If you're like most people with a Squarespace website, you've probably thought about marketing automation, but it's never really been a priority.

Honestly, I don't blame you.

For starters, when you think of marketing automation, you usually think of enterprise tools like Marketo, Eloqua or maybe even Hubspot.

Those tools are often made for big businesses, which isn't exactly the target Squarespace demographic (i.e., more DIY and small business).

More practically though, Squarespace doesn't really offer any integrations with a marketing automation platform. Their contact forms go to MailChimp or Google Sheets, so you're stuck with that if you're not accustomed to pasting and styling forms all day–which is probably one of the reasons you picked Squarespace in the first place.

But on the other hand, marketing automation with Squarespace is actually not all that complicated and–I joke you not–free if you know what tool to use. 

First, Why Do Squarespace Folks Need Marketing Automation?

We live in a day where we work so hard to get someone to our website and then even harder still to get them to fill out a form or engage with us in any meaningful way.

And then what? Many of us do nothing. :(

More than 30% of entrepreneurs and small businesses either have a manual system or no system at all for managing the contacts and leads that they generated on their websites.

Another 30% are simply using their email inbox.

It's so, so sad. 

We end up having no clue of what's happening with our customers and no sense of where the opportunities lie.

That's why you need marketing automation.

You can tag and track things your subscribers and customers do automatically and then trigger time-saving and money-making campaigns without ever having to get involved.

If you're doing any sort of promotion of your Squarespace website, you really can't afford to neglect the marketing automation opportunities to help you maximize the return on what happens after that first visit.

Especially if you can get started for free.

Next, What's This Free and Easy (and Free) Automation Tool You Speak Of?

Ok, enough with the suspense. Drip is the powerful and easy-to-use marketing automation platform we've been alluding to.

I'm going to go out on a limb here and guess that you picked Squarespace because you wanted an easy way to quickly publish a beautiful website that didn't look like everyone else's and didn't cost and arm and a leg. 

If you had unlimited budget and time, you would have hired a developer and a designer and built something custom.

But instead you decided to pick a platform that had a ton of web-publishing features crafted to be easy enough for you to use and designed to grow your business–or whatever goal is at the core of your online endeavor. 

That's the same idea behind Drip, but only with marketing automation.

You get a full suite of the most powerful marketing automation tools on the market today, but they'e been designed so intuitively that you don't have to be an automation expert to use them.

With Drip, you get email marketing features just like you'd get with a tool like MailChimp (see our full review between Drip and MailChimp here).

But email is just one of many components of a marketing automation platform.

The most compelling feature of most automation tools, however, is the mechanism by which automation sequences/campaigns are built.

Workflows are where automation strategies are built in Drip, and they are a thing of wonder to play around with.

You start with a blank canvas or a template and then build out your marketing campaigns according to your business rules using their building-block like actions.

If you can logically break down the steps in your marketing process, you can build it in Drip.

Workflows give you unlimited flexibility for automation, personalization and control of your marketing efforts, which ultimately save you time and make you more money

One last thing...

Automation tools like Drip give you the ability to manage your entire subscriber list and customer base given their solid contact management tools. 

You can apply tags, trigger events, set custom fields, and so much more. 

Finally, you can get out of Gmail, or your Excel spreadsheet or who knows what you're trying to cobble together to get a sense for all the things you know and have done with a customer.

Behold, Drip's activity history for a subscriber:

The entire subscriber journey is tracked and available for you to view in an easy-to-interpret customer timeline.

Do you love Drip yet? It gets better. 

Best of all, Drip is free up to 100 contacts (and starts at $41/month after that), which makes it the perfect platform for those that don't want to have to pay for a new tool while they're learning it and don't want to break the bank once they're off and running.

Ok enough with the introductions...

Let's show you ten super simple ways to start incorporating marketing automation with your Squarespace site using Drip.

At Last: The 10 Money-Making Marketing Automation Tactics You Can Put To Work On Your Squarespace Website

Now we're going to jump into some marketing automation strategies that you can put to work on your Squarespace website using the Drip platform.

While the opportunities are limitless, we've assembled these common use cases that many entrepreneurs and marketers tend to struggle with.

Keep in mind: any marketing tool you use should be able to do these things; we just happen to like Drip a lot.

1) Add An Email Opt-In Form To Your Website

In order to automate the marketing your subscribers receive, first you need subscribers. And the easiest way to get people to subscribe on your website is to use an email capture pop-up form.

