How Much Does it Cost to Build a Personal Brand?
Why do people spend a lot of money going to a brand-name school versus a cheaper tuition option for their education? Why do people drive expensive cars or carry designer handbags? Why do they buy or rent office space on K Street, Madison Avenue, or Michigan Avenue?
Do you know why? Personal branding.
A personal brand is an image you put forth to your audience. It represents the center of who you are, your secret sauce, your values, and that aspect which sets you apart from the crowd. It’s what people think, say, and share about you when you are not in the room.
And whether you like it or not, you most likely have a personal brand. What you share on social media channels, the emails you send, the blog posts you craft, how you show up at events--they all comprise your personal brand. The main question is whether you want to actively control this branding process or you want it to control you.
Why Build a Personal Brand?
Regardless of whether you are a CEO, entrepreneur, or a recent college graduate, you should consider developing your personal brand.
Having a brand sets you up to compete in tight markets and industries.
In fact, in some industries, you can’t even get a job without a brand. Legal work requires you to have a personal brand, real estate requires you to have a personal brand, and of course, entertainment requires you to have a personal brand. ·
Personal Brands Are Financial Tools
With a personal brand, you can charge premium prices. Once you have a successful personal brand, more people will be willing to purchase your services. As the demand increases, you can also increase your rates, demand a higher salary, or pay more expensive fees for people and companies to access you.
Personal branding increases visibility and connects you to more people. Individuals usually connect with people who have well-developed personal brands as compared to those who do not. For instance, if you have a LinkedIn profile, you could be one of the 44% of users who take home more than $75,000 per year, which is over $16K more than the national median in the US.
Personal branding makes you an influencer. The more that people connect with you, the more you become an “influencer.” And an influencer is an individual who meaningfully shapes the behavior of his or her followers. These activities happen both online (social media, newsletters, blogs, etc.) and offline (conferences, networking events, charitable fundraisers, etc.).
How Much Will It Cost You to Build a Personal Brand?
The cost of building a personal brand will usually vary depending on the approach taken. These include DIY (do-it-yourself), a team of freelancers, or a personal branding agency, like ours.
DIY (Do it yourself)
This approach may seem to be the least expensive but also is the most work with a lot of hidden costs. It involves undertaking all that is required to create a personal brand single-handedly. With this approach, you will do the necessary photography, copywriting, and related tasks to ensure your personal brand is of high value.
There is a lot of work to be completed by one person in this approach, which to some extent, can interfere with the quality. If you decide to adopt the DIY in your personal branding strategies, be ready to:
Cater to the costs of acquiring appropriate equipment (good camera, video editing software, and a high-powered computer)
Invest a substantial amount of time in acquiring the appropriate skills (copywriting, web development, SEO, editing, social media management, video editing, etc.).
Bringing the above into perspective will likely lead you to pay roughly $1100+ for the equipment and approximately spend 80+ hrs to perfect all the required skills. Equating this 80hrs into the $15 minimum hourly wage means you will have spent $1200. In total, this will be roughly $2300-$3000. On top of this, add the fee which you are supposed to pay your trainers and you will definitely see this can quickly turn into an expensive option.
Having a team of freelancers
This strategy involves getting different freelancers to work on various aspects of your brand identity. On various online hiring platforms, you can find freelancers who specialize in copywriting, photography, social media management, web design, and other applicable expertise. You will only need to coordinate them and make sure they submit professional work. Under this option, you can expect a rough budget of approximately $5,000 considering a professional web design will cost around $2000, copywriting work can be roughly $449 per month, and professional photography at $100 per hour. There is no standard rate for these services, so costs can vary widely.
Hiring a specialist personal branding agency
With this option, you know the costs upfront to build your personal brand. Your role is simply to review the final products delivered. The agency will coordinate a team of experts working on your brand identity until you become satisfied.
It is important to make a distinction between personal brand coaching and consulting. Coaches help inspire and motivate you to achieve more with your brand, while consultants and agencies work from a business model or framework that makes use of data to determine a strategy. The cost of hiring an agency is typically $3500 or more, but may end up being less than if you do-it-yourself and it is certainly less of a time commitment.
Bottom Line: You Need to Take Ownership of Your Personal Brand
No matter which path you choose, it is worth noting that having a strong personal brand is the key to success in today’s unpredictable economic market. Without establishing a solid personal brand, you will just be another faceless individual in the crowd. Creating a personal brand is no longer an option in a global economy, but rather an economic reality for those people who want to succeed as entrepreneurs or ascend their roles within organizations and industries.
