Believe it or not, but the personal brand is no longer just how you see yourself or how others refer to you — your personal brand is now “what google says about you!” So, the big question is “What does Google say about you and your brand?” and “How do you start showing up in the right way in an online search?”

Let’s face it, you don’t get a second chance to make a first impression and these days your first impression usually shows up in an online search.

To some, personal branding may seem like a new and trendy buzz word, but the personal brand has always been around and has always been important; it is simply your reputation or in other words, what people say about you when you are not in the room.

However, with the Digital Age, easy access to information, and Google having approximately 3.5 billion searches per day, it has become much easier for anyone to find your brand or to form an opinion about your brand by doing a simple Google search.

So now, every time you post, share, comment and like something online, you are leaving a digital footprint of your brand for the world to see and the opposite is true — if you are not posting, sharing, liking and commenting on things related to your brand, then you are lacking an online presence. So, what do you do? You start becoming more intentional about how you are showing up both on and offline.

STEPS TO BUILDING A BETTER PERSONAL BRAND

In my workbook, A PR Chick’s Guide: 8 Steps To Building Your Personal Brand — I break down the various steps on how to successfully discover, develop and enhance your personal and professional-personal brand. However, today I will focus on my Three-Step Process to Building Your Personal Brand: CLARITY – VALUE – COMMUNICATION

CLARITY — when you have clarity on who you are, your core values, your personal and professional goals and the things you are passionate about, you are able to develop a driving force or personal brand mission statement for your life. You will start to align with the people, companies and things that are representative to who you are.

VALUE — by understanding your unique value and expertise, you will be able to see how you can start differentiating yourself from others in your industry, by looking at your experience, your qualifications, and your own personal journey. I always tell my clients to start with: What problem do I solve for my clients? And, how do I solve this differently or better than my competition?

COMMUNICATION — this means for me both online communication (social media, websites, online articles) and offline (networking, presentations, team meetings, social events). Start first by identifying who your key audience would be or your ideal client and then start thinking about the best way to start communicating with them. Are they mostly online? Do you need to start attending more conferences or events? The communication about your brand should be clear, concise and easy to understand.

For example, My name is Naomi Garrick and as personal branding coach, I help executives and entrepreneurs to stand out in a noisy world by helping them to build a better personal brand.

BUILDING YOUR ONLINE BRAND

Now that you have clarity on who you are and you understand the value that you have to offer, It is important to start creating “social proof” to back-up what you have on paper about your brand — that is how you communicate your brand online. Here are a few of the reasons why your online brand is important.

Benefits of The Online Brand

– You create a reference point for someone interacting with your brand for the first time.

– You allow people to learn about you in realtime by sharing relevant content and not relying on what’s out there in cyberspace about your brand.

– You attract the right kind of people and opportunities.

– You can showcase your knowledge and expertise.

– You create credibility and build social proof.

Here are few quick tips to get started

– Do a Google search of your name or brand! It’s important that you are aware of what the rest of the world is currently seeing about your brand!

– Start with Why? Why do you want or need to be online?

– Think about what is the one thing that you want to be known for.

– Create a one-liner that represents who you are and the problem you solve in one sentence — this can be used for your short online profiles.

– Get a professional headshot for your profile images.

– Think about what you can share and start providing value and communicating your expertise.

– Look at the various online opportunities and platforms and select the ones that best align with your brand and your ideal audience.

Use these steps to help build a better online presence for your brand, so that you can start showing up as an expert or thought leader in your industry — start providing knowledge, and joining conversations that are relevant to your brand or industry. It’s time to start showing up on your online platforms and building an active and engaging digital footprint for your brand.

Naomi N. Garrick is a PRSA Certified Reputation Champion and Personal Branding Coach for Executives & Entrepreneurs. Visit www.linktr.ee/naomigarrick or follow her @theprchick on Instagram for personal branding tips. Email her at:

naomitheprchick@garrickcommunications.com