Personal branding is an immensely fascinating concept when itcomes to marketing and one that will be naturally interesting tomany people.

Essentially, personally branding means taking your name andyour image and turning that into your brand.

This is a way for people to potentially achieve a minor form ofcelebrity online (hence the mass appeal!) while also presenting anopportunity for businesses to reach a much larger audience in afar more personal and impactful way.

At the same time, personal branding allows you to create more ofa direct relationship with your audience – and to be more “human”and accessible. This in turn means you will be more likely todevelop actual friends and fans, rather than just customers orclients. This is a FAR more powerful kind of relationship for anybusiness.

Personal Brands Explained

The best way to explain a personal brand is to suggest a fewexamples you can learn from. Take Tim Ferriss for instance. TimFerriss is a prominent creator, an author, a podcaster andsomeone who has a massive online following.

Part of Tim’s success comes down to his branding. Notice howyou know his name rather than a company. The same goes forsomeone like Tony Robins, or perhaps Pat Flynn. These arepeople whose names come first. Elliot Hulse or the Hodge Twinsare similar examples, as are many more YouTube personalities.

If you choose to create a personal brand, then the name of yoursocial media account is your name. The things you post are clipsfrom your life. And the business name takes a back seat.

Why it Works

There are many reasons that personal branding works well andparticularly when combined with social media.

For starters, a personal brand makes your website and businessfeel much more personal and it makes people feel as though theyknow you and can relate to you. That means they’ll feel as thoughthey can trust you and in turn, that means they’ll be willing to buyfrom you.

The aim is to become a role model, and to become someone thatothers want to emulate. Most of us will base what we wear onwhat we see in magazines, and what we see celebrities andfriends wearing. We are significantly less impressed by advertstelling us that we should wear a t-shirt.

This is the power of “social influence.” And it’s massive!

Having a more personal relationship with a brand also makes youmore emotionally invested. It means that you’re going to want tosee what they do next and you’re going to feel involved in their success. This makes you far more likely to engage with theirposts and to be persuaded by what they have to say.

Another reason it works is because people love living vicariously.People love getting an insight into the lives of others and this way,your social media will become much more interesting andaddictive to follow.

Finally, though, using yourself as your brand allows you to sell the“value proposition.” A value proposition drives most successfulproducts. This is the “promise” for what your product can do forpeople. It is the lifestyle you’re promoting and the emotional hook.

By having a personal social media account, you can showyourself living the lifestyle you’re selling. And when you do that,people will be inspired to buy your products.

The 3 C’s of Influencers

Are you ready to step up your game as an influencer? Do youwant to join the big boys in your respective niche and attract thehighest-paying sponsors?

Then you need to focus on THREE golden rules: the three C’s...They are...

Content

Being an influencer is all about creating amazing content.Whether you’re on Instagram, YouTube or Vine... it really doesn’tmatter. People tune in because they want to be inspired, informedor entertained and that’s what your content does.

This is also important when it comes to networking, getting shout-outs from other influencers and finding sponsors. The better yourcontent, the more other people are going to want to be associatedwith your brand. We’ll address how to do all of this later in thebook.

So how do you make amazing content? Again, it’s all aboutunderstanding your value proposition. You need to know why youraudience responds to what you’re doing and what they hope togain from following you. Once you can do that, you can tap intothat emotional hook and keep bringing them back.

Community

Community engagement is absolutely critical for influencersworking on Instagram and other networks. These are socialnetworks and the operative word here is social.

That is to say that these platforms are designed forcommunication. If you are putting out content but not responding to comments or messages, then you’re not really using thechannels as they were intended.

Start to actively respond to your audience and engage them andthey will feel as though they actually know you. This gives them agreater sense of ownership over your brand and of belonging andultimately, it’s what makes true “fans” as opposed to passivefollowers. Even friends!

This is also the best way to sell something as an influencer: usingwhat we call the “soft sell.” Imagine that you are selling lifecoaching for $1,000 per session. Instead of shoving that downpeople’s throats, you instead post images of you living your bestlife and mention casually that you offer life coaching. People willcontact you to ask about it, at which point you spend time talkingto them, getting to know them, and understanding if you can helpthem. Only then do you outline the program you offer and theprice, at which point they’re hooked. This is how, as an influencer,you can successfully sell truly “big ticket” items.

Connection

Finally, you need to connect. Success as an influencer is as muchabout who you know as anything else and if you can workalongside the other big influencers in your niche then it will giveyou a leg up that helps you get to the top that much faster.

Associate yourself with the brands people love and you willeventually become one yourself!

Of course you also need to put yourself out there if you’re going tofind those sponsors. Don’t just wait for them to come to you!

How do you connect with your partners? One option is to checkout our elite community of like-minded creators.

Over the course of this ebook, we’ll be addressing each of theseconcepts and more over a series of steps. Follow these steps tothe letter, and you’ll become a powerful influencer!