Everywhere you look on social media there’s larger than life personalities.
Top influencers will rent a Lamborghini or a tank to push their comedy sketch towards the extraordinary. Business leaders like Mark Cuban and Gary Vee believe in what they’re saying 110%, and their message is infectious as a result.
In an age when putting yourself out there is as significant as putting your brand out there, the deck seems stacked against introverts. You may wonder how you can compete online with extroverts who live for the limelight.
Well, just like extroverts, introverts have their own set of superpowers. You can capitalize on your strengths to boost your personal brand too.
Why introverts need personal branding
Before diving in, let’s briefly look at why personal branding is important and will be even more vital in the future.
If you haven’t put serious effort into building your personal brand yet, here’s why you should get started today:
- 92% of people trust recommendations from individuals over brands whether they know them or not. (Nielsen)
- 70% of hiring managers say that a personal brand is more important than a resume. (LinkedIn)
- 60% of consumers are more likely to do business with a company that uses personal branding effectively. (Branding Strategy Insider)
It doesn’t matter if you’re starting your career if you’re a serial entrepreneur or an artist. Those with personal brands have the power to create change and turn their aspirations into reality.
Define your personal brand
It takes plenty of dedication and consistent action to build an effective personal brand. To get started on the right foot, create a strategy road map to ensure you’re working towards your goals.
These are the key questions to answer:
- What are your goals for your personal brand?
- Who’s your audience?
- What are your content pillars? (key topics)
- How will you communicate with your audience? (including formats such as “how to,” “behind the scenes,” etc.)
- Which channels will you use?
- How often will you post on each channel?
- How will you make your audience take action?
- How do you plan to meet your goals?
- How will you measure the results?
Yes, some of your answers will seem obvious. Other times your decisions will feel like shots in the dark. Complete your strategy to solidify your initial direction and to create personal accountability.
After you put your strategy into motion and gain experience, you can start to leverage the power of data. Once you learn what works for your personal brand and what doesn’t, items that were shots in the dark will come into focus and new approaches will emerge.
Some items could never change such as your basic goals and audience. However, it’s both typical and desirable to adjust most of your answers over time. You, your career, and marketing trends, amongst other things, are sure to evolve.
It’s particularly important for introverts to decide how often to post and to create a content calendar. Nurturing your audience is a never-ending process. Out of the gate, it won’t feel natural or even seem reasonable to post as often as it takes to make an impact. Your content calendar will provide that helpful nudge.
Let your strengths guide you
Extroverts thrive on social interaction online just as they do offline. They may be charismatic and have a natural talent for speaking on camera. Social media is highly visual and video content keeps gaining in importance. So, extroverts have strengths that are well-suited to the current social media landscape.
When casually viewing an introvert’s content their strengths that translate to social media might not be as obvious.
Your greatest feats are likely done behind the scenes. Introverts all have different superpowers, and the key is to find yours that propel your personal brand. It could be a knack for strategy, strong IT skills, creativity, interpreting marketing data, etc.
Keep in mind that business leaders who might come off as extroverts are actually introverts. Bill Gates, Tim Cook, Elon Musk, and Mark Zuckerberg are household names and they’ve gotten there as introverts. They’ve mastered skills they weren’t good at initially such as public speaking and talking on camera. And if they achieved that, so can you.
Let your natural abilities guide you don’t make them your destiny either. At some point, you need to build on it by tackling new challenges.
Start with your home base communication style
Very few people can do it all when it comes to how they communicate with their audience. Whether it’s comics, graphics, writing, or speaking on camera, there’s a good chance you are far better at one method than the rest.
Let’s look at two famous people: author Stephen King and actor Ryan Reynolds. To dramatize the point, let’s imagine they both decided to switch roles just for their personal branding efforts. So, Stephen King only made videos. And Ryan Reynolds only posted text. What a misuse of talent, right?
In your lifetime, think about how much time you’ve devoted to writing, photography, acting, music, etc. Whatever you’ve spent the most time on is your home base. Start there, and build out from there.
Step outside your comfort zone
When it comes to growth, you need to get comfortable with being uncomfortable. Building your presence online is no different.
