7 Reasons Why I Started Taking ‘Personal Branding’ Seriously (And Why You Should Too)

Over the last year or so, I have been talking about personal branding a lot.

I mean….A LOT.

Isn’t it funny?

A direct response marketer like myself who has built all of his million dollar businesses via measurable campaigns, keeps talking about something as intangible as branding.

So why do I do it?

Because it FREAKING WORKS.

Over the last few years, I have noticed that my personal brand has:

1. Helped me close sales MORE easily
2. Helped me close certain sales which I would NOT have otherwise been able to close
3. Attract super committed customers & clients like bees to honey

A business partner of mines said he has a situation where someone came to him and said:

“Shaqir…I have been following you for a while and I love what you are doing. You seem to be everywhere online. I want to partner up with you and I have around $100,000 to invest in my business. Tell me what’s the fastest way to get results?”

Isn’t that sweet?

And just like that I sign up high ticket customers/clients for products and services ranging from $10,000 to $100,000.

When incidents like that first started happening, I was surprised (& thrilled) but didn’t pay much attention to why it was happening.

But when such incidents started becoming more and more frequent, it became so obvious as to what was the reason.

It was PERSONAL BRAND that was causing it.

There was no mistaking it.

Ever since I realized it, I have quadrupled my efforts to develop my BRAND.

When I say BRANDING, I don’t mean doing some vague corporate style marketing where the focus is to be on the top of people’s’ minds.

What I really mean is doing stuff that gets people to feel a STRONG UNSHAKEABLE connection with you.

You know the feeling which you get when you KNOW someone is just AWESOME and you just have to follow their path.

When people get that about you….you are GOLDEN.

Trust me on that.

Haha.

So how do we make people feel a strong connection with us?

I found out that if you do certain actions OVER & OVER again, not only will you make more sales but you will be strengthening your personal brand every single day.

Over time, your results will start compounding and you will experience exponential growth.

In this blogpost, I am going to list out the things that I do which has helped me build an insanely strong personal brand (and this brand keeps getting stronger every day).

1. Be Authentic & Pour Out Your Thoughts By Writing Regularly

While this may seem like a simple advice, over 99% of marketers don’t follow it.

Most marketers are too busy either trying to copy (read steal) others’ work or come up with some clever (read unnecessarily creative) piece of writing to stand out.

It doesn’t work.

People came smell BS from a long way.

They can feel when you are being disingenuous.

That’s why writing from your heart and saying whatever you want to say connects with people at a core level.

I email my list DAILY where I share my real life experiences, stories about my various business trips, stories about my personal life, various marketing strategies, etc.

When people keep reading my emails day after day…month after month….one day, they finally wake up with an INSANE desire to work with me.

Same goes for blog posts too.

Blogging allows me to cut loose and delve deeper into different topics which may not be possible with emails.

That’s why I love writing blog posts for my readers.

As the great copywriter Ben Settle says, there is something therapeutic about turning your mind’s swirling thoughts into words.

It’s a way of expression.

Once you get into it, you will find it amazing to churn out cool emails and blog posts that produce results (sales, goodwill and personal branding).

So keep writing regularly and be yourself.

Here’s a big tip if you TRULY want to write from your heart:

Write fast in one go like you are speaking to the reader. It doesn’t matter if what you write looks bad. Just KEEP writing fast.

Once you are done with it, then go and edit it.

Do this regularly and you will be surprised to see how much your writing as well as your results improve.

2. Create Regular Videos

In today’s online world, videos play a HUGE role.

People want to see who is behind a website.

People want to know you.

I will give you a real life example:

Whenever I market any Live Event, I find that people SHOW UP at the event more often when I do videos.

When I just use text, the show up rate is lesser no matter how great the copy is.

That’s just one of the many many examples of how much videos can influence people.

So get out there and start doing more videos.

You don’t have to do crazy long videos.

Start with small 2-5 min clips where you deliver value.

If you are too shy to show your face, then start out by doing screen capture videos. Use tools like Camtasia, Screen o matic, etc to capture what’s on your screen.

You can do product reviews, take people through your product back office, do presentations, trainings, etc.

The list is endless.

The more videos you do…the more you will bond with your audience.

3. Do Content Filled Webinars

This is something that can give you an instant cashflow boost as well as help you develop credibility.

I regularly do a LOT of webinars where I open up my screen and walk people through various concepts and marketing strategies. I spend a considerable amount of time putting together the slides so that people can get value of my webinars even if they don’t invest in the high value programs I offer at the end.

Each webinar I do takes up around 2-3 hours and I take in questions during this time and interact with my attendees (vast majority of them stay right to the very end).

Every single webinar leaves me exhausted and immensely satisfied at the same time.

Not to mention, I pull anywhere from $25,000 to $100,000 for every webinar promotion I do these days.

Haha.

Double benefit.

Here’s the thing:

You don’t have to be some BIG SHOT to do webinars.

All you need to do is just build an email list, announce that you are going to do a webinar and just FREAKING do it.

What if no one attends your webinar?

So be it. Practice doing the webinar to an empty audience.

What if you don’t make sales?