Surely you've seen them across the web. Some pop-up forms take over the whole page. Those are annoying.

Other forms follow you everywhere as you scroll on the page . Also... annoying. 

Drip's pop-up forms are super subtle and tasteful, which can help contribute to an surprisingly decent lead flow in the long run.

For example, I've generated close to 1,000 leads in the past year since installing a Drip pop-up form on my koi fish blog last November.

2) Send Any Squarespace Form Submission to Drip

The forms you put on your website typically kick off some sort of a process. Someone fills out the form and then you have to do something, right?

With Drip, the "something" can all be automated. Instead of you getting an email and then having to do something with it, Drip can handle that for you.

Instead of you having to reach out to the customer to schedule an appointment, Drip can do it.

Need to qualify a lead? Let Drip handle that for you.

Want to automatically send a newsletter each week based on your newest blog posts? Once again, Drip has got your back.

And while Squarespace doesn't integrate with Drip directly, we put together an easy work-around that lets you connect Squarespace and Drip like peanut butter and jelly between two pieces of bread.

3) Automate Email Delivery of Courses, Ebooks, and More

If you're doing any lead generation, then you're probably giving away a whitepaper, guide, e-book, or other type of lead magnet in exchange for the email address–among other things–of the people visiting your landing page.

Hooking up an automation platform like Drip to Squarespace will almost always be your preferred way to deliver digital goods/services.

Whether you want to simply send a link to a .pdf or put into motion an entire automation campaign, you have infinitely more options available to you with Drip than with a simple email marketing tool.

For example, we use the technique mentioned above to route new contacts into Drip where we then kick off a week-long automation campaign that sends them a new chapter in a course each day for seven days.

4) Handle Blog Subscriptions and Email Newsletters Too

Another super-handy Drip feature is the RSS-to-Email option, which bloggers tend to love.

With this feature, you supply the URL for your blog's RSS feed and specify the cadence for when blog updates go out and Drip will automatically send your blog's update/newsletter for you.

If you're like most people, you don't have unlimited time to spend each week on marketing, so removing one-off tasks like this from your plate can really start to free you up to focus on newer and bigger marketing opportunities. 

Not only is this a cool marketing automation feature, but it's one that's not entirely that common. Drip makes a lot of smart choices like that about what features to include and which ones to exclude because they add clutter or needless customization when none is really needed to get the job done.

5) Create Cart Abandonment Campaigns

Most of the big e-commerce stories use a common tactic called a cart abandonment campaign when a potential customer adds an item to their shopping cart but never then doesn't purchase that item within a given time.

An email containing a coupon or other special offer is sent to the customer to entice them to complete their purchase. Depending on your online shopping habits, you may have one or more of these in your inbox right now.

It's a highly effective tactic that enterprise companies use every day to add another 5-15% of revenue on top of existing daily sales if done right.

And with Drip and Squarespace, you too can create cart abandonment emails campaigns, no matter what you sell.

6) Send New Subscriber Campaigns 

A new subscriber campaign is an email or set of emails that you send to people who recently signed up or downloaded something from you.

Also called indoctrination campaigns, a new subscriber campaign often covers the basics of:

• Why your brand exists

• How to connect with you

• 1-3 ways to start engaging the best that your brand has to offer

Once again, Drip makes it easy to create this campaign once and then have it automatically trigger each time a new email/lead hits your list.

Here's a simple workflow that checks to see whether new customers and contacts are "indoctrinated" and sends them a campaign if they're new to your brand.

7) Handle the Webinar Registration Process

Webinars are probably the single most effective tactic for anyone selling things on the Internet because it combines the benefits of in-person sales with the convenience of purchasing something online.

Yet sadly, few marketers and entrepreneurs have ever hosted a webinar for one reason or another. 

Sometimes, it's because we think we don't yet have an audience big enough to host a webinar.

In reality, the right topic presented at the right time of day to the right visitors can convert at a rate that's 3-5x higher than standard campaigns, which can make this channel a top-performer when it comes to ROI.

Other times though, it's because technology can be hard. But it doesn't have to be.

Drip integrates with webinar platforms like Crowdcast, Demio, and our current favorite, BigMarker because they host great webinars.

Plus, we can use a Squarespace web page for our webinar registration process and then route registrants automatically to BigMarker, which rocks.

8) Send Birthday and Special Event Emails

One of the best things about using a marketing automation platform is the personalization capabilities you have at your fingertips. 