Personal Branding in Real Estate
The rise of the internet has effectively leveled the business playing field and in no industry is this more true than in real estate. The omnipresent online universe including the prevalence of smartphones and social media sites means that you can, theoretically, connect with anyone anywhere. And in order to be competitive in an industry founded on personal reputation, trust, and word-of-mouth, that is exactly what you have to do! Real estate has never been more competitive than it is now. If you want to find new clients, close deals, and expand your business, you’re going to need a strong personal brand to help you stand out from the competition.
Real estate is an industry that thrives on name recognition. It is virtually impossible to attract new clients without a strong reputation within your local community, supported by genuine testimonials from happy clients. If nobody in your community knows your name, you will be unable to grow your business. Period. You have to be proactive about establishing and enhancing your personal brand; a strong personal brand is crucial. So, the obvious question is, how do you make a name for yourself?
When you set out to build your brand, don’t forget who you’re talking to. In other words, before you turn your focus towards yourself, take a good look at your prospective audience. Take some time to identify your ideal client base, their needs, problems, and concerns, what pushes them to purchase and, most importantly, where they spend their time both online and offline. You need to put yourself and your message in front of their faces, or you’ll be talking to an empty room. If you take the time to identify your target audience, then you can tailor your personal brand to help people solve their problems and connect with them wherever they are. Never forget that your business is building relationships.
Once you have identified your client prospects, turn your attention to what makes you different from your competitors. Think about your passions and areas of expertise, why you became a real estate agent and who you most enjoy helping. Consider talking with past clients to learn more about their experience working with you. Why did they choose you over another agent? What was most helpful or important in your interactions? Would they refer you to a friend or family member and, most importantly, what could you do better in the future?
Now that you are starting to develop a clear sense of your client base and yourself, it’s time to make yourself visually recognizable. You should hire a designer. A strong personal brand comes with a distinct kit of branding visuals that will accompany your name wherever you choose to market yourself. This is not a time to be frugal. Hire a professional designer to help you develop a logo, color scheme, and graphics for your digital platforms. Now is the time to cultivate brand consistency. You should be equally recognizable in person, on Twitter, and on a billboard.
Your personal brand is tailored to your ideal customer, rooted in your strengths and individuality, and primed for brand recognition. You are ready to build your blog, generate content, and share your brand with your prospective clients.
How Do You Rebrand When You Are Transitioning Industries?
Personal reinvention is necessary for many reasons. Maybe you’re looking to take on a new challenge or find more meaningful work. Maybe you’re hoping to shake limiting perceptions of you that hinder your career growth. Rebranding can be a major shift, such as a retail manager moving into a marketing analyst position, or it can be a subtle transition from a manager role to a leadership position within the same industry. Whatever changes you’re hoping to manifest, taking control of your personal brand is a necessary part of the journey and can mean the difference between a lackluster position and a rewarding career. One of the trickiest steps in this path is persuading others to embrace your rebranding efforts.
There are techniques you can use to facilitate a smooth industry transition. Recognizing your strengths, defining your destination, and marrying the one to the other should be your first objective. You have skills. Once you have determined your destination, you will be able to figure out which skills apply and how. Remove the industry-specific labels and reframe your skill-set with the lens of whatever position you want to be in. Research keywords in your target industry and reword your skills to match. Use this new language in your resume, LinkedIn profile, and interviews.
Recognize the distinct “you-ness” that will be inherently part of your personal brand regardless of industry and find a way to embrace it. Leverage your points of difference, whether that be previous experience that distinctively colors your new brand or distinguishing personality traits that you can use to your advantage. Shrewdly leverage anything that makes you stand out whether or not these attributes are strictly relevant to your work.
Perhaps the most crucial part of successfully rebranding yourself when you transition industries involves crafting your narrative. Your personal story of why you chose to transition to a different career should communicate to prospective employers what this move means to you and where exactly you want to go. Though it is perfectly natural for human beings to be curious and want to develop new interests, employers are liable to view this as erratic behavior unless you provide another explanation. In order to protect your personal brand, it is therefore necessary to formulate a coherent narrative to explain precisely how your past experience fits into your present goal.
You may have changed directions in a big way, but you cannot expect the people in your vague but expansive social and professional network to know this unless you deliberately and strategically reintroduce yourself. These are the same people who will, hopefully, be your buyers, leads, and promoters in the future. Update your social media content: Facebook, LinkedIn, website, etc. Make sure your information is consistent and up-to-date.
