People join LinkedIn for various reasons. They may be scouting for jobs, connecting with people, or reaching out to prospects. Whatever it is, building a personal brand on LinkedIn is key to succeeding on the platform. You need to be active by fully participating in activities, sharing information about what you do, and gaining visibility.
LinkedIn is ranked among the top social media platforms professionals use, so it makes sense to build on it. In this article, we explain how to build a personal brand on LinkedIn and stay authentic on the platform.
1. Optimize Your LinkedIn Profile
Optimizing your profile sends an impression to anyone who views your profile. You can start by editing your professional headline to specify what you do for your target audience, and then highlight the pain points you address.
Overall, your profile should reflect what kind of brand you are and the image you want to represent. If you are a freelancer looking for clients, start by optimizing your LinkedIn profile to get more clients. Also, add contact details like your email address for people who would like to reach out to you.
Progressively, you want to update your profile to reflect certifications and recent work experience, which adds credibility to you. Also, adding your skills, relevant keywords, a top-notch “about me” section, and a clean, professional headshot would boost your profile.
2. Build Relevant Connections on the Platform
Once you have an optimized profile, you can reach out to connections. An important rule for building relevant connections on the platform is communicating with people in a professional yet natural tone. You can reach other professionals or clients in your niche by sending them personalized invites. Also, ensure to give them space while waiting for a response.
You want to strengthen your brand image by building a professional network on LinkedIn, so start by interacting with their posts and making meaningful contributions. The more you interact with professionals in your field, you connect with game changers that open you up to collaborations in the future. These connections can boost your visibility and attract clients.
You can start discussing shared interests with these connections, which can be a good conversation starter. This interaction may result in a full-blown business relationship and friendship. Finally, LinkedIn’s algorithm is such that when your connections interact with your post by liking or commenting, it shows their LinkedIn connections increasing your reach.
3. Understand Your Target Audience
Not everyone on LinkedIn has to build a brand around motivational quotes or become a LinkedIn coach. What kind of business do you own? What’s the first impression you want people to have when they see your posts? When you have answered these questions, you can start studying these people whose attention you want.
Most times, it’s best to create a persona for your target audience, including their age range, values and beliefs, and most importantly, their interests and pain points. By understanding your target audience, you can position yourself as someone with the solution to their pain points.
The best way to understand your target audience is by conducting surveys and client interviews that give insights into their problems. Another way to do this is by studying your competitors closely to understand what kinds of people they address.
4. Create Relevant Content That Addresses Pain Points
Once you understand your target audience, creating content to address their specific needs will be easy. The best content ideas are the ones that leave your readers satisfied. By doing this, they see that you understand their pain points and can solve their problems.
You should create content that leaves your readers longing for more. It should educate, inspire or entertain them, sparking their interests. And by creating relevant content, you position yourself as an authority. Depending on your niche, pain points mostly center around productivity, support, finances, and how-tos.
Start by creating an outline that covers these areas. You can also include case studies if you’ve worked with clients with these pain points. In addition to applying unique LinkedIn post ideas to boost your engagement, try creating content for your target audience rather than what you think they should hear.
5. Have an Authentic Brand Story (Be Real)
If you’ve been on social media for a while, you would know how powerful an inspiring brand story can be. Some brands push visibility using a grass-to-grace story. However, you don’t need to forge stories to build a personal brand. If you’re authentic, you’ll pull your crowd. So it’s best if you are as transparent as possible.
The essence of having a brand story is to improve trust, and it doesn’t help to fake. Instead, add your personality to your brand and carry your audience along with you. After all, you’re building a personal brand. Take your audience through growing your brand, including your successes and hurdles.
Now, you don’t want to leave everything out there, just enough to make people realize that they are interacting with a personal brand and not some vague entity. Also, keep your brand story simple, and as you interact on the platform, it should reflect why your brand exists.
6. Publish on LinkedIn
LinkedIn publishing is one feature many users need to learn about. It allows you to publish articles on the platform and add them to your profile. The best part is that these articles can show up on Google organic searches when they are SEO-optimized, giving you the exposure you need.
This way, you benefit from gaining visibility on LinkedIn and Google. You can also feature these articles on your profile, so prospects can see them once they click on your profile.
Publishing articles on a professional platform like LinkedIn helps you stand out in your niche. This feature also notifies your followers when you publish content, helping you reach newer and wider audiences.
7. Customize Your Feed by Following People in Your Niche
To build a personal brand, you want to know your niche’s hot topics and trends. You can do this by following people in your niche. Share ideas and join conversations that show you’re knowledgeable in your area.
Also, following people in your niche customizes your feed and helps you see who they interact with. If you want to go further, interact with these connections and expand your reach.
8. Stay Consistent With Your Posts
In consistency lies your power. While building a personal brand, you need to show up more than a few times. It would yield better results if you were consistent at it, so try showing up every day. Unarguably, consistency can be one of the hardest things to do. However, by making your presence known on LinkedIn, you attract people to hear what you say.
Therefore, you’ll need to publish content, interact and reach out to connections on LinkedIn consistently. You may need an accountability partner to help ensure you are always on track.
Get Maximum Visibility With LinkedIn
LinkedIn is wild with visibility. If you know how to play your cards well, you’ll be building a strong personal brand in no time. Aside from brand visibility, you can also become a respected thought leader in your niche. In addition to these tips, you may want to learn how to grow your reach on LinkedIn while you build your brand.
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