We already covered a lot of utility-based and behavior-based automation features, but nothing illustrates an automated personalized experience like a happy birthday email.

If you know a person's birthday, you can store it as a custom field in Drip and then automate the process of sending them an email, which can be completely personalized based on what else you know about that person.

This feature might not seem like it's all that important, and you're right.

Birthday emails are a little novel on their own, but they can have a huge impact over time when you combine this tactic with other personalized communications.

9) Automate Purchase Fulfillment & Up-Sell/Cross-Sell Campaigns

Let's say you're selling something on your Squarespace website that's fulfilled digitally like an ebook, audio file or .pdf, for instance.

Chances are, you're using Stripe and you're using it for one or more of two reasons:

1. Stripe is a very reliable and easy-to-use payment processor

2. Stripe integrates with everything, including Squarespace and Drip

What this means for you is that you can trigger automated processes and campaigns when people buy something from you.

By default, Squarespace allows you to send files when people to purchase, which is nice.

But Drip gives you full control to fulfill more complicated purchases while creating a memorable customer journey along the way. That's not just nice. It's awesome.

10) Create a Lead Qualification and Sales Process

Not everyone sells something directly on their website.

Some folks–especially if you're in a service-based business–are more likely to first generate leads and then convert those leads into customers through some sort of a sales process.

It's common to use a customer relationship management (CRM) tool to help manage this process.

Drip isn't a CRM per se, but it's night-and-day compared to what most entrepreneurs are doing right now and many will find that they'd rather just use Drip to manage their pipeline than adding a CRM, which can often be overkill. 

For example, if you're a software startup looking to qualify potential beta candidates (hypothetically speaking, of course), you might have a workflow that looks like this:

Start Automating Your Marketing on Squarespace

So that's it... ten reasons why Squarespace & marketing automation make sense together and how Drip is the tool to make it happen.

If you've got general questions, comments or feedback, please do share your thoughts about Drip and/or MailChimp below.

Also, readers of this blog are always welcome to contact me with your specific questions around Drip, Squarespace or any of the other marketing tools you're using today.

In this tutorial, we'll show you how to integrate Squarespace with Drip, the world's easiest and most powerful marketing automation platform.

Before We start, Why Integrate Squarespace with Drip?

The easy answer is two-fold:

1. Time

2. Money

Unpacking that a little more, marketing automation tools like Drip are a great way to automate manual tasks that sap the already limited time we have to dedicate to our marketing.

And unlike basic email marketing tools like Mailchimp, which have recently included some piecemeal automation features, Drip is among the class of tools that make all sorts of things easier and faster.

Why kind of things?

At the building block level, you can created completely automated workflows filled with emails, decisions, forks, delays, one-off emails, purchase notifications and more. 

These features help you save time by completely automating the process of sending campaigns, assisting sales teams, qualifying leads, fulfilling orders, and much, much more.

What you'll need to integrate Squarespace with Drip

Squarespace doesn't yet integrate with Drip natively, but that shouldn't stop you from being able to experience all of those sweet, sweet automation benefits.

To integrate Squarespace with Drip, you'll need the following tools:

• A Squarespace account: Set one up here

• A Drip account: Set one up here

• A Google Drive account: Set one up here

• A Zapier account: Set one up here

Once you've created these accounts, which are all free on top of your existing Squarespace subscription, you can proceed to the next section of our guide, which will walk you through exactly how to integrate Squarespace with Drip.

Let's get started on saving you time and making you more money!

Step 1: Connect a Squarespace Form to A Google Sheet

The first thing we'll need to do is to get new submissions from your Squarespace forms out of Squarespace using one of the three supported methods:

1. Email

2. Google Sheets

3. Mailchimp

Our method for integrating Squarespace and Drip involves Google Sheets.

Find the form in Squarespace that you want to send to Drip.

Next, navigate to the Storage tab within the Edit Form interface.

Enter the name of the Google Sheet you want to send new form submissions to. Squarespace will automatically create a new Google Sheet if you enter a name of a document that doesn't yet exist.

Save your changes and you're done with step one. Easy, right?

Step 2: Connecting Your Google Sheet with Zapier

The next step involves getting new contacts/leads/entries in your Google Sheet over to Drip. 

In order to do this, we're going to enlist one of the most helpful tools on the entire planet for marketers, Zapier. 

Imagine you have data or information about a person in one tool (e.g., Google Sheets) and you wanted to send that information to another tool (e.g., Drip).

