“Think of your personal brand statement as a ‘cut to the chase’ elevator speech.”
– Anonymous

Over 4.8 billion people have access to the internet. 

That equals about 60.9% of the global population. 

The Covid-19 pandemic has accelerated the digital revolution like nothing we’ve ever seen before. From driving demand for internet access to skyrocketing global data consumption, the pandemic has served as a catalyst.

This digital revolution has resulted in an ever-increasing number of people hunting for jobs, freelance work, and high-ticket clients/customers within their niche over the internet.

But if you want to get hired, close deals, or convert high-ticket clients, you need to build a strong online presence. From your social profiles to your website, you need to not only position yourself as an industry expert but also someone who’s trustworthy, credible, and authoritative.

And that’s exactly what strong personal branding can help you with.

Want to attract real estate investors? You need to build a strong and bold personal brand.

Seeking a job? Same.

You may be extremely talented and perfectly capable of delivering high-quality service – but if your personal branding efforts don’t resonate with your offering and fail to help you build trust and confidence– your target audience will find it extremely difficult to count on you.

This means – you can be the very best in your niche yet still fail to convert clients and close deals.

I know that sucks.

But that doesn’t mean you can’t do anything about it.

Numerous thought-leaders, business consultants, and influencers are hell-bent on building a strong personal brand. That’s because they don’t want to be a nameless part of a corporate brand anymore.

And my advice for you would be to do the same.

While creating your personal brand – I’ve seen most entrepreneurs, business consultants, influencers make two big mistakes without even being aware of it.

First – they don’t build a fool-proof personal branding strategy that helps them steer in the right direction and build growth systems that are focused on helping them achieve their goals.

Second – even if they do build a personal branding strategy, they don’t do it right. They fail to build a simple yet detailed statement or two that helps them showcase their expertise and USP.

This statement is nothing but a personal brand statement that’ll have a major impact on your personal branding efforts.

Some people keep it too informative and technical. On the other hand, others keep it too casual and forget to highlight the important parts.

Don’t make the same mistake they do.

To build a strong, rock-solid personal brand, you need to build a bold personal brand statement that’ll not only help you showcase your expertise but, at the same time, sum up everything about your personal brand.

Don’t worry if you’re facing a hard time summing up your personal brand statement. This blog post has been rolled out to help you understand what a personal brand statement actually is and the five best personal brand statement examples that’ll inspire you.

What’s a Personal Brand Statement?

Think of your personal brand statement as a slogan, tagline, catchphrase about you and your services.

But – it’s not just a catchphrase.

A personal brand statement is a one-or-two liner that sums up your brand. From helping you showcase what you do to your USP to who you’re trying to help, this statement will help you position yourself as an industry expert and leave a great impression.

At the same time, you need to make sure that it’s catchy – that’s the only way you will be able to make your audience remember and recognize you.

It needs to be strong.

At the same time – it needs to be informative yet short.

And most importantly, you should make sure that it’s catchy enough such that it keeps you at the top of your audience’s minds.

While building a personal brand statement, it’s critical to choose your words carefully. At the same time, you need to make sure that you arrange them in the right manner.

But in the end – this statement should be a perfect reflection of your USP, service, identity, and values.

Some tips while writing a personal brand statement:

• Be honest
• Make it memorable
• Choose an audience
• Showcase your expertise
• Highlight your USP
• Explain how you add value to your target audience’s lives
• Be concise
• Don’t make it too casual
• Don’t make it too technical
• Keep it simple and short

While I can go on and on – I want you to build a strong personal brand statement – which is why I’ve prepared a list of the five best personal brand statement examples to inspire you.

Let’s have a look.

5 Genius Personal Brand Statement Examples to Inspire You

Here’s our personal brand statement examples list:

• Aaron Orendorff
• Ann Handley
• Neil Patel
• Larry Kim
• Dave Nelson

Aaron Orendorff

“Saving the world from bad content.”

Millions of blog posts are published every single day.

The worldwide web is flooded with gazillions of content pieces.

And the bad news is – the majority of these content pieces are completely worthless and boring, and dull to read. On top of this, these content pieces don’t deliver value. 

Most marketers, entrepreneurs, and businesses build content just for the sake of boosting their rankings on the SERPs. And while doing so – they produce content pieces keeping only the search engines in mind. 

What they fail to focus on is the fact that their readers are humans.

Aaron Orendorff already knows this. Who’s this guy? He’s one of the high-grade content marketers on the world wide web and a regular contributor at Business Insider, Mashable, and many other major publications.

Every single one of his content pieces is highly engaging, well-researched, informative, and manages to keep his audience at the edge of their seats. Also, the content he rolls out is heavily focused on delivering actual value, unlike most content pieces published on the internet.

His personal brand statement “Saving the world from bad content” sums up his expertise. This statement is followed by a “B2B content strategy that’s built for humans, generates qualified leads, and scales over time.”

The reason why Aaron’s statement tops our “5 Genius Personal Brand Statement Examples” list is not only because it catches his audience’s attention but also sheds light on the biggest problem with content marketing. Also, he perfectly demonstrates expertise in his niche by having a perfectly aligned sub-headline in place. 

Believe it or not – he has summed up his entire resume in just two statements.

And that’s a huge achievement.

Ann Handley

“Empowering ridiculously good marketing.”

And here’s the second entry in our top five personal brand statement examples list.

Those who aren’t aware who Ann Handley is – she’s a digital marketing pioneer and WSJ best-selling author. She inspires marketers to build marketing strategies that get real-world results. She’s the author of “Everybody Writes: Your Go-To Guide to Creating Ridiculously Good Content.” 

Also, she has co-authored “How to Create Killer Blogs, Podcasts, Videos, Ebooks, Webinars (and More) That Engage Customers and Ignite Your Business.”

She has contributed bylines and commentary to IBM’s Think Marketing, Entrepreneur Magazine, Mashable, Huffington Post, and The Wall Street Journal. 

Her personal statement “Empowering Ridiculously Good Marketing” perfectly sums her achievements, expertise, and what she stands for. It’s short and on-point. Also, note that she has used the power words “ridiculously good” to generate buzz. 

This statement is a perfect reflection of how good Ann is at what she does. She’s a great author and marketer – but at the same time, she knows how to build a strong personal brand.

This statement is followed by “Digital marketing pioneer, writer, speaker Ann Handley inspires marketers to create marketing magic that gets real-world results.”

 This statement informs what Ann Handley does and gives her audience an idea that she helps marketers achieve what most consider to be impossible. 

Neil Patel

“Do you want more traffic?”

Click here to listen to Adam’s insightful conversation with Neil Patel 🙂 Also, don’t forget to leave your valuable feedback on iTunes – that’s what keeps our founder going – your support matters.

Neil Patel is a digital marketing predator. He’s a ridiculously good marketer and helps marketers and brands level up their marketing efforts with his easy-to-consume yet informative blog posts and other content pieces.

He’s the co-founder of KISSmetrics, Hello Bar, Crazy Egg, and Neil Patel Digital agency. Every single one of these companies is focused on helping up-and-coming as well as veteran online marketers, as well as brands, level up their marketing game.

He’s really good at what he does.

And his content marketing efforts perfectly reflect this.

His personal brand statement “Do you want more traffic?” isn’t just a simple question – but it perfectly sums up what Neil Patel can help his target audience with. While his statement is simple, his years of experience, strong personal branding efforts, and reputation helps him back up his claim. 

His personal brand statement sparks curiosity. Of course, brands want more traffic – this personal brand statement in the form of a question is his way of showcasing his expertise and conveying the message that he’s capable of helping brands boost their website traffic.

Larry Kim

“Be a unicorn in a sea of donkeys.”

Who’s Larry Kim? He’s the founder of WordStream – the World’s top PPC marketing software company and the CEO of MobileMonkey – a chatbot-building platform for marketing professionals and businesses. At the same time, he’s a search engine marketing expert. 

