Hi Successful Gremlins!
Today’s personal branding question:
“How do you take an unknown new brand from zero to reputable? What are the first steps?”
It’s easy to look at personal brands like Gary Vee or Marie Forleo and feel like the road to that type of success is closed off to you. However, no successful and sustainable personal brand occurred overnight. In the same way you would follow a recipe in order to bake a delicious cake, there’s a process you can follow that will allow you to take your personal brand from unknown zero to reputable hero with a little elbow grease and discipline.
Go Niche Yourself
I really cannot believe the number of “guru’s” out there preaching the Gospel of No Niche. Luckily for you, you’re in the Temple of Nichedom. Here, we preach the Gospel of Alienation and read from the Psalms of Targeting.
Before you can create brand-building content, you have to figure out: who do I want to serve? who can I provide value to? who could benefit the most from my skills/work?
Coming from a place of service will always lead to the path of least resistance. Meaning? When you live your life leading with value, life will absolutely reward you. Believe it.
Polarize Your Audience
So once you have figured out your audience, now is the time to create content, products, services, etc that absolutely polarize ‘em. I know your instinct is to help and cater to everyone. But I’m here to let you know: that is the fastest way to stay stuck in the same exact place— never growing, never profiting.
There are a million ways to polarize your audience including visuals/aesthetics, topics, delivery, distribution, etc.
What many entrepreneurs don’t realize is that we polarize people all the time accidentally by how we dress, our taste in food, etc. I’m advising you to do it ON PURPOSE and STRATEGICALLY. The last thing we need is lukewarm content and programs that don’t inspire people to do shit, right?
So how does one go about doing this? Take some time to figure out the trends in your industry and start discussing either a different take or be willing to talk about the absolute OPPOSITE of what’s being favored.
My favorite example of polarizing their audience is Ariana Grande’s song “thank u, next.” While most pop stars are singing about keying their exes trucks or wanting to get back together, Ariana went ahead and wrote a whole ass song where she THANKED her exes for the individual lessons they taught her. While there will be people who #cantrelate, it soared to the tippy top of the billboard charts regardless.
You Got(ta) Serve
Remember when I had said: When you live your life leading with value, life will absolutely reward you. Believe it.
Well, I meant that shit.
The reason why Marie Forleo stays winning is because every Tuesday she showed up on YouTube and delivered nothing but straight value and has done it for over a DECADE. For FREE. Without expectation.
You gotta do the same. Consider this: when you’re dating someone, you don’t marry them within 30 minutes of knowing them right? Of course not. It takes time to gain that mutual trust and loyalty.
Building that relationship with your target audience through consistent value is the same— and it’s vital to launching your personal brand into the stratosphere.
So when it comes to taking your personal brand from unknown zero to reputable hero, remember to make sure you know who you want to provide value to, you’re never lukewarm in with your content, and you’re continuously providing value to them!
Does that make sense? Let me know in the comments what your thoughts are and if you need help with any of the above, feel free to ask for help!
Can’t wait to hear from you!
I appreciate you,
Shamia
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