So be it. Improve your presentation and keep doing more webinars.

It doesn’t matter if you fail.

At times, you JUST need to get started.

Keep driving traffic to build your list and and keep inviting your subscribers to attend your webinars (start with short small content filled webinars with an offer at the end and move on from there).

The more you do, the better you will get.

And results will follow.

4. Be Accessible

This is something that is VERY important but at the same time, it must be taken in the right context.

If a prospect emails you a genuine question about your product and he receives no response, how would that make him feel?

Crap.

He would find it hard to invest in your products when a valid question doesn’t get answered.

That’s no way to conduct a business. Online business doesn’t mean humans turn into robots.

When you are accessible and you clarify the queries of those who reach out to you, it creates trust and results in MORE sales.

It also reassures your prospects that tomorrow if they run into any problems, they can always contact you and sort it out.

With that being said, we need to keep the accessibility part in context.

Just being accessible doesn’t mean you should be a slave to your prospects and customers.

It doesn’t mean they can reach you at any time and you are supposed to give a quick answer.

It also doesn’t mean you are supposed to lend them a shoulder so that they can cry about their failures.

No. No. No.

You must be accessible ONLY for legitimate queries.

You are here to help serious people. Not provide free service to tire kickers and whiners.

Now when you become successful, your time will get more valuable. At that stage, there is no way you can personally be responding to each and every query.

When you get to that stage, you need to setup support desks and have someone monitor your business emails so that every single genuine query gets answered on time.

It’s a good business practice and a simple gesture like that would go a LONG way in helping you make more sales & building your brand.

5. Be Active On Social Media And Post Regularly

As much as doing emails, blog posts and webinars help….the fact is that a lot of your potential customers hang out on social media sites.

Having a strong social media presence is a MUST if you want to develop your personal brand.

The advantage of social media is that when you DELIVER VALUE, people can like it, comment on it and share it with others.

Everyone gets to see so much activity happening which positions your status in their minds.

Right now, I am focusing my efforts on 2 social media sites mainly…Facebook and Linklen.

It’s going great.

I share pictures, write about my experiences, do the occasional rants, write some value content pieces and people seem to LOVE it.

In fact, there are quite a few people who check Facebook more often than their email. So when you are out there marketing yourself by giving value, you can significantly increase your reach.

Here’s another tip.

Create Facebook Groups and invite people from your list to join you there.

It’s a great way to connect with people and start a lot of meaningful discussions.

A well maintained Facebook group will become a hub for thriving exchange of ideas as well as a great platform to make your latest announcements which will drive in more sales.

6. Be Your Natural Self

While we should strive to be professional, at times its ok to show our fun self.

You could be the CEO of a billion dollar company but that doesn’t mean you will always be serious 24/7.

We all have the fun whacky crazy side of ours.

Feel free to show that.

Post pictures of you doing simple stuff on social media.

Post pictures of you laughing like a jackass.

Share funny videos and memes.

Let the world know you don’t take yourself seriously 24/7.

It really works.

I have the habit of sharing some of the most craziest pics of myself on social media and people seem to LOVE it.

I suggest you do the same.

Let people know who you are.

7. Have High Standards And WOW Your Customers

This is something I take VERY VERY seriously.

My customers and clients are people who have bestowed their faith on me and have given me their hard earned money to get my products and services.

In return, I make sure I deliver 10X the value compared to what they have paid.

I want my customers to succeed like crazy.

I crave for their success because nothing pumps me up more than seeing my students succeed.

I want them to contact me like a happy kid and gleefully tell me about the awesome results they got following what I taught them.

That’s why I strive towards creating (or promoting) the highest quality programs.

In addition to that, I have put together a team of coaches to guide my high end customers and have a robust support system.

The goal is to give my customers/clients the BEST EXPERIENCE possible (in terms of education, implementation and support).

You know what happens when you do all this?

You get a TON of happy customers and word spreads fast.

You get a lot of referrals and it keeps growing each day.

So always make it your point to WOW your customer.

It will pay you back 1000X very fast.

So these are the things that I have been doing to build my personal brand and the results have been pretty good.

I would suggest you give them a try too.

Of course, you can’t do all of them at one go.

So start out by writing regular emails and blog posts and move on from there.

Consistency is the key.

Keep doing it and soon you will start seeing good results.

Now let me just close out this post with a VERY REAL fact:

While it’s absolutely possible to build a highly successful online businesses to the tune of 6 and 7 figures FAST…..it’s also possible to lose it all if you don’t build your business on sound principles.

There are countless marketers out there who became successful online and then took things for granted which led to their business crashing and leaving them broke.

I, on the other hand, will be able to create 5 multi million dollar business starting from 2017 and every year my income will only grow.

Why?

Because I CARE about my business and CARE about my customers.

I don’t promote shady products for a quick buck or let my customers rot after they have bought from me.

I run my business with great care which is why I see great results from it.

So ALWAYS make sure….you give a DAMN about your business and customers.

Provide value.

Build a brand.

Wow your customers.

Keep innovating.

Do all this and you don’t ever have to worry about your business crashing because your sales & brand value would ONLY be rising.

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All the best.