Not many marketing companies are capable of delivering brilliant results. And you’ll find most of them to fail at what they do. His personal brand statement, “Be a Unicorn in a Sea of Donkeys,” helps him position himself as a unicorn in a world full of donkeys. 

This statement builds a rock-solid impression and helps Larry generate massive buzz. He’s not highlighting his expertise directly via his personal brand statement. Instead, he’s using the power of words to position himself as a marketing pioneer. That’s the reason Larry’s statement made it to our top five personal brand statement examples list.

Also, he’s conveying the message that to actually stand out; you need to stop following the masses. You need to be different and special. This statement helps him not only show that he’s unique and special, but he also wants his audience to do the same.  

Larry’s personal brand statement is fun and unique. At the same time, it’s catchy, and his audience is bound to remember it. 

Dave Nelson

“I believe in you… Now you must believe in yourself.”

While most entrepreneurs, business consultants, marketing veterans, real estate experts, and people in other industries craft personal brand statements that help them position themselves as industry experts and share their experience and values, what you need to know is that not always does a personal brand statement need to be about you.

Yes – that’s right.

Remember – it’s your audience that will be reading this statement.

So, it makes sense that you build it for them.

Dave Nelson – a personal trainer who once struggled with obesity – he uses his personal statement “I believe in you… Now you must believe in yourself” to target his audience who lack self-esteem.

These days, people lack confidence. Obesity has a measurable and clear impact on self-esteem. If you’re overweight, the chances are that you may be feeling angry, frustrated, and upset.

At the same time, you may find it extremely hard to believe in yourself.

Dave faced the same problem once.

But – if you want to change your life – you need to believe in yourself.

That’s the only way you’ll be able to achieve what you want badly in life. 

Dave’s personal brand statement makes his audience get up and take some kind of action.

He encourages his audience to believe in themselves – which makes his personal brand statement even more unique.

His statement is empowering. And it helps him connect with his audience emotionally. 

And that’s what makes it so unique and catchy.

Build Your Personal Brand Statement Today!

If you already have a personal brand statement yet doesn’t make your audience take the desired action – then I hate to be the bearer of the bad news – it sucks.

Yes – I prefer being honest – that’s what helps me deliver exceptional results.

Your personal brand statement should:

• Be honest
• Be memorable
• Highlight your audience’s pain points
• Showcase your expertise
• Highlight your USP
• Simple and short
• Make your audience feel emotionally invested in you.

Inspire your personal brand statement using the five brilliant examples we’ve mentioned above.

Most entrepreneurs think of crafting a personal brand statement to be nothing but a formality. But – let me tell you this – it’s not. 

This statement may be capable enough to help you close multi-million-dollar deals. Maybe – billion – who knows?

That’s the reason you need to put in your valuable time and efforts crafting a brilliant personal brand statement – for a better future ☺

“Personal branding is all about managing your name – even if you aren’t a business owner – in a world full of disinformation, misinformation, plus semi-permanent Google records.

Going on a date? Chances are that your blind date has already Googled your name.

Going to a job interview? Ditto.”
– Tim Ferriss

Most people confuse personal branding with social media marketing.

But – it’s not. 

Building a personal brand isn’t just limited to increasing your Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, or Instagram followers and boosting your social media engagement rate. 

Those are just the perks of personal branding.

But – personal branding is positioning yourself as an industry expert such that people in your niche look up to you as a thought leader – someone who’s credible, trustworthy, and authoritative. 

Having a bold personal brand will help you make your audience take the desired action. 

Upon hearing your name, they should feel confident – that’s because they trust you already and expect you to deliver what they want.

For example, Change Creator’s co-founder Adam Force is one of the most well-established branding experts with a strong personal brand. Believe me – I’ve seen people look up to him. 

So, whenever Adam’s audience hears from him, they know they can trust this guy to deliver the desired results and solve their problems. They know they can trust him.

Recently, he published an article titled “Uncover the True Meaning of Branding.” It’s one of the best-performing content pieces on the Change Creator website. The reason – Adam’s audience already knows that Adam is a branding expert and knows what a personal brand actually is. 

So – when they click-through the blog post on search engines, social media, Change Creator blog section, or other sources, they already know that the information they’ll be receiving will deliver actual value.

And that’s the power of personal branding.

Building a strong and bold personal brand is the key to success. It’s not a one-time thing or strategy you need to implement.

Instead, it’s a continuous process. 

Experts like Neil Patel, Gary Vaynerchuk, Jeff Goins, and many others already know it. And that’s the reason they have knocked their personal branding efforts out of the park.

This blog post lists down the ten best personal branding examples you should look up to – if you’re looking forward to building a strong personal brand and positioning yourself as an expert in your niche.

So, let’s dive straight into it.

10 Brilliant Personal Branding Examples One Should Look Up To

Okay, so here are the top ten brilliant personal branding examples:

• Elon Musk
• Gary Vaynerchuk
• Mo Farah
• Neil Patel
• Seth Godin
• Brian Dean
• Shaun White
• Leonardo DiCaprio
• Oprah Winfrey
• Sean Ogle

Let’s set foot in the realm of personal branding. 

Elon Musk

Who am I kidding? We all know who Elon Musk is. 

You may love him or hate him – but his name is almost as well-known and popular as Google, Apple, Coca-Cola. And it doesn’t matter if you have an interest in the technology field or not; the chances are that you may be familiar with this guy.

Elon Musk has launched several businesses in the past few years, some of which include Zip2 (his first startup), PayPal, Tesla, SpaceX, The Boring Company, and more.

The list goes on and on.

He’s not just a tech expert. And he’s most certainly not famous just because his businesses have done well over the years.

No – it’s so much more than that.

Elon Musk’s tweet led to the rise of Dogecoin – a well-known cryptocurrency. At the same time, one of his tweets crashed the cryptocurrency market like nothing we’ve ever seen before:

His drive, success story, and the will to put futuristic technology into an average person’s hands have helped him position himself as an industry expert and build a strong personal brand. He’s known for making the impossible “possible.”

And that’s what makes him such a big inspiration.

For some, Elon Musk’s rise to success may seem like an overnight one. But trust me on this one – it’s not. While his dedication, hard work, and undeniable will to succeed have surely helped him establish a strong personal brand, some other factors that have heavily contributed include:

• His unique personality – not because of his long list of ventures but because of his unique personality and how he interacts with people. Just pick any of his interviews and you’ll find every single one of those to be highly engaging and intriguing.
• He’s not one-of-those made-up corporate CEOs that are focused on building a strong public image. With Elon, it’s different and feels real. He says stuff how it actually is. Usually, you’ll see him answering questions directly rather than going the corporate way.
• Another reason – his success story as an entrepreneur – rise from zero to a billionaire is inspirational and motivational.
• All of his businesses are focused on solving real-world problems. 
• Elon cares. Time and time again has he showcased his concerns over population collapse, AI, climate change, and other world problems which most entrepreneurs definitely don’t care about. And the best part is that most of his ventures are focused on making a change and addressing these issues.

These points have helped him build a strong personal brand. 

Gary Vaynerchuk

Gary Vaynerchuk is one of those guys who you can’t resist listening to. He’s a self-made multi-millionaire who not only knows how to make money but loves sharing his knowledge and experience regarding the same. 

What makes him unique is his love for swear words. If you listen to his videos, you may already be aware of the fact that he just loves using them. This showcases his brutal honesty – positioning him as confident, authentic, intriguing, and practical. During an interview once, he revealed that his favorite curse word is “di**face.”

As stated by him – “it’s just something that happens when I’ve the camera on me.”

His brutal honesty is one of the reasons why millions of his followers love listening to his podcast, reading his books, and consuming his content pieces across different digital platforms. It allows people to think of him as transparent and someone who shares his experience honestly, unlike those other entrepreneurs flooded throughout the internet. 

