A strong personal brand distinguishes you, increasing your chances of attracting high-quality clients and accelerating revenue gains. Strengthen your brand by implementing this practical advice.

Understand Your Value: Creating a personal brand starts with knowing yourself. What personal strengths can you leverage to attract clients and develop ingenious, results-generating solutions? “Personal branding is about taking things you’re good at and using them to help others,” says William Arruda, a New York-based branding expert and author of Career Distinction: Stand Out By Building Your Brand. 

Perform Consistently: Say you determine that your unique value is that you’re a reliable marketing partner who is expert at coming up with outside-the-box promotional ideas. It’s important then that you deliver performances consistent with this identity on every order or your brand – and your sales – can suffer.  

Think Digital: Most prospects will research you online. “So make sure you’re virtual identity is consistent with your brand,” says Arruda. Establish a strong website with testimonials, a professional bio and other information that conveys your distinctive value. Even consider purchasing a website that’s your “first name-last name.com” and other variants of your name and company.

Additionally, get active on social media platforms. Ensure that there is consistency of message, tone and character across your site and social platforms. When it comes to social, Arruda says salespeople must build a profile on LinkedIn that’s appealing to ideal prospects. “Integrate multi-media into your profile,” he says.

Create and Curate Content: Your original online content says something about your brand. So does discovered content you share. Thus, if you aim to convey that you’re a deft marketing partner, create a blog that establishes you as a consultative expert in the promotional products industry. Also, tweet and post links to articles, videos and infographics with information that’s useful and/or entertaining to target clientele. It doesn’t always have to be serious to attract serious business.

Get Your Logo and Tagline Right: Your logo should have colors and a design that evokes the character of your brand, and your tagline should succinctly and sharply convey that image. Want to be known as the cool, calm and collected consultant? Blue could be the color for your logo. Do a web search on what logo colors mean. Keep your brand colors consistent throughout printed and online marketing materials.

Step Out From Behind The Computer: While digital brand-building is essential, it’s important to take your efforts into the non-virtual world, too. Try speaking as an expert at trade shows, seminars and marketing-related events. Network at happenings attended by potential customers. Serve as a source in articles in industry magazines and other publications.