Personal Branding Mistake #71: YOU'RE LETTING YOURSELF GO

Keep posting and keep updating your social pages. It’s easy to get lazy about your personal brand but patience is a virtue. Good things don’t come to those who simply wait; good things come to those who act.

Regularly posting and updating your social pages increases your visibility and drives more engagement from your audience. Just because you posted a few times last week doesn’t mean you shouldn’t post this week. An estimated 75 million Americans check their social sites several times a day so keep your pages fresh and engaging. When search engine spiders look at your site for changes, they report back to Google with data that says “Yes, this website is important because it’s constantly updated with fresh and quality content”. This means that your website will rank higher for important keyword searches. Don’t be lazy. Never underestimate the power of activity to bring more visibility to your brand.

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Personal Branding Mistake #72: IT'S TIME FOR SOME SPRING CLEANING

Let spring inspire you – and your social pages. Tidy up, be clear, and bring your profile up to speed. Don’t let your personal brand get stale.

Allowing your profile to get stale due to lack to time, inspiration or plain old effort is a mistake. 41.4% of LinkedIn users say that keeping a fresh profile helped them uncover potential job opportunities. 69% of Twitter users stay active following others based on recommendations from friends. Keep socially busy with new and engaging content. Have that content point to your brand promise in a way that encourages your audience to want to learn more. Active users get above average marks for their brand.

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Personal Branding Mistake #73: LINK IT UP

There’s no better incentive to read a post than a catchy link. Paste links to interesting articles, personal sites and blogs. Make your readers stop scrolling and start clicking.

Great links are essential to audience engagement and action. Including a link in your update can increase engagement by 84%. The top 50 most engaging updates on LinkedIn include a link, image or video. Capitalize on audience curiosity and make this a best business practice. 50,000 links are shared every minute on Facebook. Actively engage your audience by prompting them with call to action links! Links will take your brand much further than text only posts.

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Personal Branding Mistake #74: ZZZZZZZZ...

No one wants to open an InMail beginning with a generic subject line. Spice it up, get to the heart of why you’re reaching out, and put yourself in your connections shoes – what would make you open an InMail? 

Make your purpose clear and give your audience a reason to get involved. Keep the subject line under 6 words (thinking mobile, roughly 25-30 characters will fit in the subject line on their mobile browser). A short subject line ensures that mobile users see the entire line. Grab your audience’s attention by putting something in the subject line that relates to them. Use questions, lists and other engaging lines. Do your homework and make the message personalized to break through the clutter.

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Personal Branding Mistake #75: YOU DON'T HAVE A PLAN

Before executing your social media strategy, make sure you have a plan and specific goals. Aimless posting won’t help tailor your personal branding message. 

Identify measureable social media objectives for your personal brand. Start by asking the question: where do I want to be professionally in two years and how can social media help me get there? Engage an expert to develop, manage and execute your plan. Make sure your plan can deliver on your goals. Test and re-test tactics to move towards those goals.

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Personal Branding Mistake #76: YOU'RE TAKING ON TOO MUCH

It isn’t easy to create and maintain a social presence. Take all the help you can get. Use tools like Hootsuite or Edgar to better manage content and schedule posts.

Hootsuite is an incredibly useful application for managing social media networks. Often referred to as a social media management system or tool, it enables you to view multiple streams at once and monitor what your audience is saying. Hootsuite has more than 10 million users around the world and is the most widely used social media relationship platform. Hootsuite allows you to manage multiple social media networks in one place, schedule posts in advance, share information easily across the web with your followers, view analytical data and engage in social media listening.

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Personal Branding Mistake #77: NOT HAVING A PERSONAL BRAND!

Believe it or not, most senior professionals don’t have a brand promise. Big opportunity lost.

A personal brand is not a portrait or a tagline (although it may include these). A brand is not a biography or a website (although it may be expressed in these). A brand is a promise you can keep … a benefit to your audience that is understandable, believable, delivers superior value and differentiates you from your peers. Whatever your current branding efforts are intending to do, they are perceived by your audience as making a promise. And if that promise is not what you want to communicate, then you’re in trouble. So consider doing research with your audience to find out what they think: what your brand really is, what people perceive of you as promising. And discover if you’re standing out … in the way you want.

