The Easiest Way to Build Your Personal Brand

I saw some posts that they are quitting their 9-5 jobs and having a full time on building their personal brand.

At first, I said, “wow that is ridiculous”.

But later on, I learned that, “okay, this is what we are now”.

And to be frank, I am quite the same now. I always try hard to build my personal brand by posting consistently on my social media and on my blog.

Fortunately, I am getting support from other creators, but of course, before reaching this point, I was the same as you: trying to build a social media following, chasing followers, and begging for connections without even trying to build something genuine.

I remember when I was just starting, I joined a blogging community and tried to spam them, plagiarize, and even publish AI-written blogs, which obviously did not work in the long term.

I got penalized and banned from the community.

I did not stop there; I tried again. But this time, it was genuine.

In there, I found success – I built a real connection on the internet, and it was my realization that building your personal brand is easy if you are not trying hard, if you do not focus on things that are unnecessary during the first stage of your journey.

Why Your Online Community Helps Your Personal Brand

Quality over quantity

When you are just starting, I know where you are looking at; your follower count.

I know, I’ve been there.

But over time, I realized that I was focusing on the wrong data.

This was my routine:

I always feel discouraged when I don’t see my follower count increasing. So, my posting streak has stopped, and I have become inconsistent, which is wrong, especially if you are just starting.

When you are just starting, focus on creating quality content, and be consistent until you get what you are looking for.

Once you have enough followers, it is time to look deeper into your analytics and start understanding your audience.

Improve your brand visibility through organic growth

It all starts with you.

When you are building your personal brand, it is not a good idea to just keep posting content and then leave. You need to interact with your audience, start getting their trust sincerely, and build a connection with them.

Have you heard about the “network effect”?

I have a friend online through an organic connection, we became friends even online, we have never seen or met each other in person, but we fully support each other.

When I started building my personal brand, this friend contacted me, saying that he was sharing my profile with his audience so I could also get supporters.

He was one of the reasons why I had a slight increase in my followers when I was just starting.

Now, it is the network effect. When you start creating sincere connections on the internet, you can ask for their help if you need it effortlessly.

In fact, there are times when the people you meet online are way better than the friends you have in person.

My proven strategies on how to build a successful personal brand

Identify your people

This is what I did not do when I was just starting.

I thought I could just start writing like a diary, every thought should be written, yes, if you don’t care about its monetization.

But if you treat your personal brand as your business, then you are doing it wrong.

Always start by knowing who your target audience is; it is hard to sell bread if you are selling it to someone who is not hungry.

It is like building your personal brand, always know where and who to sell or who will consume your content, by doing this, you can easily find your people and get more of their attention.

Choose the right platform to use

I stayed on many platforms before, but only a few of them are working for me. I tried using all of them, but most of them are not even getting any attention from people.

I tried everything, I took online courses, and asked for advice from successful creators, but all of them worked.

One day, I tried joining Medium, and there, I saw like-minded people, people who share the same interests as me, and people who will consume and read my content.

Now, I always focus there and am starting to get more eyes than before.

I even get subscribers to my email and account, even if I am inactive, thanks to my evergreen content that still appears on their feeds.

Show your appreciation to them

It was 3 years ago when my favorite blogging platform stopped paying its users – there were no sponsors anymore, the platform is still operating now, but if you seriously focus on monetization, it is not the best place I would recommend now.

But when I was just starting there, I remember hosting events and giveaways to my followers. It is just to show my appreciation to them for supporting me through my journey.

I thought it was just a waste of time and money, but over time, they kept supporting me, and I think it is part of growing your personal brand.

It is not your audience that will always keep spending money and effort; you also have to do the same, support and appreciate them, and I assure you that they will keep supporting you.

Keep your community healthy

When you are starting to grow your audience, I know that there will be negativity that will come to you.

Some will try to bring you down, getting mad at you, and saying things against you.

It is normal for growing brands, but as an aspiring creator, you must address it politely. I wouldn’t say anything, but sometimes, it is better to just shut your mouth and not say anything back to them.

As long as you keep arguing with them, you are just giving them a reason to do what their goal is, not seeing you grow.

Focus on what truly matters

Now, you are seeing growth in your analytics, you can dig deeper and analyze your stats. You are now seeing the big picture of your growth; it is time to focus and be conscious of it.

It is now the time to think of your strategy and ask yourself, “Why am I not growing?”. It is time to make your strategy.

Adapt and learn new things

Now that you need to be conscious of your statistics, this will be the point at which you will think of the strategies that you will need to adapt to be able to survive and maintain your growth.

I remember when I was just starting, I only focused on creating as much content as possible, I made sure that they were of quality, and my readers would get learning from it.

I was a writer, but after almost two years, I decided to step up and learn to market myself.

I started learning SEO, and it is what I am still doing now. And to be honest, I enjoyed the whole journey of being a writer and now shifting to SEO.

I still do write occasionally, but now, I do my best to grow my own website through marketing and also other businesses that pay for my services.

How I succeeded in my journey

I won’t say that I have fully succeeded for now because I am still learning and doing some more things. I love exploring things and trying to learn something new that I can apply to my journey.

But before I went into this, there were a lot of difficulties that I had to deal with, such as spending money trying things, but it turned out that it didn’t work.

Some are doing some dirty marketing, such as follow-to-follow, you can get quick results, but it won’t last over time.

I would say that when doing something, you must be passionate and interested in it because you won’t last long if you are just trying to become viral, but do not really love what you are doing.

I had a friend whom I invited to start writing because I was earning $200/month back then. He tried, he knew that it could be profitable, but since it is not his passion, he did not continue and stopped writing, even though he knows that he can earn from it.

Chasing the goal isn’t enough; you yourself should love what you are doing, it is the secret to enjoying the process.