Zapier is like a switchboard operator for your different marketing tools.

In this next step. You'll see how to get information from that Google Sheet into Zapier.

Assuming you've created a Google Sheet and a Zapier account, head to the Zapier directory and search for both Google Sheets and Drip.

Look for the Zap—this is what Zapier calls an automation rule—called "Create or update Drip subscriber from new row in Google Sheets".

Once you've found it, click on "Use this Zap."

Follow the simple steps in the wizard to connect to a Google Account and select the sheet you want to sync with Squarespace.

You've just completed the second step of our tutorial. High five!

Step 3: Connecting Zapier With Your Drip Account

The last step of our simple little process is to complete our Zapier rule setup to connect it with your Drip account.

Follow the prompts from Zapier to go through the different authentication requests to connect your Drip/Squarespace/Zapier accounts together.

If you get stuck at any point, refer to the video above. There are a lot of clicks, but they're easy clicks, so we should be OK.

At some point, you'll be faced with this screen, which will ask you how you want to map fields from your Squarespace form into Drip.

We recommend doing at least these three things:

1. Mapping an Email Address is required. Select the appropriate field from your Google Sheet to designate the field for the Drip Email Address field.

2. Select the advanced options link to set addition custom fields in Drip. Take note of the conventions suggested in the video above.

3. Tag new submissions of a Squarespace form uniquely. For example, we're tagging people with a contact-us tag when the form is filled out on our Contact page.

Once you've gone through the wizard on the Zapier website, you'll get a confirmation that your Zap is active and that all your new form submissions on your Squarespace website are headed to Drip.

Excellent! Except, let's test it out to make sure it works.

Testing Out Your New Drip and Squarespace Integration

Once you've completed all of these steps, you should be able to test things out by sending a test submission through your Squarespace form.

Wait about five minutes—the minimum time between you Zapier Zap—and then check to see that the subscriber has been added to Drip.

If everything looks like you'd expect, then you're all set.

Drip and Squarespace are now tied at the hip, affording you untold marketing automation capabilities above-and-beyond what you can do with the default form capture options Squarespace offers.

Squarespace and Drip are Integrated. Now What?

Once you've integrated Squarespace and Drip, the next step is to automate all the different parts of your marketing using Drip's marketing automation capabilities. 

We'll be posting a lot more in the future about what are the highest revenue opportunities in marketing automation and how you can experience them as a Squarespace website owner.

In the meantime, let us know in the comments or in social media whether this tutorial was helpful and if it's something you end up using to make more money online.

Until then, have a great day! 

Hey there. It's Josh Braaten.

Long time, no talk.

We haven't published anything since 2014 and I haven't written anything since before then.

But if you're reading this, we probably crossed paths a while ago. Maybe you watched a video or blog post about Squarespace or something.

Welp. I'm back. That's right, we're going to start publishing content again on Big Picture Web.

What's on Tap: making marketing simpler

In the past, we blogged about things like Squarespace and personal branding.

Moving forward, we're going be broadening things to this: We'll be showing people how to do somewhat difficult things in online marketing in a way that most marketers can understand.

What kind of things? Oh, you know, stuff like this:

• Blogging and using the Squarespace platform
• Using paid media platforms like Facebook and Google AdWords
• Tracking and tagging your site with Google Tag Manager and Google Analytics
• Using lead generation and marketing automation platforms like Leadpages and Drip
• Being all-around-awesome at marketing

What do you want to hear about?

What's been getting you down lately? Are there any strategic or technical digital marketing things you're tying to do and could use some ideas or a little help? I'd love to know!

Your personal brand serves a variety of purposes. When done right, it does the work for you by representing your values and mission. It serves as an introduction and first impression to new acquaintances. Because a brand can serve as a testimonial to your character, it can also help you achieve professional goals. If you ever find yourself out of work, a personal brand can be leveraged to demonstrate your abilities, drive, and commitment.

The perfect accompaniment to your personal brand is a website dedicated to it. A website is not only essential to your brand, but it is also essential to your professional wellbeing. Recents posts by The Muse and YouTern discussed the advantages of having a personal branding website. Here’s why you need one:

1. It lets you flex your tech muscle

Just having a website can say a lot about you. It shows your dedication – after all, there’s a big difference between saying and doing something. It also shows your knack for technology, a highly desirable quality in any field. Even if your website was easily created on a platform such as Squarespace and you know little about making a website, no one has to know. A website for your personal brand is in itself impressive.