These are the four points that have helped Gary build a strong personal brand:

• He’s authentic – and he takes great pride in it – his love for swear words has helped him rise to the top.
• He works his ass off – I’ve had the chance to interact with him and he’s just one of those guys that work day and night.
• He is familiar with the things that are in high demand and valuable.
• He’s rock-focused on delivering actual value to his audience – and he doesn’t mind sharing truly value-adding strategies that most of the top giants are afraid of doing.
• He’s on Snapchat. He’s on YouTube. He’s literally everywhere you go. And just like our knowledge about the universe, his brand is continuously expanding. 

He has an entrepreneurial spirit. He’s hardworking and self-confident. And he obviously knows how to draw attention to him.  

These are just a few of the traits that make him a powerful personal brand.

You’ll find his personal brand to shine on every social media platform in existence.

He acts as a spokesperson for entrepreneurs as well as anyone and everyone who desires happiness. You’ll find most of his content pieces sharing the same message over and over again – and that’s to forgo the trappings of society, finding out what you’re extremely passionate about, and turning it into a paying opportunity.

Mo Farah

Mo Farah relocated from Mogadishu to England with his family when he was 8. While in West London, his PE teacher saw how talented Mo really is and strongly believed that he could become a star runner.

And here we are – in 2021 – Mo Farah is the most popular and successful British track athlete in Olympic games history. He’s known for his Olympic gold medal victory in 2012 and 2016. 

Over the course of the past few years, he has heavily focused on personal branding and also received endorsements from popular sports brands like Nike. His 2012 and 2016 gold medal wins have helped him develop a huge fanbase. This was followed by Mo cementing his legacy by collaborating with sports brands like Nike and keeping his audience up-to-date about his life and the brands he’s collaborating with through his social media profiles.

What makes Mo stand out is his down-to-earth personality. At one point, he dedicated each of his 4 gold medals victory to each of his 4 children. 

You’ll find him to be really active on social media platforms – as he keeps the conversation going and shares his experience with his followers.

Neil Patel

Click here to listen to Adam’s conversation with Neil Patel on Change Creator’s Authentic Brand Mastery Podcast. Also, every single one of your opinions matters – so it’d be really helpful if you could share your valuable feedback 🙂

And here comes my personal favorite – Neil Patel. He’s not just a marketing guru – but I believe that he’s a marketing expert who’s on a mission to helping up-and-coming digital marketers achieve tremendous success. Also, he helps brands skyrocket their marketing efforts via his value-adding content pieces.

He’s on a mission to revolutionize the marketing industry – which he has done already.

He’s the co-founder of KISSmetrics, Crazy Egg, Hello Bar, and Neil Patel Digital agency – each of these companies is focused on helping online marketers, as well as brands, level up their marketing game.

In the realm of digital marketing, Neil Patel is a predator. And that’s not just me being all praises – just because I love consuming his content pieces. Apart from the fact that he knows all the ins and outs of the industry, he believes in delivering his message in a simplified manner. You’ll find his blog posts to be well-researched, thorough, and data-driven – which makes him the go-to expert for any brand looking forward to hiring a marketing agency.

Over the course of the last few years, Neil has cemented his position as an online marketing and SEO guru. And every content piece he rolls out is in sync with his personal brand visual elements. 

Just like Gary Vaynerchuk, you’ll find Neil Patel to be everywhere. Some may claim him to be a fake guru. But no – he’s not. What has helped him establish a strong personal brand include:

• He’s a prolific blogger and delivers highly authoritative and easy-to-consume blog posts.
• His client roster is just so incredibly impressive.
• He’s also been recognized by President Obama.
• He’s New York Times Best Selling Author
• He’s just everywhere – from forums to podcasts – you’ll find him all across the world wide web.

Click HERE to look at his life infographic to learn what made him a multi-millionaire:

I can go on and on yet still not run out of words – that’s how amazing this individual truly is.

Seth Godin

Adam Force (the founder of Change Creator) had a brilliant conversation with Seth Godin – it was so delightful to have Seth Godin on Change Creator’s Authentic Brand Mastery Podcast 🙂 Click here to listen to the full interview.

Seth Godin is a marketing veteran. He’s one of the most popular business and marketing experts who people find extremely hard to resist. In the last 25 years, Seth has published 20+ books, his thought-provoking content pieces, and his induction into the Direct Marketing Hall of Fame (2013) and Marketing Hall of Fame (2018).

He’s a rare gem known for his accomplishments as an entrepreneur and truly informative and motivating books. He’s known for giving back to society – which is really rare these days.

And the thing is – people don’t want to hear from a company. Instead, they want to hear from none other than Seth. And what makes him unique is his knack to write short-form blog posts.

Rather than producing 2,000 or 5,000-words blog posts or guides – he delivers value well within 200 words. Every single word he writes has been well-thought-out and delivers value. 

In fact, at one point – I read somewhere that editors utter, “Only Seth Godin can get away with that” when their teams deliver short-form blog posts.

Some of his unique traits that have helped Seth build a strong personal brand are:

• He’s authentic.
• People love good stories. And Seth isn’t hesitant to share them with his audience.
• He also shares stories about people who have achieved tremendous success.
• Seth is a trend-spotter. He knows how to spot things as they are beginning to gain traction.
• His writing is on-point. He’s able to convey the message well within 200 words – which companies find it extremely hard to do even after crossing the 5,000 words limit.

Brian Dean

Today’s digital world is so crowded that business owners often find it extremely difficult to understand who they should be trusting. Literally, millions of blog posts, videos, social media posts are published every day. 

And in this ever-crowded world, Brian Dean – the founder of Backlinko – breaks through the noise and delivers well-thought-out content that’s heavily focused on helping people solving their real-life problems.

His personal brand is all about trust.

You’ll literally see his audience claiming him to be the very best in his niche.

His focus on publishing practical strategies has helped him make a name for himself – allowing him to help marketers and entrepreneurs find it extremely easy to grow their online business. 

Some of Seth’s unique traits that helped him build a strong personal brand include:

• He’s the founder of Backlinko.
• Just like Neil Patel & Seth Godin, he produces content pieces that are not only engaging but deliver tremendous value to the audience.
• His “Backlinko Blog” has been claimed to be extremely valuable by numerous top publications, including Forbes, Entrepreneur.com, Inc Magazine, and many more.
• And that’s not all – he also focuses on other digital channels like YouTube, Twitter, and many more.

Professionals trust him to deliver value. And that’s what he does. Trust me on this – he lives up to his words and is one of the most brilliant marketers you’ll find on the world wide web.

Shaun White

You won’t believe this if you don’t know who Shaun White is – this guy was sponsored by Burton Snowboards when he was just 7. When I was seven, I was just busy watching cartoons and playing video games. 

Those who don’t know him – Shaun is one of the most popular American professional skateboarders, snowboarders, and musicians. He has won three Olympic gold medals in half-pipe snowboarding.

Throughout his career, he has been known for his focus on innovation and spinning in ways no snowboarders ever have. And his personal brand is based on the brilliant things Shaun can do with his body. Yes – he’s an Olympic Gold Medal winner – but Shaun isn’t known just for that. Instead, his audience tunes in to watch him not just skateboard or snowboard – but they tune in to see him defy gravity. 

You’ll find him across different platforms showing off his skills:

Instagram:

Twitter:

His Own Website:

Facebook:

The moment you land on his website – you’ll find yourself in another world – it’s just pure magic. 

And that’s the power of strong personal branding.

Leonardo DiCaprio

Okay – again, I’ll say this – who doesn’t know this guy? His rise to stardom has been impressive to watch. His acting career has – in Barney’s words – been LEGEN-wait for it- DARY.

He established Leonardo DiCaprio in 1998 – and his main goal has always been to restore balance to the threatened ecosystems. Through this – he wants to ensure the long-term health as well as the well-being of 7.8 billion people. 