Do not underestimate the importance of having a strong LinkedIn profile. Regardless of industry, the most critical foundational element of your career marketing effort is your LinkedIn profile. To make your profile more compelling, integrate multimedia elements that showcase your expertise. An easy way to use LinkedIn is to share articles relevant to your target market on your homepage. You can also participate in the platform’s special interest groups.
Waller & Company is a one-stop-shop consultancy that implements online presence strategy, public relations, and crisis communications to help leaders and businesses manage their brand. Very few companies offer a full-complement of personal branding services necessary to guide leaders through all stages of their professional life-cycle. Our goal is to help clients use personal branding to increase visibility, leverage expertise, and attract new opportunities. Due to the very diverse needs of our clientele, our services range from individual consultations to training workshops for corporations and nonprofit organizations.
Fintechs Looking For M&A Opportunities Need A Personal Approach To Branding
Many fintech companies may be ready for acquisition but can they say the same about their branding? Incomplete or unsuccessful brand strategies are some of the biggest detriments to fintech companies who are looking for acquisition opportunities.
Here’s why the CEO’s personal brand is an emerging fintech company’s biggest asset - if they utilize it correctly.
Fintech companies saw the highest M&A quarterly volume ever for Q1 2019, reaching a total volume of $112.1 billion USD. Staggering as that is, there are many more missed opportunities where great fintech startups fail to attract lucrative deals due to a subpar initial reception.
Fintech companies have to rely on the power of their branding to attract the right investors and public interest. Whether they plan on presenting their idea at Finovate or going through several funding rounds, that first impression is essential for establishing a good rapport. Fintechs who don’t focus on promoting a professional outward presentation, and a united brand, will ultimately set themselves up to fail.
When The Power of Branding Drags You Down
We’ve seen countless branding fails in the past, from both small businesses and big brand names, even within the fintech industry. A prime example of this is Facebook’s recent unveiling of their new cryptocurrency, Libra. A small fintech startup called Current quickly realized that Libra’s logo matched their own, and called them out on it via Twitter. The CEO of Current, Stuart Sopp, mentioned to CNBC that “This is a funny way to try and create trust in a new global financial system,” and he hit a very important point with that statement.
The fintech industry is the amalgamation of two big industries - technology and finance - and each brings its own set of problems to the table. But one of the biggest adoption barriers that all fintech companies face is the trust factor; the inherent and perceived security flaws that make people wary to trust a new system with their valuable data and money.
The aim of any fintech company is to build a strong, coherent brand that can overcome that trust barrier, and eventually (if that’s their aim) gain enough backing to become a viable target for M&A. But when something like the Libra logo situation happens, it breaks down the small headway the company has made. Some larger companies are able to weather this type of setback but that won’t work for newly emerging fintechs.
When Fintechs Do Branding Well, They Leverage Their CEO’s Brand
Fintechs who want to build a positive brand image know that they need to focus on creating a friendly, open identity that connects with people in a real way. There are more than enough examples out there of fintech leaders and marketing gurus espousing this very idea. Yet, at the same time, it’s incredibly hard to find many who are talking as passionately about the big role that personal brand impressions play, especially on social media.
In a lot of ways, fintech brands’ reputations are tied to their founder or CEO’s personal brand. According to a study by Burson-Marsteller, as much as 48% of a company’s reputation comes from the impression created by it’s CEO. Those who value building trust with the public, value their CEO’s reputations, because these lend authenticity and approachability to the brand, which in turn builds trust.
This concept is universal to every industry, and can be especially invaluable in fintech, where the industry can so quickly come across as impersonal and distant. The finance sector needs to be humanized through a user-centric approach and the easiest way to achieve that is with a strong personal brand.
How Personal Branding Can Help You Make Money Through Webinars
The term “webinar” is a clever blending of “web” and “seminar” and represents an online lecture, workshop, or presentation. The key feature of a webinar is the promise of real time interaction between the audience and the presenter. Webinars are radically accessible, offering potentially valuable content, generally free of charge, to geographically disparate individuals from the comfort of their own home. In this way, webinars are tools for immediate customer engagement and dynamic avenues for content marketing strategy.
Once you have convinced individuals to set aside an hour of their time to listen to your message, you have already converted them to potential leads; in exchange for the content you are providing, they have already given you contact information, most likely email addresses. You are perfectly set up to grow your brand, increase your reach, and establish your expertise; webinars are the perfect way to achieve this.