2. Everything’s under your control

Having a website also puts the control of your brand back in your hands. While you can only do so much on social media sites like Twitter or LinkedIn, a website allows for customization, and more importantly, the space to display exactly what you want to show about yourself. As The Muse put it, a website allows you to show what you’ve done and what you want to accomplish, unlike a resume that just shows who you are.

3. It houses your content

Creating content not only benefits your website through search engine optimization, but it also allows you to demonstrate your expertise on a visible platform. No matter what form of content you create – whether that’s a blog, vlog, podcasts, etc. – do not underestimate it’s value for your website. This essential component for a personal branding website not only allows you to demonstrate your expertise, but it also allows you to engage with others in your field. Content is a great key to networking, though it’s a two-way street. Engage with content from others in the community to network and get your brand out there.

4. It’s all about you

The great thing about a personal branding website is that it’s all about you and your brand! You can customize the design to exude your personality and professionalism. Your own website gives you the space to elaborate on your personal narrative and branding mission statement. Instead of telling what you’ve done, you can show what you’ve done through a portfolio, work samples, and testimonials, suggests YouTern. Keeping the “personal” in a personal brand demonstrates authenticity and shows visitors to your website exactly what they’re going to get. People like seeing a face behind the name.

5. It sets you apart

Employment is never permanent. If you ever do find yourself out of work, switching careers, or even vying for a promotion, a website may be the key to getting exactly what you want. Instead of having just another resume in the stack, include your website in a job search to set yourself apart from other applicants. Do not underestimate the importance of the visual – a nicely crafted website can catch the right sort of attention and will let you stand out from the crowd. It will let you elaborate all you want and can provide much more information about you, your brand, and your experience than you’d ever fit on a resume. Plus, with many recruiters scouring the web, it may bring opportunities straight to you.

Ready to take your personal brand to the next level with your own website? Give Squarespace a try. They make it easy to set up a professional and aesthetic website with little to no knowledge. Squarespace is an award-winning platform that allows anyone to build an elegant and operational website. With 24/7 support, a domain in your own name, and built-in search engine optimization and Google Analytics compatibility, Squarespace is your go-to for an impressive personal branding website!

Rule 1: Be specific in your content

Content creation is a best practice for personal branding, though despite branders’ efforts, many are making missteps online. One crucial mistake is in the subject matter itself. There is so much content posted online that it can be easy to blend into the background. Any one area of interest is sure to have many outlets of information posted online. To combat the information overload, make your content stands out with great specificity, suggests a recent Blogging 4 Jobs article. The more specific your personal brand’s content, the better.

Rule 2: Keep your content consistent

Content consistency is another best practice for your personal brand. Consistency does not mean producing a lot of monotonous, like-minded content. It means being consistent in delivering it. Set a schedule for yourself to publish a new post as often as you can manage, with once a week being the desired minimum. Consistently creating great content isn’t easy, but it will get your personal brand the strong digital presence and authority you want.

Rule 3: Interact with other content

Besides creating and publishing your own content, engaging with other content on the web can also be beneficial, according to a recent article in Inc. Magazine. Interact with your brand’s community by keeping up with relevant blogs or other content and engaging with meaningful comments or discussions. Bring new perspectives to light, propose some followup questions, or take an opposing view. By doing so, you not only educate yourself on current happenings in the community, but you also network with other creators and establish yourself and your brand as well.

Rule 4: Provide a home for your content

Because content can garner a lot of web traffic and visibility, you’re going to need a visually appealing site to welcome visitors and provide a strong first impression. Squarespace can do that for you. If you don’t already have a website, or if your current website is outdated, consider trying out one with Squarespace. With 24/7 support, you never have to worry about problems with your content. You can get a yournamehere.com URL for the best possible visibility. Search engine optimization is built in to maximize web traffic to your content. Most importantly, Squarespace is known for its professional, award-winning designs. They’ll give your content an edge on the competitors and leave a lasting impression on visitors to your site!

There’s no getting around it. Content creation is a best practice of personal branding. What is your favorite type of content to create? Have you found success in any type in particular? Share your thoughts and leave a comment below!

The influence of the visual

The world has become more image-centric than ever. Business Insider predicts that 880 billion photos will be taken in 2014 - enough for 123 images per person on the planet. And thanks to the internet and social media we are sharing these images like never before. Over 300 million photos are uploaded to Facebook daily. The photo sharing app, Instagram, boasts 200 million monthly active users, according to Digital Marketing Ramblings.