From private concerts hosted by Elton John to Thailand’s Prime Minister (Yingluck Shingawatra), hundreds, if not thousands of well-known people have been a part of his cause – and this has resulted in helping him elevate his status over the course of the past few years. 

He’s not just known for his acting career. Yes – he’s a megastar – but what makes him unique and stand out is his philanthropy, which has helped him strengthen his personal brand.

Just hop onto his social media platforms and you’ll see him not promoting his films. Instead, almost all his posts will be focused on building a better world and environmental problems.

While writing this blog post, I found out that Leonardo DiCaprio invested an undiscoled amount in an Israeli cultured meat startup “Aleph Farm.”

As stated by him:

He’s not just a world-class actor. He’s a good human being as well.

He’s hell-bent on saving Earth and it shows. Also, he has joined forces with several organizations like Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC), the International Fund for Animal Welfare (IFAF), Global Green USA, World Wildlife Fund (WWF), and more.

Oprah Winfrey

This list would have been incomplete if I hadn’t included Oprah Winfrey to it. She’s the person – who’s known by her first name itself, all thanks to her brilliant personal branding efforts.

She’s the mother of personal branding. 

Who hasn’t heard of Oprah? She has capitalized on her personal branding efforts in a brilliant manner which has helped her get paid for what she loves to do and live her dream life. 

And she hasn’t just tapped into the power of personal branding just to provide herself and her loved ones an astonishing life.

Oprah has used her personal brand to change people’s actions. Once, she delivered the same message in three different episodes – which convinced a woman to stop hitting her children. You’ll see her deliver consistent messages all the time – which heavily influences people’s actions.

Also, she’s a Black American Woman – who comes from a modest background and now has become a billionaire and a TV Mogul. She’s the very first African-American woman to have launched her own production company. Also, she’s so talented that she was nominated for Academy Award after her first movie. 

Look at all her brilliant achievements HERE.

From helping her build her dream life to changing people’s actions via her consistent messaging, Oprah Winfrey has knocked her personal branding out of the park – and her example has inspired millions of women just like her.

LeBron James

Another athlete who we love watching and can’t get enough of – LeBron James, is one of the world’s most popular and successful basketball players and athletes.

People call him “King James” for being a positive role model and a HUGE inspiration. He’s the phenomenon. While he has a brilliant on-screen story, his off-screen personal branding efforts have made him a megastar. 

He has diversified into retail, media, and much more. He also launched his “I Promise School” in Akron, Ohio. You’ll find his name popping around frequently, especially in the sports industry – and that’s not only because of his achievements, but his strategic personal branding efforts have helped him come a long way.

You’ll find him sharing his story, experiences and interacting with his followers on Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, and other social media platforms. What I personally love is him sharing his authentic take on life via his social media posts – as you’ll see him rolling out posts related to his family, what he’s currently working on, and basketball.

Some of his achievements that have helped him build a strong personal brand include:

He’s really good at what he does. And that has helped him achieve worldwide recognition – which has made him a strong personal brand.

Conclusion

Rome wasn’t built in a day. And the same is the case with personal branding. You can’t build a strong personal brand overnight. 

And the thing is – building a strong personal brand is a continuous process. 

You’ll have to consistently spend your valuable time, efforts, and everything you have in you to build your personal brand – to position yourself as trustworthy, credible, authoritative, and an industry expert.

Every single name in our top 10 list has done a brilliant job at building a strong personal brand. You can do the same – but to achieve the best possible results, you need to build strategic personal branding systems that will help you hit your KPIs and achieve your goals in an efficient manner.

So, what are you waiting for?

If you’re looking for support with building a brand people love with a high-converting website, learn more here.

And if you’d like to gain more insights into personal branding, feel free to read other blog posts we’ve up and published in our blog section:

• How to Develop a Result-Oriented Brand Positioning Strategy?
• 7 Mistakes to Avoid When Naming Your Brand
• 9 Golden Rules to Tap into the Unbelievable Potential of Personal Branding

“Developing a brand positioning strategy will help you find the right parking space inside your consumers’ minds and go for it before someone else takes it.”

Laura Busche

“Here’s a once in a lifetime opportunity: I am willing to pay for any car you put your eyes on. That’s right – any car. Just go for it – it’s on the house.”

If I were to say those magical words to your face, what’d be your first impression?

I know you’d get excited.

And soon, you’d find yourself dreaming about getting your hands on a Mustang or maybe a Tesla. Or a Lamborghini.

After all, that’s the dream, isn’t it?

And when you finally make a decision, here’s what I want you to understand:

It doesn’t matter which car you chose. But the company that manufactures this car heavily influenced your decision.

So, if you chose a Mustang, Ford made you choose it.

Popular brands like Volkswagen, Tesla, Ford already know what people value the most about cars.

And whether you know it or not – brands use this kind of knowledge to build an intentional perception of their products/services in their audience’s minds.

By tapping into the power of brand positioning, companies position their brands in the mind of their consumers and prospects.

Think of any popular brand.

Whether it’s Apple or Nike, any popular brand that you think of already has an outstanding reputation in the marketplace.

People don’t just look up to these brands.

They love them.

They already have a positive image of these brands in their minds.

And that’s what developing a result-oriented brand positioning strategy will help you with.

This blog post sheds light on:

• What is Brand Positioning & Why is it Important?
• 5 Types of Brand Positioning Strategies You Should Know About
• How to Develop a Result-Oriented Brand Positioning Strategy?

Let’s touch down on each one of these topics one by one.

First, let’s understand what brand positioning means.

What is Brand Positioning & Why is it Important?

I’ve seen entrepreneurs believe in the myth that they can build an outstanding brand reputation by singlehandedly delivering good products or services – and doing nothing else.

I do not deny the fact that you should offer a good product or service.

You definitely should.

But that’s not the only thing about your brand that your audience will fall in love with.

You need to focus on different aspects like delivering a great experience, adding value, focusing on your audience’s pain points and problems, and much more.

Most importantly, you should develop a favorable position in the marketplace that’ll help you attract and retain your audience.

If this right here is the very first time you have heard about brand positioning, here’s the definition for you:

“Brand positioning is the art of positioning your brand in your audience’s minds. It’s so much more than a fancy logo or your catchy tagline. Developing a brand positioning strategy will help you differentiate yourself from your competitors in an efficient manner.”

A brand positioning strategy will help you position your brand as unique, favorable, credible, and different in your audience’s minds.

The thing is – your brand already has a reputation.

But it’s up to you to decide whether you want to gain control of your brand image and reputation.

With a world full of brands offering the same products these days, you need to make sure that you are differentiating your brand from the competition.

This will help you communicate value, raise brand awareness, justify your pricing, and much more.

Some benefits of brand positioning include:

Helps You Laser Focus on Your Target Market

• Allows You to Differentiate Yourself from the Competition
• Helps Gain Clarity on the Problems
• Enhanced Understanding of the Customers’ Challenges
• Helps Build Message & Story that Resonate
• Allows You to Justify Your Pricing Strategy

And many more!

That being said, if you wish to reap these benefits, you need to gain insights into your target market.

On top of this, you need to sow the seeds in the form of brand signals.

These brand signals are nothing but sensory triggers that will help you build a bond between your brand and your audience. You can easily communicate these signals via your visual identity and brand messaging.

However, you should make sure that these signals resonate with what your audience expects.

That’s the only way you’ll be able to create a positive image of your brand in your audience’s minds.

Before you start developing your brand positioning strategy, it’s important to learn that not all brand positioning strategies serve the same purpose.

The purpose may vary.

That’s the reason we’ll now look at the different types of brand positioning strategies you should know about.

