If you’re here, you’re probably wondering about personal branding for business owners and bloggers and if you should focus on it. I say yes – you should be, as there are several very good reasons why personal branding for bloggers and solopreneurs is a powerful strategy!
Consciously building one’s brand is intensive, but the rewards are great.
Yes, it’s tough working on the basics of starting and growing a blog or a solopreneur business. However, if you want success, you will also need to add personal branding as a growth strategy.
Many of the top successful bloggers and solopreneurs all do one thing: they have a personal branding plan in place.
Branding your website or blog is one thing. However, your readers and site visitors want to know who is the person behind it! People are naturally attracted to other people and their ideas.
I made the mistake of hiding behind my Suburban Tourist blog. Not focusing on my personal branding ended up holding me back for many years. I could have been farther ahead!
When I changed my mindset and decided to focus on myself as the key driver behind my site, things changed drastically.
Still not sure this is something you should be doing?
I’ll take you through the top five reasons why personal branding is important for bloggers and solopreneurs. I hope you’ll be inspired to develop and implement your own personal branding plan and strategy!
DISCLOSURE: This post contains affiliate links, meaning if you click on a product or service, and decide to purchase it, I may receive a commission at no extra cost to you. All recommended products and services are based on my positive experience with them. For more information, please read my Disclaimer.
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What Is Personal Branding?
Before we jump into the reasons why it’s important to create a personal branding plan, we need to first understand what it is!
Personal branding is the conscious act of growing one’s personal brand.
Personal branding is the systemic, strategically planned process of building your brand so that people perceive you in a specific way that helps your blog/business flourish.
Creating a personal brand is an ongoing process that can take months if not years. It can take a while to get you to a point where you are successful and recognized as an expert.
So, it’s good to start sooner rather than later!
Personal Branding For Business Owners And Bloggers: 5 Reasons Why It’s Important
Still on the fence about spending extra time creating a personal brand strategy alongside your blog or business?
Personal branding for bloggers is a method to achieving success. I hope these reasons why personal branding is important will motivate you!
This post is for:
- Small business owners who are heavily focused on growing their brand, understanding that their personal story is a driver for customer interest and desire to purchase products/services
- New bloggers thinking about how to position themselves as niche experts, right from the start.
- Those who have been blogging for a while but without consciously focusing on how to position themselves.
Many bloggers fail to realize that the blogger can attract readers to a site. Hey, I did, so don’t beat yourself up over it, if you thought so too.
Unfortunately, hiding behind one’s blog or site does not reap any rewards.
Some may be using various tactics and activities to subconsciously brand themselves.
For some, growing a personal brand is a priority, but don’t know where to start.
For example, writing about oneself on an About Me page is sometimes the extent of “personally branding” yourself. It’s a good start.
Whichever camp you’re in – either afraid, doing it subconsciously and haphazardly, or actively considering growing your personal brand – the key steps for personal branding are:
- Research
- Strategize and plan
- Implement your strategies
I hope to encourage you to start your personal branding journey!
So let’s get started with the list of why it’s important to grow your personal brand.
1. Build Personal Credibility, Authority And Trust In You
Personal branding for bloggers and business owners is a way to build credibility and authority.
You’ve just started a blog or solopreneur business. Nobody knows you. Site visitors don’t know if they can trust you!
If you’re hiding behind your blog, site visitors aren’t sure if the content they’re reading is credible. People like to know who the author is and their background experience. This adds a level of trust.
Secondly, you build authority in your niche topic.
Over time, if you’re actively promoting yourself, and sharing valuable content freely with your key readers and potential customers, they will see you as an authority on your topic.
They will be more likely to purchase digital products and services that you offer as they’ll see you as credible and helpful.
PRO TIP: If you haven’t heard of EEAT in terms of SEO, you should! Ranking factors now include experience, expertise, authority and trustworthiness. Guess how you develop this? You guessed it – through building your personal brand.
| RELATED: How To Find Your Authentic Brand Voice That Resonates With Readers
2. Boost Visibility And Grow Your Audience
When you’re actively putting yourself “out there”, you’re attracting interest in yourself and what you do!
It doesn’t matter if you are doing personal branding as a business owner of for your blog.
I can’t tell you how many interesting people I have found through Facebook groups and Instagram.
These people have decided to engage with others and share content on topics that interest me.
Your key objective is to build awareness for yourself and your blog/business. When you actively post on social media, in active, well-run Facebook groups, and reach other to others via email or comments, you’re making yourself known!
As a result of boosting your visibility you’re growing your audience because if people find you interesting, they will follow you and your blog/business.
Growing your audience grows your blog/site traffic. And you know what that can bring! More profits and income over time.
| RELATED: Over 100 Marketing, Blogging And Business Hashtags for Instagram
3. Grow Your Network And Leverage A Broader Audience
Personal branding for business owners and bloggers is a smart strategy because it helps you grow your network.
