As a busy entrepreneur, the chances are that you don’t have enough hours in the day to get everything on your to-do list done, never mind think about posting on LinkedIn and Twitter.
However, building a personal brand on social networking sites can offer a whole host of benefits for your business, some of which you may not have considered.
Below, we’ve rounded up five of the biggest to help you decide whether to make the investment…
Allows you to build awareness
Let’s start with the obvious one.
An entrepreneur who regularly posts about their business and industry is going to be remembered more than the entrepreneur who is quietly working away.
We get it: shouting about your successes can be cringe-worthy and against your nature, but when it comes to business, you need to do everything you can to stand out.
Lilach Bullock posts about her marketing business on social media virtually every hour, allowing her to amass a following of more than 100,000, and achieve a Twitter verified tick.
Sell more products and services
Next up, let’s talk about business.
Whether you’re selling stationary or solicitor services, posting under your personal brand as well as a company profile means you’ll be putting your business in front of more potential customers.
We’re not saying that you need to spam your friends and family on Facebook with promotional content every day, but building a personal brand via Facebook Page and LinkedIn profile will ultimately lead to more clicks and sales.
Matt isn’t pushing his videography services on LinkedIn; instead, he’s showcasing a client case study and reminding is connections that he’s an expert in video content creation.
Build trust
Humans like humans.
Content posted by users on LinkedIn performs much better than content posted by businesses; that’s because we’re drawn to people like us, their stories, their vulnerabilities, and their successes.
By building a personal brand through social media, you can build trust and credibility in your niche – people will recognise your name when they see your posts on their timeline and, when they eventually need a product or service that you offer, they’ll be more likely to think of you than a company offering a similar service.
Murray builds trust on LinkedIn by sharing tips and tricks on his industry. He’s not selling; he’s offering his expertise for free, and his connections engage in the comments section.
Reduce your reliance on paid ads
As businesses spend more on paid advertising and ad space is becoming more competitive, Google and Facebook have slowly increased their fees.
That’s not to say they’re jacking up the prices for the sake of it; digital advertising is all about supply and demand, so whilst you can pay as little as $0.01 per click in some industries, it can be as high as $100 in others.
By building a personal brand that people trust and recognise, you can sell to the people you already know, rather than spending thousands of pounds trying to capture them elsewhere.
An organic post and a sponsored post on LinkedIn. Which one are you more likely to engage with?
Spin-off into coaching, eBooks, and speaking
Though your personal brand should ultimately serve as an extension of your business, there’s no reason why you can’t spin off into offering other services off of the back of your success on social media.
If you become an authority in your industry that people come to for advice, you might be approached for speaking, TV appearances, quotes for newspaper articles, and perhaps even branch out into launching your own ebook or coaching business.
This digital marketer has pivoted from running a digital marketing agency to becoming a speaker, commanding tens of thousands of dollars for a set at a marketing conference.
There you have it – just some of the reasons why entrepreneurs should build a personal brand on social media. If you’re too busy to do it on your own, turn to 99social for support. We offer affordable social media management for small businesses and can manage your personal LinkedIn and Twitter pages as well as your company’s official pages. Get in touch to find out more and arrange a quote.