5 Types of Brand Positioning Strategies You Should Know About

Following are the five important brand positioning strategy types I want you to be familiar with:

• Positioning Strategy Based on Product Characteristics
• Based on Price
• Based on Competition
• Based on Product Use or Application
• Based on Luxury or Quality

Let’s focus on each of them one at a time.

Brand Positioning Strategy Based on Product Characteristics

I’ll be honest with you.

I love cars.

That’s the reason I love referring to the automobile industry in my articles.

And that’s what I’ll be doing again.

Let’s consider the automobile industry again.

Different automobile brands have their own unique positions in the marketplace.

For example, Toyota’s position is reliability. At the same time, Volvo’s positioning is safety. Porsche’s position is inclined towards performance.

And every single one of their cars communicates their unique position with consumers.

Your product characteristics should always be aligned with your brand positioning strategy. And every single one of your products should easily be communicating your unique position with your audience.

Brand Positioning Based on Price

Your brand positioning strategy can also be based on price. So, if you are a brand offering top-notch products for an extremely low price, then you can position your brand as the one that delivers quality at a competitive price.

And if you are the only one to offer the same products or services at a certain price range, then that’ll become your market position.

Your audience will recognize your brand as the one that offers premier products or services at a budget-friendly price.

Brand Positioning Based on Competition

Like we mentioned already, thousands of your competitors are already offering the same product or service that you are.

Positioning your brand based on competition will help you highlight a major key difference.

This unique point doesn’t necessarily need to relate to your products or services.

Instead, it can be about anything that may sweep your audience off their feet.

Brand Positioning Based on Product Use or Application

You can also base your brand positioning strategy on your product’s use(s) or application(s).

For instance, literally millions of fitness coach out there offering their own unique service.

And you can position your personal brand based on your service’s use or application.

For example, you can position your brand as the one that offers fitness coaching that can help people build a lean body within five months.

But, if you develop your brand positioning strategy based on your product’s or service’s use or application, you need to make sure that your product(s) or service(s) live up to the mark.

Otherwise, developing a brand positioning strategy based on the product use or application will be nothing but a waste of your valuable time as well as efforts.

Brand Positioning Based on Luxury & Quality

High prices are usually associated with high quality.

And you can even develop your brand positioning strategy such that it is based on your product’s quality.

For example, Apple offers the best quality products in the tech space.

And while their pricing is on the higher end of the scale, people don’t usually focus on the pricing.

When they think of Apple, they think about quality.

And if you are offering the best quality or the most luxurious product or service in the market, convey the message to your audience.

Develop your brand positioning strategy based on your product’s or service’s quality.

But, alongside this, what you should note is that not all high-priced products or services are luxurious.

So, you’ll be leaving a bad impression if you base your brand positioning strategy on luxury and quality yet offer a poor-quality product.

And these aren’t the only brand positioning strategies out there. We’ve just listed the most common and major ones. You can target different areas and develop a brand positioning strategy literally on anything.

So, what your brand positioning strategy should be based on heavily depends on your audience’s needs and wants. And once you have finally locked in how you want to position your brand in the marketplace, it’s time to finally start putting in place a brand positioning strategy.

Let’s dive straight into it.

How to Develop a Result-Oriented Brand Positioning Strategy?

You’re just seven steps away from developing a fool-proof brand positioning strategy for your business:

Assess Your Current Position in the Marketplace

• Identify Your Competitors & Conduct Thorough Competitive Research
• Discover What’s Unique About Your Brand
• Build a Brand Positioning Map
• Craft Your Brand Positioning Statement
• Make Sure That You Live Up to it
• Own It
• Assess Your Current Position in the Marketplace

Like we already mentioned, your brand already has a position in the marketplace.

But that doesn’t mean that your audience sees you as a credible and trustworthy brand.

You need to gain control of your brand positioning.

And the first step to do that is by assessing your current position in the marketplace.

But before you do that, ask yourself:

How well do you see your business doing against your competitors?

What are your brand’s unique traits?

Which of your products and services are famous among your customers?

How well is your brand doing in terms of sales and retention?

Get your hands on this data. Be honest with yourself. Compare this data with how you want your brand to be seen.

And there you’ll have it – your current brand position in the marketplace.

Identify Your Competitors & Conduct Thorough Competitive Research

While building your marketing plan, you may have already conducted thorough competitive research. But if you didn’t, it’s incredibly important to understand who you are in direct and indirect competition with.

To develop an outstanding brand positioning strategy, you need to take into consideration your top three or four customers. Look for the brands ranking for the keywords you want to rank for. Use tools like SEMRush, Ubersuggest, or Ahrefs to gain insights into who your competitors really are.

And once you have the list, review their websites, social media profiles, reviews, and anything you can get your hands on.

Understand how well their engagement rate is.

And based on that, consider performing a SWOT analysis. Ask yourself:

• What are their strengths and weaknesses?
• What do their customers love about them?
• What do they hate?
• What’s their Unique Selling Proposition?
• What’s their current market position?
• What promises and claims are they making? Are they living up to all of it?
• What’s their brand positioning strategy based on?
• And is it working?

Discover What’s Unique About Your Brand

Brand positioning will allow you to stand out from your competitors.

But, if you want to position your brand as unique in the marketplace, you yourself need to understand what makes you unique.

What works best for your business? And what’s the one thing that’ll help you attract and retain as many of your target audience as possible in this highly competitive market?

Once you conduct thorough competitive research, you’ll probably start seeing patterns.

You’ll even see that some of your competitors have the same strengths as well as weaknesses.

But some of the popular ones may have their own unique selling proposition.

So, what you need to do now is focus on their weaknesses. And measure them against your strengths.

This will help you identify the one or multiple things you can offer that your competitors cannot.

And that’s how you’ll be able to position your brand as unique in the marketplace.

Build a Brand Positioning Map

Your competitors’ brand positioning strategies will probably be based on different factors.

And like we discussed in the previous section, one of your competitors’ brand positioning may be based on low pricing, whereas the others’ may be based on quality.

Now with the competitors’ list you’ve created, it’s time to place your competitors on a brand positioning map to represent which competitor’s brand positioning strategy is based on which factor(s).

And once you build this map, you’ll see the picture shaping right in front of you.

Here’s an example of a brand positioning map we fetched from the American Marketing Association:

Now, based on your current brand positioning, competitive analysis, your unique offering, and audience’s needs and wants, you can lock in what you want your brand positioning strategy to be based on.

And you can even add it to the map.

This will help you gain a clear perspective of where your brand positioning currently stands.

And you can compare this with where you want it to be.

This will in turn allow you to craft a brand positioning statement and taking the much-needed steps to position your brand the way you want to.

Craft Your Brand Positioning Statement

Now, you have learned what you want your brand positioning strategy to be based on.

The next step is to craft a one or two-sentence statement that highlights your brand positioning strategy and helps you communicate your brand’s mission and values to your customers.

Keep it simple. At the same time, make sure that it’s compelling and catches your audience’s attention.

For example, here’s Coca-Cola’s brand positioning statement for your reference:

“For individuals looking for high-quality beverages, Coca-Cola offers a wide range of the most refreshing options — each creates a positive experience for customers when they enjoy a Coca-Cola brand drink. Unlike other beverage options, Coca-Cola products inspire happiness and make a positive difference in customers’ lives, and the brand is intensely focused on the needs of consumers and customers.“

Not only is it simple, but it also communicates Coca-Cola’s brand positioning in an efficient manner. At the same time, it helps Coca-Cola differentiate itself from its competitors and create a positive image.

Once you craft your brand positioning statement, the next step is to try it out. Put it to the test. Reach out to your consumers and ask them for their honest feedback.

This will help you understand whether your positioning statement is actually having the desired effect or not.
Make Sure You Live Up to It

You can develop a brand positioning strategy based on luxury or quality. But your audience will see right through you if you offer poor-quality products or services to them. You can hire the best copywriter to craft your brand positioning statement.

