Tuesday Tip: Get personal and strengthen your brand in the process

It emphasized perfectly what I hoped to discuss in today's tip. It's easy to look to other brands for inspiration when building your own or your company's, but I encourage you to do the opposite: get more personal and in the process, you'll strenghten your brand. 

Why build a personal brand

In a post from Digital Current by Sam Hurley, "7 Vital SEO Trends to know for Google Rankings in 2017," he points to personal branding as one of the most important factors in SEO this year. This does not only include people with a personal brand; instead he states it can be, "highlighting a real person as a (or the) face of your company." Why? People want to do business with real people and not corporations.

He goes on to explain that if we want to work with the most recent Google and Facebook Search Algorithms, personal branding is one way to do it. For example, one factor within the Facebook algortithm makes it so individuals' posts show up more so than companies'. 

At ArcStone, we get behind this notion of making it personal. Much of our initial work with a client is based in audience development. One of the main questions we ask a new client is "who do you want to reach?" to establish a voice. To find what social media networks they should be on, we seek the answer to "how / what / where do they want to hear what you have to say?" Then we help build a brand that feels personal, and we make sure it is found on the right networks. 

How to build your brand

This idea of the personal over the popular was a major theme presented as my coworker Annie and I attended the #TrendingEvent last week at The Social Lights. With social media as the topic, all six panelists concluded the most important aspect across channels is authenticity. The more you can be you rather than trying to say what others are saying, the more your audience will see your brand and the more your company will develop its voice. 

A way to make this happen if you're not a one-man show, Hurley suggests you elect your CEO or long-term employees to be highlighted as the voice of blog posts, social media, site content and the like. As they build their name, your brand is strenghtened as well. 

Could you assign an expert in each category of your blog and have the posts be attributed to them? Their author page could be centered around feeling more personal, linking to their Twitter or LinkedIn. How about including staff photos on your site and using social media to tell authentic, fun stories about your staff.

Conclusion on personal branding

Branding should always come back to authenticity, real people and true stories. Don't just aim to sound like you are keeping up with what's trending – say what you or your company's principles would say. React as a person, not a robot.