Your broader network of industry-related friends can help your business grow so much faster. Consider how your network of contacts can help you:
- With testimonials for your products/services
- Sharing your free lead magnet with their followers, your new product launches, etc.
- Referring people to you for your products or services
- Giving you a boost in exposure via guest posts, Instagram interviews, podcast interviews
And so much more!
Use personal branding to build your blogger network or business network and watch your business thrive.
4. New Business Opportunities And Collaborations
Another reason why growing your personal brand is beneficial is that it attracts new business opportunities and collaborations.
Consider this: when you have a strong personal brand, that aligns with another brand or another blogger/solopreneur, the chances are they will want to partner with you on a collaboration.
You can do things such as:
- Working together to create a summit
- Partnering for a joint training that leverages you and the other person’s strengths
- Share each other’s offers to newsletter subscribers, social media followers
- Do product reviews, promote courses, and digital content (especially beneficial if you have an affiliate program – as I do!)
The options are endless. Yet another reason to build a personal brand strategy and implement it!
| RELATED: How To Create An Awesome Lead Magnet: 50 Ideas For Inspiration
| RELATED: 15 Ways To Promote Your Affiliate Links Successfully
5. Ask For More Money!
The last reason why growing your personal brand is an important strategy is that it gives you the ability to ask for more money.
With all of the above benefits of nurturing and growing your personal brand, comes a greater audience. A larger audience and community mean more blog traffic and engagement.
It also means you have more credibility and a position as a niche expert. You become an influencer.
Brands love working with influencers who can help them create awareness and interest in their products and services. If you have a large, engaged audience and you’re getting traffic, you can ask for more money for sponsored campaigns.
The same applies to your services. Consider this: as you become known as one of the top experts in your niche, your coaching or consulting rates can go up.
Instead of $125/hr for a one-hour coaching session, you can be asking for $150 + based on your years of experience, results, and your position as an expert.
PRO TIP: Look professional in how you sell your products and services! Invest in quality platforms such as Podia to sell your coaching services, as well as courses and digital downloads. I’ve been using it to house all of my digital offerings and to coordinate payment for my blog coaching services. Read my Podia review and check it out yourself by trying the free trial version!
Keep consistent with your visual branding – here’s a free printable that helps you organize your fonts, colour palette (HEX #’s), and more!
| RELATED: The Best Online Coaching Tools To Invest In To Grow Your Business
Creating A Personal Brand
Now that you know more about personal branding for bloggers and solopreneurs, the next question is, where do you start?
By creating a personal brand strategy.
Plans take time to research and develop. If you’re serious about positioning yourself as a niche expert and as somebody who attracts readers, clients and customers, do it right, from the start.
One thing that you can do today is to tweak your About Me page to better position and introduce yourself to readers.
Start with this About Me page worksheet, that will guide you as you figure out your audience, your mission and how to best position yourself. It’ll be part of your personal branding strategy.
Next, sit down and start researching what others are doing, and how you can grow your own personal brand.
Create an official plan with objectives, strategies and tactics. Include measurable goals.
And then implement it!
Be original: avoid copying content from others (you’ll be caught and labelled as a plagiarist). Have an opinionated – share your stories and thoughts. Be a leader in your niche.
When you start to consciously grow your personal brand, you will see weekly, monthly and annual growth with your blog or business.
Don’t give up when something doesn’t work 100% as you anticipated it would. Change strategies, and keep moving forward! You will succeed!
Need help building a personal brand strategy? Let’s connect. I offer support through personal brand coaching, alongside blog coaching.
| READ MORE: A Guide To Branding Your Blog Or Online Business
QUESTION: Are you starting or planning to work on your personal brand strategy? What do you find the most challenging about growing your personal brand?
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I agree fully, Margaret. Building personal blogging brands instills trust. We stand out in a brilliant way by branding ourselves through blogging.
Ryan
Glad you agree Ryan!
I completely agree – creating a personal brand is an important component in this industry. It’s been a scary part of the journey for me, but I truly believe it is a critical part of relationship-building with my audience. Oh, and I’ll be working with your Free About Me Page Template soon so that I can really hone in on my message and personal branding that much more. Thanks for sharing!
I agree! Personal branding is essential for bloggers and solopreneurs to stand out. But it does take time, and some have it easier than others. As you mentioned above, the important thing is to keep moving forward. Thanks for sharing.
Personal branding is so important for my overall strategy as I am trying to come off as friendly and relatable. I want my audience go know they are not alone. So putting a face and a feeling to my blog really helps them trust and bond with me.
I think I need some help with this! Seem a little unclear about my branding still… thanks for the share!
So I love this. I absolutely agree. I think it’s so so important to stand out and branding is the way. This was so in depth as well!
Thank you Christina! Hope it’s given you some useful tips!