We respond better to these images as well. On sites like Twitter and Facebook, photo posts garner significantly more engagement than typical text posts, according to Fast Company. Visual content is fun and easy. It makes it quick to get across a message or idea. Graphics and images are recognizable for brand consistency. And visual content is much more accessible than a block of text. It’s easy to see how some strategic images can really enhance your personal brand’s presentation.

Using visuals for your brand

Image-conscious professionals looking to give their brand an update have been turning to professional photo shoots, according to a recent New York Times article. Gone are the days of stuffy glamor portraits. Now, professionals seek out creative and extensive shots for the ultimate personal branding presentation. Sure, the images are out of the box, but they’re still professional. They also infuse elements of their personality, and most importantly, their brand’s values into the images more so than a run-of-the-mill headshot.

Yes, your brand is important – but so is the way in which you showcase it. A bad quality photo could detract from an otherwise solid brand, warns Celebrity Branding Agency. A good photo will provide a strong first impression and convey a professional aesthetic for your brand. The presentation of your brand should be consistent across various forms – business cards, social media, blogs, an your website. Taking a variety of photos from a shoot such as the ones featured in the New York Times allows you a solid base of consistent, high quality images but gives you enough wiggle room to update your look every now and then. Plus, they provide a face behind the brand for some much-needed personalization.

Visualizing your brand

With such a heavy influence of images, where should you showcase them? On your website, of course. If you still don’t have your own website, seriously consider it. The world is increasingly becoming digitalized, and people are definitely looking for you and your brand online. Nothing is worse than finding someone’s website online that looks like it’s straight out of 1998. Don’t rely on an outdated site or your social media platforms to house your brand – instead, get a Squarespace website.

Creating your own personal branding website is simple even if you don’t know code or web design with Squarespace’s LayoutEngine web publisher. Gain visibility and track your success with its built-in search engine optimization, analytics, and integration with Google Analytics. Most importantly, Squarespace, which features award winning design, will make your site look amazing on any device. Let a Squarespace website be the ultimate presentation for your personal brand!

What success have you seen from incorporating visual content? Share your advice and leave a comment below!

Here are the components that make a great personal branding statement:

1. Begin with a big picture purpose

Everything about your personal branding statement should be purposeful. Specifically, the first portion of your statement should tell of your intentions in a grander scheme. Telling others with confidence what mark you will leave on the world is no easy task and takes some personal reflection. Ask yourself, what can I do and who can I become? How will I better the world around me? This, Seaver explains, should be a permanent and static declaration.

This first segment of your personal branding statement, which is sometimes identified as an intention statement, can be tricky to whittle down to such a definite declaration. However, by simply writing this down you’re already empowering yourself with focus and holding yourself more accountable, according to Empowering Personal Development. Business coach Kim DeYoung also has some great advice on brainstorming and crafting a strong intention statement.

2. Include your short-term aspirations

After dissecting your big picture purpose, take your perspective into the next three to five years, suggests Seaver. This next portion of your personal branding statement should focus on your personal goals for the next few years. These goals should compliment your big picture purpose but hone in on smaller, more tangible goals for your professional success. Ask yourself, what could you do in this time frame that would make you feel accomplished and satisfied? What would be a good representation of your brand? Whether it’s moving up in the workplace, mastering new skills, or finally starting that new project, select goals that are both challenging and achievable.

3. Add your interests

Sometimes personal branding statements can become too impersonal. Your passions and interests can say quite a bit about who you are and what drives you. Ask yourself, what makes you lose track of time? What can you concentrate on and achieve with a great sense of satisfaction? What makes you step up to a challenge?

For example, maybe your interest is running because you like to push yourself to meet race goals and top a personal best. This demonstrates your persistence and determination. Whatever your interests are, reflecting on what about them interests you is another component essential to your personal branding statement, says Seaver.

4. Sum up with your strengths and skills

The final portion of a personal branding statement should highlight exactly who you are what makes you different. Identify your strengths and best qualities. A good way to get an honest perspective on yourself is by asking those around you. Seaver also suggests examining your LinkedIn profile. What are your top endorsed skills? What have others said about you in your recommendations?