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Personal Branding Mistake #78: 3 - IT'S A MAGIC NUMBER

Listing three areas of expertise on LinkedIn has been shown to be an effective way to expand your business opportunities. Too many areas can overwhelm your audience, and too few can diminish your brand credibility. 

Members who list skills on their LinkedIn profiles receive an average of 13 times more profile views than those who don’t. While you can have up to 50 skills displayed, 3 is the optimum number to list. Too many skills give the impression that you’re a generalist not a specialist. Not what you want to support your brand promise.

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Personal Branding Mistake #79: TOO VAGUE!

When describing your personal brand industry be sure to avoid broad terms like marketing or technology. Develop a more precise niche that effectively conveys what you do. 

Generic industry descriptions will not support your brand promise and will not help differentiate you from the crowd. Remember the 80/20 rule: 8 of 10 readers read your headline copy but only 2 of 10 read your entire profile. Stay industry specific from the top down to support your brand.

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Personal Branding Mistake #80: DON'T BE A BROWN COW!

Don’t be just another face in the crowd. Be a purple cow! Find your personal brand and what differentiates you from the herd.

Capture attention by doing things differently from your peers. Start with a strong brand promise backed unique aspects of your personal story. Use articles, links and visuals to support your promise. Videos work particularly well to make you special. Don’t be afraid, different is better when it comes to your branding.

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Personal Branding Mistake #81: SHOWCASE YOUR SKILLS

Your social media channel should feature YOUR most skilled form of communication. If you like to write, post and make a blog to vocalize your brand. If you feel comfortable speaking, make a YouTube video or podcast. 

Use your most engaging form of communication to capture your audience’s attention. In an eye-mapping study of Search Engine Results Pages (SERPs), video results commanded more attention than other forms of content. Videos and visuals are the most engaging types of content. Unfortunately or not they work better than lots of text so use them to elevate your brand.

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Personal Branding Mistake #82: CAMERA SHY?

Don’t be! Creating video content is a great way for your audience to get to know you better. Videos are personal and professional and can highlight the value of your personal brand. 

If adding video content to your social media strategy has not been a priority, it should become one now. 74% of all Internet traffic in 2017 is projected to be video so get ahead of the trend and put your brand in the spotlight. Using the word “video” in email subject lines boosts open rates by 19%, click-through rates by 65% and reduces opt-outs by 26%. 33% of tablet owners watch an hour of video per day so get video into your strategy moving forward!

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Personal Branding Mistake #83: NO PROFESSIONAL SITE

Unlike social pages you can completely control the content and design of your personal or business site. Your site allows the freedom you can’t have on social pages to create an optimized platform for engagement.

When you own your messaging platform you have complete control over the branding, content, layout, SEO, etc. If you don’t already have a professional site, create one now. Start with a brand promise and build support content to create a cohesive brand presence. 40% of all visitors will abandon a webpage if it takes too long to load.  Design your site so that it is completely optimized and loads quickly. Include links to your professional site on all of your social media platforms to build traffic.

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Personal Branding Mistake #84: IT'S ALL ABOUT YOU

Don’t forget the importance of the about page on your personal or business site. This is where you can tell your brand story in detail. Be descriptive and make sure it points to your brand promise.

Whether it’s your personal or business site, remember the “About” page is the most visited page. Make sure that you use this page to clearly tell your brand story. Present visitors with relevant details about your brand in a visually engaging way. Today’s web design technology and fast internet access allows for easy integration of video and multimedia elements to create a compelling visual story. Tell visitors in your ABOUT page why you are different and better than competition. And optimize your page for mobile as 80% of Internet users own a smartphone.

