Are You Consistently You?

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Are You Consistently You?

 

Are you consistently being you? Do you know what that means? Let’s try and experiment. Keep reading, breath deep, relax and let your mind open to the words that follow. Imagine you’re in a crowded room that is packed wall to wall and overflowing with your most perfect customers. It’s a festive occasion. There’s plenty of mingling and little groups chatting about this, that and other things. You hear music playing and people laughing. You think of the glasses and rattle of ice as drinks are served and consumed. Not caring, you pick a small glass and approached. You’re laughing over something, it doesn’t matter what. As you draw near, a couple of heads start and notice. You say, “Do you mind if I crash this party?” Everyone smiled as their body shift to welcome you closer. The tall elegant woman says, “Tell us about you.” At this moment, all eyes and ears are upon you. What do you say? Even more critical, what message does every fiber of your being communicate through those that are around you? It’s not merely the words you use, but the presence or command.

Regardless of whether you realize it or not, with every action you take and every word you use, you communicate precisely what it is that makes you uniquely you. Even if you don’t understand that completely, does it makes sense for your success to take the time, to learn how best to leverage those aspects of your personality, to create the most compelling indeed the most unique presence you can? You bet it does. You bet it matters to your business and to your life, make time. A lot of personal branding advice is about putting yourself out there so that others see you as an expert on the subject. What do you do when you’re starting out in your field? You don’t feel you have a ton of expertise and unique information to share. You’re not an MIT professor, behavioral economist or CEO of a wildly successful start-up or someone who has spent fifteen years excelling in their field. Whether they are a perfectly ordinary person, who happens to be interested in a particular industry and once you get a leg up on others who are competing for the same job.

In the beginning, how do you brand yourself when you’re not sure if you have something to say? What if you just don’t know how to get started? How do you find your voice? It’s simple. Spend your time learning about what is going on in your field. Read books and blogs. Subscribe to scholarly journals or read them at the library. Listen to webinars and go to learning events, especially conferences. Do everything you can to stay up-to-date and find relevant information then use that to start branding yourself. First, write about what you’ve learned. Every time you read, learned, and see something interesting, take an hour or so afterwards to write down your take on it. On the blog, it’s best to share what you found most thought-provoking, a lesson that you applied to your own life or a personal story about the time you saw what you learned about what happens.

Pass on good information that you’ve learned, while adding your own personal touches. That’s how a business expert I knew about has started. She knew a lot about her field but was completely flustered about starting her own blog. She had no idea where to even start. She started off a blog by combing the internet for other experts work and then responded to it. Doing that for the first couple of months helped her find a voice and then she was off. Now, she’s a respected business speaker with a popular book and a booming business. This works for newbies in the field as well. Even if you don’t have the expertise to share, you’re sharing that you’re a passionate learner. Then use what you find as a collection tool. When you’re spending tons of time learning about what’s going on in your field, you’re finding some interesting stuff. Use that to advance your personal brand.

With every action you take and every word you use, you communicate precisely what it is that makes you uniquely you. Click To Tweet

Keep a database of interesting resources and the database of people whom you want to impress with your personal brand. Make sure you keep track of what they’re interested in and what their concerns and needs are. When you see something in your research, that you know they’ll find interesting, email them a link to it with a short note. This works especially well after you met someone at a networking event, especially if you can find something relevant in the conversation you had with them. For example, if you’re talking to someone about leadership, you might send them a link to a TEDx Talk by behavioral economist, Dan Ariely about what motivates people to take action or through an article in Fortune about how exposing employees to the actual customers who will buy a company’s products, can be a powerful motivator to get employees more engaged in their work.

Do this for a couple of reasons. First, if it’s an interesting article that is relevant to the person you want to connect with, they’ll be glad to receive it. Judging by how busy more people are in the workplace, it’s highly likely that they haven’t had the time to spend time browsing through current articles about their field. Not only are you demonstrating that you’re someone who is paying a lot of attention to the field, but you’re also helping them by sending them articles they probably wouldn’t have seen otherwise. It’s a great way to signal to the person that you are someone who is bringing something to the relationship, instead of just being concerned about what’s in it for me. If you’re starting up, people don’t expect you to have the expertise of someone who spends decades of selling in their field. What they do want to see is someone who has a lot of passion for their field and who are doing whatever they can to learn as much as possible.

Employers want to hire people who are passionate about their work and who are eager to learn. Brand yourself as someone who is enthusiastic about the subject you’re interested in and work on gaining your knowledge that will make you an expert in the future. In the meantime, use the knowledge you’re gaining to cement your relationship with people who can help you get where you want to be. By now, you know how valuable it is to build a brand that establishes you as an expert within your market. Developing your expert brand will help you bring in more business, allow you to charge higher rates and makes it easier to retain clients and customers. I’m going to cover five simple tactics that you can put in place to help you enhance your personal brands status. Make the right impression in a strong business card. Your business card plays an important role in formulating the first impression that you create. It’s important that your card positions you in the right light. That doesn’t necessarily mean that a card is flashy or dramatic.

Your business card will represent the brand you’re building. Demonstrate your knowledge via social media platforms like LinkedIn, Twitter, and Facebook. It’ll give you the opportunity to demonstrate your expertise to the world. Share articles that are relevant to your audience. Provide insight and analysis of breaking news concerning your market. This approach provides value to your audience, while reinforcing your expertise at the same time. Use your email signature to build a brand. Many of you sent hundreds of emails each week, so why not brand this interaction each and every time. You can do this with your email signature, which will summarize your points of differentiation. While reinforcing your brand, include a logo as well if possible and dress the part. If you are branding yourself as a high-powered lawyer, you shouldn’t show up to work in a badly worn suit that hasn’t been dry cleaned in a month.

 

Similarly, if your brand is a personable, friendly, laid back retirement advisor, the flashy suit doesn’t fit. Dress appropriately for the brand you’re developing. Donate your expertise. Finally, one of the best ways to demonstrate your expertise and reinforce your brand is to find causes and charities to get involved in. This gives you the opportunity to utilize your ability while working for a greater cause at the same time. Building your personal brand is the one thing to guarantee longevity at work or even in your business because no one can take it away from you. One lucky audience that posts a review on iTunes will win a private confidential consultation and coaching with me in discovering your unique soul’s purpose. I will lead you on a personal journey to discover the unique mind-body psychosomatic map of your life.

You will get a detailed report and a personal 45-minute consultation with me that is worth thousands. I’m going to help you design a life that works so you are able to say yes to the things that matter and eliminate everything else that slows you down. The more clear you can be about how to organize your daily life to support your bigger vision, the more you step into your true potential, stay on track and accomplish all that you want and deserve. Are you ready to make that happen? Feel free to reach out to me to ask questions at AskDrSun.com. Your life is a gift, design it. Do what matter and join me each week as we get closer to designing the life of your dreams. Join me next time on Your Life By Design.

Important Links:

• iTunes – Your Life By Design Podcast
• AskDrSun.com
• Dan Ariely – TEDx
• Fortune Article