Even if you’ve used social media for years, creating a personal brand is a big step because you are transitioning from connecting largely with people you know to connecting largely with people you don’t know. Whereas your intentions were to stay connected with friends and family before, now everyone can see the mission you’re working towards.
Introverts in particular value privacy and at some point, you come to the realization that your life will never be the same once your personal brand succeeds. Criticism and judgment from people you’ve never met can be an intimidating thought. But once it clicks that your greatest obstacle is obscurity it becomes easier to push forward.
Digital marketing changes rapidly because people respond to novel things. Fresh approaches grab our attention. Things we’ve seen over and over become wallpaper in our feed.
As an introvert, just as you’ve found your rhythm with a particular marketing format, you’ll be challenged to adopt a newer, more effective style.
Make it about ideas, your projects, and other people
Ever get turned off by personal brands that scream “It’s all about me?”
Extroverts can sometimes get away with talking about themselves excessively, sharing their personal challenges, and fitting in opinions from left field. It works for the rare person with an abundance of magnetic energy, but don’t make the mistake of believing it’s something most people can pull off because you see it a lot online.
Typically, it’s best for introverts to switch the focus away from themselves and make it about other things: namely ideas, wisdom they’ve gained from others, and experiences that will help their audience in their journey.
In fact, people who make their personal brand about their audience rather than themselves will almost always get better results. Think about what your audience gains from consuming your content and the value you bring to the table. Focus on making their lives better and yours will follow suit.
Get comfortable with making short-form videos first
Whether it’s how-to videos on YouTube or reels on Instagram, video is where it’s at. It’s become essential in social media marketing.
Video might not be your thing, and as an introvert, the thought of speaking on camera might send a chill down your spine. The good news is you don’t always need to appear in your videos. There are plenty of ways to build a connection with your audience without even showing your face.
Here are some introvert-friendly ideas to get the ball rolling:
- Show people a project you’re working on and use a voice-over to explain your process.
- Start a screencast and make a short tutorial for your audience.
- Show people something remarkable about your surroundings and post it as a story.
Make no mistake, learning to effectively speak on camera is a must. Start with short clips to gain experience and confidence.
Choose a topic that’s meaningful to you in the moment. Write a script or an outline to give your content structure. Generally, unscripted content comes across as more natural and authentic. However, you may need a script at first to ensure you get the right message across.
Batch create your video content
Want to know the top reason people don’t create video content? They don’t believe they have enough time.
Producing high-quality videos requires preparation such as establishing the right appearance, setting up lighting, microphones, etc. Thus, if you can shoot a few video ideas or even several in one day you maximize the value of that preparation.
Batch video creation is an advanced technique you won’t want to leverage until you’re confident in your workflow. If making one-off videos takes more time than you’d like, keep in mind you’ll be able to achieve better results with far more efficiency once you graduate to filming in batches.
As an introvert, you might have to work up the courage to film yourself. Creating your videos in batches ensures you make the most of the days when you’re ready to take it on.
Master the art of consistency
If I had to choose one thing that’s the most critical to success in personal branding it’s consistency.
A study by Marq found that brands that are consistent increase their revenue from 10 to 20%. But really, it’s about so much more than that.
Once you stop posting people quickly forget about you as their feed is always overflowing with new content. It’s far better to find a posting schedule that’s achievable so you remain consistent than it is to post a superhuman amount, quit for a month, and then start posting again.
Consistency is one of those things that sounds easy but is challenging in practice.
There will be days you don’t feel good and won’t want to shoot another video. There will be days when you’re low on inspiration and seemingly out of ideas. There will be days when you’re incredibly busy with business operations and fitting in content creation won’t seem possible.
Those that keep creating whether it’s easy or hard will look back and be grateful to their former selves for pushing through. That’s what it takes!
Conclusion
Establishing a personal brand is an investment in yourself and your future.
It’s easier to gain people’s trust and attention as an individual than it is as a brand. And there’s no end to this stage in public perception in sight.
Introverts will have to overcome doing things their initially not comfortable with to make an impact. In many cases what will mean mastering video marketing, and at the very least making video a part of their mix.
Are you an entrepreneur looking to use personal branding to propel your business? Contact us so you can take personal branding strategy and content production tasks off your to-do list.