But, if your actions don’t live up to the words, then you will be leaving a bad impression.

Here’s Amazon’s brand positioning statement:

“For consumers who want to purchase a wide range of products online with quick delivery, Amazon provides a one-stop online shopping site. Amazon sets itself apart from other online retailers with its customer obsession, passion for innovation, and commitment to operational excellence.”

And if you thoroughly read this statement, you’ll find it to be extremely true. There’s just nothing wrong with it.
Some attention-catching words they have used include:

• Wide range of products online
• Quick delivery
• One-Stop online shopping site
• Customer obsession
• Passion for innovation
• Commitment to operational excellence

Amazon’s positioning statement is well-written. It highlights the company’s commitment to delivering excellence. At the same time, it helps Amazon position itself as the #1 Ecommerce store out there.

This statement hasn’t been written to catch the audience’s attention. As you can see, it helps Amazon focus on its core objective – being the best one-stop online shopping site.

Similarly, you can have a brilliantly crafted positioning statement. But be careful about the words you use. You need to make sure that you live up to every single word you use in your positioning statement copy.

Own It

If you followed every single step up until now carefully, you’d probably have your brand positioning strategy ready. This strategy will help you transform your business.

But this isn’t the end.

And trust me – there’s no end.

You need to consistently deliver value and live up to your words.

Keep your brand positioning strategy at the center of your marketing efforts.

And make sure that everyone in your organization contributes towards helping you fulfill your promise.
Use this statement across all your marketing and advertising efforts.

And don’t forget – your products, services, and customer service you deliver should communicate your brand positioning.

Develop Your Brand Positioning Strategy Today!

The big challenge isn’t “How to Develop a Brand Positioning Strategy?”

Instead, it’s how to begin creating one.

Premium brands already know how important brand positioning is. They understand how it can contribute to the success of their business.

As a result, building a brand positioning strategy is at the top of their priority list.
So, what are you waiting for?

Develop yours today.

And if you need any help, feel free to reach out to our branding experts straight away right here:

We don’t edit pictures; we Photoshop them.

We don’t book a cab; we Uber it.

And we don’t make photocopies of our notes; we Xerox them.

Brands names like Google, Facebook, Photoshop, Xerox, and Uber are so potent that people have already replaced them with generic product names.

These brands don’t just deliver a top-notch product or service. Instead, they deliver the best possible experience to their customers. And this is exactly what has fueled the transition of these brand names into verbs.

Besides offering top-notch service or experience, it’s equally critical to smartly name your brand.

Coming up with an extremely complicated or long brand name isn’t advisable. Most importantly, it should be unique – your brand name should be aligned with your offering. And that’s our secret sauce to brand naming.

In 1999, two companies, namely TiVo & ReplayTV, entered the DVR space. Undoubtedly, ReplayTV was the one with the superior product. From a better interface to its affordable pricing, everything about ReplayTV was just perfect. Despite that, people TiVo-ed their shows rather than ReplayTV them.

The reason:

• ReplayTV comprises the verb “Replay,” which already means something else.
• TiVo is a shorter name than ReplayTV.
• TiVo is easy to remember.
• TiVo is something unique and memorable.
• In terms of offering a superior product and outstanding experience, ReplayTV won the game.

However, when it comes to brand naming, TiVo dominated the market.

And that’s the power of brand naming.

You need to carry out thorough market research, schedule brainstorming sessions, gather knowledge and invest hours in coming up with a brand name that leaves a great impression, gives you a head-start, and sticks in your audience’s minds.

We’ve seen people name their brands randomly. And usually, it turns out to be a disaster. They consider brand naming to be nothing more than a formality. And they just neglect the importance of the brand naming process.
But trust me, you need to consider the brand naming process like a life/death decision for your brand.

99% of entrepreneurs reportedly come up with disastrous brand names or make at least a single mistake.

But a wrong brand name can just shackle your brand. Worse, it may even turn your audience off.

To help you tackle this problem, we’ve listed the seven most common mistakes 99% of entrepreneurs make while naming their brands.

So, let’s dive straight into them.

7 Common Mistake Entrepreneurs Make While Naming their Brands

While we look at these mistakes, the important part is to learn from them.

So, here we go:

• Treating Your Brand Name as an Afterthought
• Complicated Spelling & Pronunciation
• Forgetting that the Brand Naming Process is As Strategic as its Creative
• Overlooking Those Complex Trademark Issues
• Drowning in Alphabet Soup
• Ignoring Global Implications
• Selling to Yourself

Let’s touch down on each one of these mistakes in brief.

Treating Your Brand Name as an Afterthought

That’s one of the big brand name mistakes most entrepreneurs and even brand managers make. Treating your brand as an afterthought could end up being really troubling for you.

Naming your brand randomly will have repercussions.

What if it’s not memorable?

What if your brand name doesn’t align with your offering?

What if it can possibly have global implications?

We’ve seen brand managers spend hours building a well-defined and actionable branding strategy.

From concept development to smart implementation, they usually put in a lot of effort. But what they fail to realize is how important it is to come up with a memorable brand name.

Trust me, brand naming is far more complicated.

It’s a complex process.

You can’t just come up with a brand name randomly and not expect to face linguistic or legal hurdles.

Maybe, it’s not available. Or what if it’s just inappropriate?

You need to brainstorm “brand name” ideas way before you start building your brand strategy.

Just outline the critical steps. Think of your products, services, and your customers. Understand who your target audience is. Focus on their pain points.

Take into consideration the industry you belong to. And based on all these factors, brainstorm ideas.

You can use legally cleared names within a month into the trademark process.

But, in the United States, it takes 12-18 months for trademarks to be registered fully. In some cases, it may even stretch to two years.

So, we’d advise you to call in the experts.

They will not only help you choose a brand name that’s memorable and the one that you love.

But they’ll also help you deal with legal and linguistic issues.

Complicated Spelling & Pronunciation

When you are naming your brand, you need to ensure that you don’t come up with an extremely complicated name that’s just too hard to hear, say or spell.

If it’s just too difficult to pronounce, people will not be able to remember it. But also, people are using more and more voice command today with Google Home and Alexa so if you’re name is spelled funny or hard to understand the voice search will not work well.

Yes, there are brands with complicated brand names. But they have been in the business for years and likely had massive budgets for brand awareness campaigns. These brands have established their dominance.

But the smart move is to avoid complicating your brand name. A longer clear name is better than a short difficult name.

It’s one of the most common brand name mistakes most entrepreneurs make.

While brainstorming ideas, come up with memorable brand names – names that are short. Stick to one or two words. Not more. Don’t come up with long phrases. Say the potential brand names out loud to understand whether it’s easy to pronounce or not.

On top of this, make sure that your brand name doesn’t have a complicated spelling. Otherwise, people will face a hard time creating content pieces about your brand.

Forgetting that the Brand Naming Process is As Strategic as its Creative

We live in a fiercely competitive world. And in this environment, the most successful brands are the ones that use their product’s, service’s and company’s physical attributes to build a long-lasting relationship with their customers.

Your brand name should communicate your brand personality and position just right. And it helps when it aligns with your offering.

So, while naming your brand, you should have clear strategic goals and objectives in place.

This will help you choose brand names that actually matter to your target audience.

Don’t just think about the impact of your brand name today. But, alongside this, you need to take into consideration how it’ll help you meet your business objectives a few months or years down the lane.

While creativity is important, don’t forget that the brand naming process is as strategic as its creative.
Work on your brand naming parallelly while building your brand strategy.

This will allow you to come up with a memorable brand name that’ll help you dominate in your space.

Overlooking Those Complex Trademark Issues

Trademark processes are often complicated.

Millions of trademarks are filed each year.

And let’s just consider that there are only 250,000 words in the English language. Well, the word count will obviously be higher – it’s literally impossible to count.

But not all these words can be used while naming a brand.