A good way to clarify your working habits is through differentiating yourself from others. What role do you play in a group setting – are you the one calling the shots, the one making sure all voices are heard, or the one suggesting an idea outside the box? How do you best work – independently or collaborating with others? What skills have you demonstrated and utilized in past experiences? Knowing and articulating a few key strengths and skills is essential to your personal branding statement.

5. Utilize your personal branding statement

All in all, your personal branding statement should be no longer than three or four sentences. It should be concise and something you can comfortably share when meeting others. Most importantly, it should be an accurate representation of your brand and those around you should know it!

Making your personal branding statement is half the work. Now you have to share it with the world. After all, a personal branding statement is no good if nobody knows about it. Share it with new acquaintances, reiterate your newly refined statement to coworkers, friends, and family, and publish it online to officialize it.

The perfect place to showcase your statement for the world to see is on a Squarespace website. Squarespace websites are easy to set up and they offer great network support. Squarespace will make your brand stand out from the crowd with award-winning design and mobile compatibility. A website that looks professionally crafted will be the perfect compliment for your personal branding statement.

Make sure to check out Josh’s Anatomy of a Personal Branding Statement infographic for more insight and share with us your own personal branding statement. Start the conversation and leave a comment below!

1. Begin with an accurate and authentic foundation

In their recent article, Global Writes stresses the importance of authenticity in your personal brand. A brand with an inauthentic founding will not succeed – everyone will see through it. A brand has to capture your personality and values in order to work – that’s its point. Whether you already have created a brand or are just beginning, take the time to reassess the foundation of your professional personal brand.

A great way to seek out authenticity for your brand is to gain another perspective through personal assessments. StrengthsFinder is a very well-known and popular assessment that focuses on your best strengths, rather than weaknesses, and how these can work to your advantage in working with others. The Myers-Briggs Type Indicator narrows your personality down into one of sixteen varieties and shows you your tendencies and how you best work. Additionally, the DiSC assessment reveals your communication and personality within a group setting and teamwork.

Having trouble defining your personal brand? Global Writes suggests you try reaching out to those around you that know your character and work habits. Sometimes others can have better insight on ourselves than we do. Ask someone how they might describe you to others, their impression of you, and how they perceive your strengths. Combine these with your own ideals to put your brand into focus.

2. Visibility is everything

You need an audience in order to be recognized, so let the world know about your brand! Networking, as always, is essential to your professional wellbeing, says Global Writes. Building relationships based on trust and your reputation is how you craft your brand. Make an effort to add networking regularly into your schedule. Networking events are common and popular, plus everyone in attendance wants a mutually beneficial connection too. As a professional, staying active in your field is equally as important as networking. Attend conferences, follow influencers, and stay involved in the conversation to stay relevant and visible in the community.

Another key to visibility is consistency. Staying consistent across social media platforms is essential to staying visible and maintaining your brand. While it’s good to show your personality with personal posts, make sure they don’t stray too far from your brand. Don’t post something on Facebook for friends and family that you wouldn’t want to be sharing on Twitter or Instagram with your followers. Ensure that your blog posts are relevant and on-topic to your brand. Keep your LinkedIn profile polished up to date, but don’t let your images on other sites diminish your professional appearance. Keep handles and usernames as similar as possible, or in the best possible scenario, the same. Post badges and links to these on your website or email signature to ensure that your connections are as connected as possible.

3. Lay your groundwork online

If you’re not online, then where are you? It’s true that your brand needs to be fully represented in person through the work you do, how you interact with others, and how you present yourself to the world. But the internet also provides limitless potential for branding your image in other ways as well. Because there are so many ways to promote your brand online, Global Writes stresses that you plan out your personal branding strategy. As Duct Tape Marketing so precisely puts it, “To wade into various social networks without intention is to almost guarantee wasted time and effort.”

So what does that mean when it comes to personal branding professionals? It means producing quality content over a large quantity of posts. It also means engaging and expanding your networks on social media. Target your content to fill a niche, reach out to your audience, and stay focused by infusing your brand’s fundamental values.

Another essential to a professional’s personal branding endeavors online is to utilize a personal website as a landing base to your online activity. Because 93% of website visits begin with a search engine, you want to put the best possible content out there at the top page of the search results. After all, only one out of four internet users make it past the first page of search results, according to Search Engine Journal.

