How are you branding?

    How often are you posting? Have you heard this question before? Well, I have to listen to it all the time from my mentor. It eventually turns to, "blah, blah, blah!" Ok, not really, but sometimes. 

There are four essential steps to creating a brand:

1. Define How You Want to be Perceived
2. Organize Your Business Based on its Promise
3. Communicate Your Promise
4. Be Consistent

   When creating a personal brand or establishing a brand for a business, it is essential to capture your audience and define how you want to be perceived. Who are you, or what type of business do you have? It is necessary to capture your audience; your audience needs a defined meaning of who you are and your business. Once you have defined your business’ promise, you need to figure out how to communicate that promise to your audience or potential clients. Clients need to know what you have to offer and why they need to be engaged with you or your business. Be consistent. Whether a personal brand or business needs to understand that consistency is vital. Be consistent in what you promise, the type of content, and how often you post. (“4 Steps to Building a Successful Brand.”)

   Once the business has been established and has a reputation on social media, it is vital to know what your customers need right now. Many brands’ focus is to go viral (getting new customers), but they need to focus on it now. Last week I talked about word of mouth marketing; this is how you get new customers and maintain current customers. Once you have a brand that is known and reputable, your name will spread. 

    Once you have checked off the list of how to brand your business, you’re not entirely done. That’s only the first list. Now that you have established who you are on the interwebs, continue branding yourself by learning more about your industry. Connect on social media with journalists, public relations professionals, influencers, and other social media platforms. 

    The Facebook business suite has a great platform that allows you to connect across Facebook and Instagram to create engaging posts with clients. Fortunately, businesses can use the same content for Facebook and Instagram but need to be aware that links are not readily available in Instagram captions. The Facebook business suite even allows you to schedule content to post across the two platforms.  Twitter will enable clients to communicate with your business directly. Hashtags will be your friend on Instagram and Twitter. I know we see hashtags across all platforms but have you ever searched a tag on Facebook or LinkedIn? If you were to go to your Instagram or Twitter and hit the search button, what will you find? Hashtag trending topics. These platforms even allow you to follow hashtags. Do you have a hashtag for your business? LinkedIn is a professional site that will enable you to connect with other like-minded individuals and companies. LinkedIn will be your go-to source for business news and your way to network through the industry. 

    Fun Fact: when I was in undergrad, I knew I wanted to work in radio, but I wasn’t quite sure how I would get to where I wanted. It was hard. I could not network in person because I was in school full-time and worked two jobs to stay afloat. So, what did I do? I branded myself on social media. I created a podcast that I recorded in the school’s studio, uploaded weekly, and began to send it to individuals in the business on social media. It took some time, but I finally received feedback and eventually landed a summer internship at CBS Radio in Atlanta. By the end of the summer, I had not one but two job offers. That is how I started my career in radio.

    How do you follow your engagements? Do you know when to post or what kind of posts are doing well? Analytics! Suppose you’ve created your business pages on each social media platform. In that case, there is a separate section to tell you everything you need to know about your audience. Below, I’ve posted some screenshots of my Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter Analytics.  

         

Impressions are how many people saw your post. Engagements are how many times your content has been liked, commented on, and shared. The reach is how many people saw your post. You can even go into detail and find out at what time are clients seeing your post on their timelines, what days they are viewing this type of content the most. Analytics also show if men or women are more engaged with your posts and where they are located. It may take some time to study analytics, but it’s worth reading if you want to keep your brand’s consistency. Establishing a brand isn’t what I would dare call easy, but it becomes a habit that you become better at with effort. (Seiplee, Pamela.)

    Branding yourself or business on social media can seem a bit difficult but think of branding your business as getting to know someone new. Someone explained it to me once as if you’re dating. You meet someone, and they make a first impression. Once they make the initial impression, you decide to continue getting to know that person. Do you give them your number or say, “No, thanks.” and walk away. Imagine is how clients will view your business. Is your brand captivating? Will it keep them there to get to know more about your business? If you decide to give the other person your number, what are your expectations of this person? You’re now intrigued and want to know more. What do they have to offer? Are they funny? Is their conversation engaging? How do they handle conflict? Are they consistent in the things they believe in? Are they confident in themselves? Your clients will naturally answer all of these questions about your business if you make the right impression. They will come back for more if you provide the content they need. 

    So now, I ask the same question I’ve been asked since I started my business over a year ago, “How are you branding?”

-Jaleesa Diggins

Works Cited

“4 Steps to Building a Successful Brand.” 4 Steps to Building a Successful Brand - Article, Yellow Pages for Businesses, businesscentre.yp.ca/-/4-steps-to-building-a-successful-brand. 

Bown, Jessica. “How Social Media Could Ruin Your Business.” BBC News, BBC, 8 July 2019, www.bbc.com/news/business-48871456. 

Seiplee, Pamela. “How to Leverage Social Media for Public Relations Success.” HubSpot.