Some may be inappropriate, whereas some are extremely complex.

There’s a high probability that your potential brand name has already been taken
Securing viable trademarks has become incredibly tough.

Hence, it’s crucial to conduct the trademark screening prior to your brainstorming sessions.

This will help you avoid the words you shouldn’t use to name your brand due to potential legal complications.

Prepare a list of these words. This will allow your creative team to search for the right legally viable name.

Deal with the legality early on in the process.

This will help you avoid settling for just any name.

Conducting a pre-screening process prior to the brainstorming session will help you avoid your valuable time and money in evaluating brand names that you can’t legally use.

Drowning in the Alphabet Soup

Some monogram names like BMW and IBM have been around for years.

They already have built up equity in their brand names.

They have established themselves in their respective industries.

Hundreds of thousands of people look up to them today.

As a result, entrepreneurs think that a monogram name would sound extremely cool and will be worthwhile for their brand.

But what they fail to realize is that they don’t have decades of name recognition to back their monogram name up.

And they end up becoming another leaf in a big pile of leaves. This right here is one of the brand name mistakes you should avoid.

Coining monogram names won’t make you unique.

Here’s a story I recently came across:

Buck & David once decided to merge their companies. Both their firms had decent brand names – not great, but only decent. Only if they had combined both their firm’s names, it would have sounded really well.

But they decided to come up with a new brand name entirely. In the end, they named their company “BDX.”

That’s B for Buck & D for David. And X is just a random letter they added to make it sound cool.

And this right here is one of the worse choices of their lives.

BDX means absolutely nothing. It didn’t even mean anything. Just because they had to name their new brand, they came up with a random monogram name out of nowhere.

And they didn’t have years of recognition to back their brand name up.

Ignoring Global Implications

Not every word in the English dictionary is appropriate.

And some may even have global implications.

Obviously, you’d hate being a victim of linguistic disasters.

You need to be incredibly careful with your brand and product names, especially if you are catering to a global audience.

Despite that, we’ve seen entrepreneurs come up with names that are inappropriate for a certain group of audiences.

Hence, it’s advisable to conduct a thorough linguistic disaster evaluation.

If your target audience includes your local neighborhood, then you can’t use words that are inappropriate for people there. Otherwise, you’ll soon become the most hated brand in your neighborhood.

People have access to a world full of information these days. And literally, anyone can pick up on issues and talk about them.

So, I’d advise you to conduct a serious linguistic disaster check before locking in a brand name.

Check your potential names with native linguists.

Even if people speak English in two different countries, slang, idioms, and cultural associations will vary.
Hence, you need to be extremely careful during the brand naming process.

Don’t Sell to Yourself

Another one of the brand name mistakes most people make – they name their brands after their high-school crush.

A tech biz named Carmen did the same.

While he really had a huge crush on a girl in high school, he couldn’t ever approach her.

So, the brand name reportedly helped him overcome his shyness and conveyed the message to never fail to pursue your dreams.

But trust me – this is just a dumb move.

You should find inspiration in your past. I do not deny it.

However, Carmen’s brand name doesn’t have a compelling origin story. It has meaning to just one person, and that’s him.

A good brand name should start conversations in your industry.

And it should perfectly align with your offering.

You should choose a name that inspires and engages your market.

Don’t make it about yourself.

Instead, make it about the people you are targeting.

This will help you position yourself as “market-facing” rather than “self-facing.”

And once you prepare a list of potential names, test them with people who will determine your brand’s success – your target audience.

Listen to their feedback. Focus on any unanticipated negative reactions.

And then only will you lock in a memorable brand name that you can turn into verbs.

Select Your Brand Name the Smart Way!

“When people use your brand name as a verb, that’s truly remarkable.”

Meg Whitman

There’s no better feeling in the world than your audience using your brand name as verbs.

While it’s true that branding isn’t just about name, logo, or brand colors, that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t focus on these elements.

You obviously should. In fact, you need to focus on every single element that will contribute towards your brand’s success.

So, what are you waiting for?

Take the first step towards building a memorable brand.

Select your brand name today.

“Branding is the art of aligning what you want people to think about you or your business with what they do believe. And vice-versa.”

– Jay Baer

It’s a great time to be alive. 

We exist in a technologically advanced and interconnected world. 

You can access your savings account in your pajamas. 

You can get your hands on any possible piece of information at any given time.

You can share ideas with people from across the globe.

About 60.1% of the world population have access to the Internet. That’s approximately 4.72 billion people with access to thousands of petabytes of data at the tip of their hands. 

Long before the digital revolution kicked off, it was just the celebrities who focused on personal brand building.

Athletes, actors, and musicians got all the attention. In fact, they dominated the world.

But now we are long past that.

Literally, anyone can hop onto the Internet and build his/her brand from the ground up.

Let’s say you are a California-based realtor with the aim of scaling your real estate business. Whenever a homebuyer hears about you, he/she will probably Google you out and try to fetch more information.

Having a solid online brand presence will help you build a solid reputation. As a result, your prospects will feel confident reaching out to you. On top of this, it’ll help you position yourself as an expert in your niche.

But, if you don’t have a strong personal brand, then your prospects may find it extremely hard to trust you. They may even decide to go with one of your competitors. 

So, whether you are a fitness coach or an IT professional, it’s extremely important to build a strong personal brand. This will help you create an outstanding impression in front of your prospects. But, most importantly, it’ll help you build trust and gain confidence.

Some of the benefits of personal branding include:

• Helps you build trust
• Allows you to position yourself as an industry expert
• Attracts ideal opportunities
• Builds credibility
• Allows you to leave your mark
• Helps build a long-lasting relationship with your target audience
• Builds positive energy
• And more!

That being said, if you truly want to stand out in their fiercely competitive world and build an engaging, inviting, and unique personal brand, you need to steer in the right direction. 

This blog post lists out the nine Golden Personal Branding rules to create a powerful brand.

9 Golden Rules of Personal Branding

Follow these rules to build a solid foundation for your brand:

• Be Genuine
• Be Consistent
• Get Your Story Out There
• Create a Positive Impact
• Focus on Delivering Value
• Build Your Own Network
• Align Your Branding Efforts with What You Actually Want to BE
• Let Others Tell Your Story
• Leave a Legacy

Let’s touch down on each of these branding rules one at a time.

Be Genuine

“I had no idea being your genuine self could make me as rich as I have become. If I had, I’d have done it a lot earlier.”

Oprah Winfrey

86% of consumers claim authenticity to be a huge factor that influences their purchasing decisions. 

stackla, 2019

These days, people expect brands to be honest and genuine. 

Their mailboxes are already flooded with thousands of salesy promotional emails from brands they didn’t even subscribe to. 

And trust me, they hate every inch of it.

Consumers are open to building long-lasting relationships with brands. But, if your personal brand is nothing more than a profit-generating machine for you, then they will see past it.

The key to successful personal branding is interacting with your audience genuinely. 

Focus on their pain points and problems. Then, prepare a list of challenges they face every single day.

And based on that, deliver a truly value-adding solution.

For instance, if you’re a fitness coach, create value-delivering content pieces that’ll help your audience achieve their fitness goals. 

Your brand message should resonate with your audience’s needs and wants. After all, it’ll be one of the reasons why your consumers/clients will purchase your products or services.

But don’t just use slogans like “building a better world” just for the sake of it. 

Instead, you need to live up to them.

You need to show your audience that you care. And your actions should reflect it. 

Being genuine will help you build trust and boost your audience’s confidence. They’d love nothing more than interacting with you. 

Be Consistent

Your personal brand means nothing without consistency. Without a consistent message, your personal branding efforts will just be a waste of your time and efforts.

From little things like your profile pictures or usernames to important aspects like a brand message, your missions, and goals, it’s critical to maintain consistency across different platforms.

Otherwise, your audience may find it difficult to identify you in this crowded digital world.