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Personal Branding Mistake #85: YOU THINK FACEBOOK IS JUST FOR FUN

Facebook is a platform built for business and pleasure. You can find your friends and you can find business. Create a professional Facebook page for business. Keep it separate from your personal page and add content for professional outreach. Don’t forget the reach of Facebook – everyone has it. Use this to your advantage. 

Although Facebook is primarily known as a social networking platform, it is also a vital asset for building your professional brand. Facebook reaches 1.44 billion active monthly users, which is the equivalent of 15% of the world’s population. 70% of Facebook user’s engage daily which represents a great opportunity for your brand. Regularly checking, posting and engaging with your audience on this platform are critical to establishing your brand. Take full advantage Facebook, be proactive and post post post!

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Personal Branding Mistake #86: NOT THINKING OUTSIDE OF THE BOX

As you’re developing content for your social pages, make sure you’re using targeted internal and external content. Use outside sites, forum pages and industry publications to get a sense of what information your audience really wants.

Prior to posting content make sure you know exactly what type of information will engage your audience. Do some Internet research; look at the questions your viewers are asking, the problems they are struggling with and the solutions they are searching for. Check out the companies and topics that your audience follows, likes or retweets in order to get a clear sense of what interests them. 2 million blog posts are written a day, so make sure your audience will take the time to read yours by posting relevant content. Don’t forget to include visuals and videos in your content as they get 64.9% more shares than text only.

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Personal Branding Mistake #87: IT'S NOT AS COMPLICATED AS YOU THINK

A lot of people don’t put any effort into their personal brand because they think it’s too much work. It’s simple; you just have to start small and keep your brand promise in mind to increase traffic and conversion rates. 

Putting effort into your personal brand is the only way to build it. Use keywords that relate to your brand promise and are known to drive traffic and conversion rates. The following are high conversion keywords for LinkedIn: Created, Improved, Increased, Developed, Reduced, Researched. For Facebook: Where, When, Tell Us, Inspire, Submit, Amuses, Warns. The following are high conversion keywords for Twitter: Re Tweet, Follow, Social Media, New Blog Post, Check Out, Help, Top. Use these keywords wisely and your brand will soar!

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Personal Branding Mistake #88: YOU'RE NOT BEING FRUGAL

There’s a lot you can do with a basic LinkedIn profile and a free website template. Assess your business needs before you go crazy buying different packages and plug-ins. Know what you need to promote then use the right tools. 

Building your personal brand doesn’t mean you have to spend big bucks on premium services. One of the primary reasons users buy premium LinkedIn is for InMail and expanded Profile Views. However, if reaching out to connections is not one of your brand’s objectives then InMail may not be essential. In 2014, 81% of LinkedIn users used the free version of the platform. Your LinkedIn profile grows naturally each time you add a new skill, accomplishment, share content or engage in other types of LinkedIn activities.

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Personal Branding Mistake #89: YOUR BRAND ISN'T JUST A LIST

Don’t simply list tasks you are capable of doing as you might on a resume. This is not a personal brand profile. Brand yourself based on a promise, not the tiny logistical nitty gritty. 

A list of expertise is nothing new to your audience. Many people believe that LinkedIn’s purpose is to showcase your resume and search for job opportunities, but it is much more than that. Your LinkedIn profile is meant to build your professional brand. Make sure your brand isn’t strictly made up of lists of skills, experience and capabilities. The status updates you post become a major part of your profile and should not be limited to accomplishments. Include articles you find of interest, references to events you plan to attend and relevant content that points to your branding.

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Personal Branding Mistake #90: YOU'RE A ZOMBIE!

Slogging through your personal branding? Don’t!  Ask a professional to give your brand the full attention it deserves to make it stand out in the crowd.

Maintaining your personal brand is an ongoing process. It is not easy to manage your brand and to keep social selling. Get help from a professional to keep you on track. By enlisting an expert you’ll receive valuable, unbiased advice. A professional will help you develop a brand promise,design your online pages and guide you to content development for social outreach. If you find yourself struggling with your brand, call in the troops and get the consultation you need to power your biggest asset.

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