To successfully build your brand, you need to provide value. You are competing with a flooded online market; you have to offer more than what the competition is offering. Now, in addition to email addresses, you have the attention of your target audience. Don’t drop the ball. Your job is to follow through by providing high quality, lively content that actively engages your audience. Use your knowledge of a given niche and match it to your target audience to provide important information in an area of interest. If you manage this successfully, you will be rewarded with a priceless gift: trust. Your audience got something they needed for free and, in the process, has learned to trust your brand and become aware of how your products and services can help them.
The numbers clearly and demonstrably back up the claim that webinars are an effective way to bolster your brand and, in turn, increase your earnings. Studies show that over 60% of your audience will turn to vendor websites, dramatically increasing traffic, immediately following your presentation. Webinars also boost word-of-mouth marketing. If you deliver valuable content, then over half of your attendees are likely to share your website information with their network. Webinars statistically increase conversion rates with an average of 34% of attendees following through with a purchase. If you send a follow-up e-mail after the webinar, a whopping 70% of your audience will go on to register at vendor websites.
Not all of the traffic that you generate will result in a direct purchase, of course. Advertising specific products and services are only one element of the overall objective which is to build a loyal following for your brand, including future endeavors and related offers. Webinars can help you accelerate the transition from prospects to leads and from leads to loyal customers, paving the way for long-term content marketing.
If you want to use personal branding to turn your expertise into a profitable business, then you need to learn how to make your content generate customer engagement on a daily basis. Once you have mastered the art of real-time webinars, start experimenting with platforms like ClickMeeting which allows you to record, automate, and track engagement during your lecture.
How Do Social Entrepreneurs Benefit From Personal Branding?
Social entrepreneurs are people who use all the resources at their disposal to solve community and world problems. They aim to, ultimately remake our world, redress the damage done in the past, and/or leave a healthier planet for the next generation. Social entrepreneurs recognize that we are all part of a mutually dependent globally community whose best interests are served by also serving the needs of others. Many social entrepreneurs don’t think of themselves as a brand, and would rather people focus on their cause. However, successful fundraisers understand that the majority of people make donations to organizations that have leaders that they perceive as trustworthy. The following are some of the most significant reasons why social entrepreneurs need to have great personal brands:
Makes you more accessible
Social entrepreneurs must be accessible for the individuals and community that they serve, as well as donors that support their organization. Accessibility becomes even more important if you are a serial social entrepreneur like Karen Kalish, who has founded three non-profit organizations and one program. After reading about her in the Harvard Kennedy School Alumni Magazine, I performed a quick Google search and found her website and contact information. When I asked her why she decided to have a personal website she explained that as a serial social entrepreneur it provided a centralized location for all of her many community initiatives.
Social media increases influence and trustworthiness
Two cliché statements that are true: People form relationships with people. People buy from people they know, like, and trust. For a social entrepreneur to achieve the mission of their cause, others must invest their time and/or money to support them. Many people like to verify that the leader of the cause is trustworthy and credible before they commit resources. Damon Jones, Founder and Chief Giver of SOCKS (So Others Can Keep Striding), said that social media has been critical for increasing awareness and funding for the SOCKS movement. Mr. Jones has encountered many people who said that they donated to other organizations in the past, and the resources didn’t meet the target audience. However, by maintaining a trustworthy image on digital media, people support his cause because social media advertises his actions as a dedicated and passionate advocate for the homeless. By integrating personal and professional content on social media, social entrepreneurs not only develop a personal brand online, but also give people a holistic perception of who they are as an individual. It will make it easier for their peers, colleagues, and clients to establish trust, connection, and an authentic relationship. Social entrepreneurs, who have personal brands that are more trustworthy than those who don’t, make people significantly more likely to, metaphorically and literally, invest in them and help them achieve their goals.
A positive presence increases fundraising opportunities
One of the most important reasons why social entrepreneurs should build and maintain their personal brand is because having a positive on and offline presence helps increase the amount of funding they can raise. All social entrepreneurs need capital in order to be able to do what they aspire to do, and since most cannot arrange all of the required capital themselves, they must try to gather capital to fund their cause. Fundraising is essential to the sustainability of any social entrepreneurial venture. The majority of social entrepreneurs already possess characteristics of a good fundraiser such as: passion, commitment, strategic, innovative, vigilant, and optimistic. Another important attribute of successful fundraisers is having a presence or the ability to command attention and being respected as a professional. Personal branding, specifically your image and online presence, can help position yourself to appear more confident and knowledgeable to donors and potential donors.
Simply put: personal branding is about sharing your vision, not hard-selling yourself. Personal branding is using public relations, social media, and professional relationships to share your story and accomplish your mission to help and serve others. These are all things that some of the most successful social entrepreneurs do and as a result it has helped them make a huge impact in our communities.