if that word can be visually linked to your brand, you’re gold.   – Cha Tekeli, Chalamode, Inc.

2. Share Your Hero’s Journey

You are a company run by human beings for human beings. Share the authenticity of your hero’s journey with the world. Life is full of obstacles, pain, and low points, not just high points and celebrations. Show your light and your darkness. Invite the world into what you stand for as a brand and where you are strong, but also where you are frail. It’s time for companies to get real.   – Corey Blake, Round Table Companies

3. Be 100% Real And Share Your Journey

People connect with people. Stories that share triumph, tribulations, and the overcoming of obstacles are examples of ways to achieve this. More simply put, allow yourself to be seen as a round character rather than a flat character. This literary idea can be inputted into a powerful brand by conveying your emotions, inner thoughts, and the struggles you have encountered along the way.   – Wendi Weiner, JD, NCRW, CPRW, CCTC, CCM, The Writing Guru

Read the full story at 12 Storytelling Techniques For Creating A More Powerful Brand

7 Essential Tools for Building Your Personal Brand Online

From Social Media Today, Ryan Erskine offers his recommendations on 7 tools for building your personal brand online.  Ryan writes:

Here are 7 tools that make it easy to monitor and improve your online brand.

1. Google Alerts

You cannot afford to miss out on conversations about your brand.

It’s nice to know when you get a shout out, and proactive monitoring could mean the difference between effectively handling a crisis and completely dropping the ball.

The bottom line is you need to be the first to know when you’re mentioned online.

Craft a Google alert alert to stay on top of your mentions or those of your competition. Decide how often you want to receive the updates and the rest will handle itself.

2. Canva

Canva makes digital designing a cinch. Want to build a custom Twitter header or a high quality slideshow? Maybe a bespoke Pinterest pin or a beautiful Infographic?

The sky's the limit with Canva and you don’t need any design skills. With so many awesome templates, you can strategize visual elements and colors without stressing about the quality of the result.

Once you’re happy with a template, you can use it again and again to deliver visual content that your audience can come to expect and enjoy.

Canva is free with the opportunity to buy some templates and features for $1 each. I’ve spent a few dollars here and there but you can develop amazing designs without spending a cent.

3. BrandYourself

If you’re looking to improve your chances of getting hired or getting leads, then you’ll want to keep an eye on your online presence. And BrandYourself’s DIY tool is the one you’ll need.

With BrandYourself’s tool, you can track the movement of your search results over time. You’ll be notified when things change, get tips on how to improve your online properties to be SEO-friendly, and learn what to do to help things rise in search results over time.

The free DIY tool lets you track three online profiles while the $99 per year subscription gives you unlimited ability to track and improve your search results.

If you’re going to spend any money improving your online brand, BrandYourself’s DIY tool is the way to go.

Read the full story at 7 Essential Tools for Building Your Personal Brand Online

Personal Branding - A Step by Step Guide

Mattias Cronborc developed this terrific infographic with a step by step guide for building your personal brand.

4 Misconceptions About Personal Branding You Need To Abandon Right Now

From Fast Company, Erica Breuer share four misconceptions about personal branding.  The first one is: 

1. "I’M NOT THE KIND OF PERSON WHO NEEDS A WEB PRESENCE"

This is the lie I hear from my clients most frequently. It’s usually paired with the mantra "I’m really kind of a private person" or "I hate social media." The worst case I’ve run into was a super talented woman targeting a digital marketing job—and she was doing it without an active Twitter feed. Yikes!

If you’re in any vein of technology or marketing these days, you have to be active on more than just LinkedIn. But you don’t have to be the type of person who shares pictures of your lunch or tweets every thought you have to build your brand on the web. You don’t even have to churn out lengthy blog posts to start branding yourself as someone who’s engaged in an industry.The truth: You can have an active web presence without baring your soul.

All you have to do is select one to two social platforms that work for you and engage with content that’s relevant to your area of expertise. Simple shares and comments every other day or so.

See the full list and read the full story at  4 Misconceptions About Personal Branding You Need To Abandon Right Now