“What’s the most powerful marketing tool to build a strong personal brand? It’s consistency.”

– Susan Gilbert

While building your brand, you need to ensure consistency across your gravitas, communication, and appearance. Following are the reasons why being consistent with your personal branding efforts is critical:

• Keeps things simple for your online followers and prospects.
• Helps build momentum and trust
• Allows you to make sure that your efforts are aligned with your goals
• Helps you define your brand and stick to it.

Alongside this, you need to be consistent with content marketing efforts.

For instance, stick to your social media posting schedule or blog publishing efforts. Make sure that you are getting out there in front of your audience on a regular basis.

Being inconsistent will create a negative impression, which is the last thing you’d want.

Get Your Story Out There

“Facts tell, stories sell.”

If there’s anything that engages people, it’s a good story. People love stories. Our human brains are hotwired to react positively to a good story.

That’s the reason sharing your story is the key to building a rock-solid foundation for your personal brand.

The brands not sharing their stories are already losing out on more than half of their existing prospects.

“Brands are built around stories. Stories of identities – who we are, where we have come from – these are the most effective stories of all. It’s one of the most efficient ways to bring brands to life.”

– Bill Dauphinais

An engaging story will help you fill any void. Also, it’ll help you differentiate yourself from your competitors.

So, if you are wondering how to get your message out there, it’s time you crafted a brilliant and engaging story and give your audience something to talk about. But, of course, the best way to share your story is via video.

78% of the world’s population watch online videos each week. 

Videos, when crafted right, are addictive and help brands engage their audience way better than other content formats.

The best part? You don’t need high-end equipment to produce high-quality videos. All you need to do is harness the power of your smartphone and get your story out there.

As simple as that!

Create a Positive Impact

What’s the first thing you’d like your audience to think about when they hear your personal brand’s name?

My guess – you’d want them to feel good.

Remember – you’re your own brand. People will not just remember you for your skills. Instead, they will remember you for the impact you had on their lives.

They won’t remember your mind-blowing paid ad campaigns. Instead, they’ll take into consideration the results you deliver. 

Helping others and keeping a positive attitude will help you elevate your personal brand to unbelievable heights.

Another important thing to note is being consistent with the results you deliver.

For instance, if you are just getting started, you might be looking forward to delivering the best results to your audience.

But, as time passes by, degrading the quality of your service and the impact you generate won’t help. 

After all, we are all familiar with Warren Buffett’s popular quote, “It takes twenty minutes to build a reputation and just five minutes to ruin it.”

In short, if you want to build a rock-solid personal brand, now’s the time to create a positive impact. 

Focus on Delivering Value

These days, people hate that getting-on-your-nerves ‘push’ marketing approach. Yet, every single day, they receive dozens of promotional messages from brands all across the globe. And they don’t want you added to the list.

Building a strong personal brand isn’t about rolling out promotional messages. Instead, it’s putting a smile on your audience’s face when they see your message or email. 

For instance, people are always excited to hear from their favorite brands like Nike, Adidas, Starbucks. That’s because these brands deliver value. So even though they are trying to get their products out there, they don’t sound promotional and desperate.

Instead, their brand message speaks for themselves.

For example, Nike’s mission statement is:

“To bring inspiration and innovation to every athlete* in the world. *If you have a body, you’re an athlete.”

Not only is it beautifully crafted, but it promises to deliver value. And that’s exactly what people crave the most. They want solutions to their problems. And if you promise them an actual solution, they’d love nothing more than doing business with you.

Like we already discussed, learn what challenges your audience faces the most in their day-to-day lives. Gain insights into their pain points. Then, understand how your product(s) and service(s) can help them tackle these problems. And based on that, create high-value content pieces that address these pain points and promise to deliver an actual solution.

Build Your Own Network

In today’s digital era, building a rich network comprising your audience and other experts in your industry should be your highest priority. 

“The richest people on Earth look for and build networks, whereas others just look for work.”

– Robert Kiyosaki

Your personal brand isn’t just about you. It’s about the connections you build with the people in your industry. Connect with like-minded people. Focus on building long-lasting healthy relationships, rather than just one-offs.

Always prioritize delivering value overselling your product(s) or service(s).

Use platforms like LinkedIn or Facebook to connect with people in your industry. Then, attend those in-person networking meetings. And if you want to build a rich network that you can always reach out to, make sure that:

• You are focusing on the right people.
• You are creating win/win situations for everybody.
• You aren’t connecting with people just to gain something out of it.
• You re-connect with people.
• You are delivering value over anything else.

And once you are familiar with others in your industry, you may even start your own networking group. Once you do, you can schedule numerous in-person or virtual events yourself. In addition, people will soon start recognizing you as an industry expert, which will aid your brand-building efforts.

Align Your Branding Efforts with What You Actually Want to Be

One of the big mistakes people make is not being familiar with who they actually want to be. 

If you are building your own brand, you need to be clear on what you want your audience to think of you. Most importantly, you must ensure that your message is focused on your goals. 

“Your life is controlled by what you focus on.”

– Tony Robbins

For example, if you want to position yourself as a digital marketing expert, then your personal brand message must reflect your desire and goals. This message shouldn’t be focused on anything other than digital marketing.

Otherwise, it’ll divert attention and lead to confusion.

Lock in your niche. Narrow down even further, if you can. Connect with people within your niche. Understand who your target audience is. And finally, make sure that all your efforts are focused on helping you position yourself as an industry expert in the same niche.

Let Others Tell Your Story

There’s a difference between you promoting your personal brand and someone else doing the same. You are obviously meant to get your name out there. But, if someone else is speaking about you, then people will definitely listen.

“If I was down to the last dollar of my marketing budget, I’d rather spend it on PR.”

– Bill Gates

Personal Branding is all about what people say about you when you’re not in the room. While you can always reach out to publications and bloggers to help you promote your brand, what’ll help you skyrocket your personal brand awareness is people genuinely praising you for the highest-quality product(s) or service(s) you deliver.

For example, if you offer the best real estate services in New York, then your existing clients would love nothing more than recommending your brand to their fellow friends or family members.

And it’s not just about delivering the best service in town. Instead, it’s so much more than that. Your audience expects you to deliver an outstanding experience. And you need to keep winning their hearts every time they interact with you. 

They will even share your story with others in their network.

Leave a Legacy

“The things you do for yourself are gone when you die, but the things that you do for others remain as your legacy.”

– Kalu Ndukwe Kalu

From Albert Einstein to Mahatma Gandhi, the one thing these people have in common is that they are remembered for the impact they made. 

If you are consistent with your personal branding efforts and apply the most reliable personal branding tactics, you’ll soon build a great reputation. 

But parallelly, you should also consider what you want people to think of you when you’re not around.

Building a strong personal brand is much more than building an empire. The only exit strategy is leaving behind a legacy.

Your personal brand will change and evolve over the next few years. But you need to build a strong foundation for your personal brand. 

Ask yourself:

“Who am I?

What kind of legacy do I want to leave behind?

What do I want my kids and grandkids to think of me when I’m not in their lives?”

Surround your personal brand foundation with the answers to these questions. And that’s when you’ll have a concrete and consistent goal in your life.

You’ll finally know what to become. And lastly, you’ll shed your blood, sweat, and tears to conquer your goals and build a legacy.

Build Your Personal Brand Today!

Becoming a worldwide and go-to industry expert in your niche isn’t something that’ll happen overnight. Instead, you’ll need to put in a lot of hard work and spend your valuable time building a solid brand foundation.

Your brand is your reputation. 

Here’s a question:

“Would you purchase from a business with a poor brand reputation?”

My guess – you won’t. 

People want to engage with brands with a strong online presence. They want to interact with brands that are known for the experience they deliver. 

While building your personal brand, focus on the nine golden rules we’ve laid out for you.

And soon, you’ll find yourself on the path to success.