That’s where your website comes in. Because you can completely customize and cater your website to showcase your brand, a personal website is the best investment you can make right now. If you don’t have one yet, give Squarespace a try. This platform makes it easy to create a website that looks professionally made. Plus, it has award-winning support services and design and is mobile-friendly. Squarespace will allow you to tell the story of your brand, expand on your experiences, and provide work samples or a portfolio. Most importantly, a Squarespace website will let you take control into your own hands to get your name front and center on a search results page. People are looking online, so give them something worth looking for!

Did we forget any personal branding fundamentals for professionals? Let us know and leave a comment below.

1. You learn more about yourself

Personal branding begins with a lot of reflection and self awareness, according to a recent article on Youngisthan. Take the time in school to explore your interests with a variety of courses. A well-rounded education is oftentimes appreciated by employers and it allows you to seek out your interests and career goals.

While you’re in school take advantage of career and vocational development programs on campus to help you better understand your strengths, qualities, and carer interests, especially if branding is new to you. A good understanding of yourself is the first step to a strong personal brand, and there is no better time to do this than as a college student.

2. You can use the resources available to you now

When you’re enrolled as a college student, you not only pay for your courses, but for the multitude of services available to you as well. Meet with your career counselor to make your cover letter and resume reflect your brand. Take advantage of the free leadership development and personal assessments they offer now while you have the opportunity. After all, you’re paying for it!

3. You can utilize your current network

During your time in school, make an effort to network and make connections with fellow students, professors, and faculty, suggests the Personal Branding Blog. Arguably, you will never again have the plethora of potential connections as you do in college. Plus, as a college student, making connections is so much easier than it is in the real world. Because professors and faculty members have both a multitude of connections and experience, devote your time to establishing strong relationships with a key few to use for recommendations and referrals to speak for your brand down the line.

4. It allows you to showcase your collegiate accomplishments

If you’re staying busy in school, you’re more than likely accumulating a lot of experience, skills, and knowledge related to your aspiring field. Document this now rather than pushing it aside. Whether it’s a course you found really applicable, a project you completed, or some work samples from your internship, collect these for future use in an application, to add to your portfolio, or to publish on your personal website.

5. It sets you apart from the pack

The recession may be over, but it’s still difficult to break into the job market with an entry-level position. Unemployment for young adults 25 and under is estimated to be double that for other working professionals, according to the Economic Policy Institute. A strong personal brand is a great way to set recent graduates apart from the pack. Besides developing an impressive grasp on yourself and your career goals, a good personal brand will do the talking for you and allow hiring managers to have a better idea of yourself and your aspirations.

6. It's a great way to express your internet prowess

The world is more digitalized than ever and the internet is simply changing how business is done. Chance are you’re a pretty internet savvy Millennial, like most are, but push yourself to take your skill to the next level. Brand your social media profiles, which are more often than not inspected by hiring managers and recruiters. Create and continue to produce quality content through a blog, which can demonstrate both your writing and communication abilities and demonstrate your personality, according to Uloop. And as always, continue to work on expanding your network on LinkedIn.

Most importantly, create a professional personal website to showcase your brand. As a college student, now is the perfect time to make a website for your personal brand. Utilize your campus’ technology center or find a computer science friend to help you out, or simply open a Squarespace account. It’s an extremely easy platform to use and you don’t have to know code to create a professional-looking website. Plus, you can acquire a yourfullname.com URL for optimal visibility. A website will allow you to further elaborate on your educational background and showcase your projects, work samples, and portfolios. Squarespace has won multiple awards for its aesthetics and user support and is the best choice for a branded website. Plus, it costs less than your Netflix account and will be an impressive asset in your upcoming job search.

What personal branding advice do you have for college students? If you're a current student, what strategies are you successful with? Share your insight with us and leave a comment below.

1. Your personal branding statement

Gone are the days of long introductory paragraphs or even objective statements. Recruiters and hiring managers don’t have the time or patience to read through a stack of resumes with drawn-out paragraphs. Don’t let this over-done aspect of your resume block the reader from getting to the important substance beneath it. Instead, switch it out with a concise, to-the-point personal branding statement. This will set the stage for your brand and how you can apply it in the workplace. Also, because many companies using tracking systems to review resumes, infuse your statement with key terms and phrases to match the position’s description.

2. Add graphics and badges

The traditional layout of your address, phone number, and email centered under your name is the most common header for resumes. Give this tired-out format a facelift on your branded resume. Include small graphics with your contact information, such as the “@” symbol with your email, or the LinkedIn badge with your URL, and a globe with your personal website, suggests Career Rocketeer in their recent article, Personal Branding a Resume. Simple graphics can really open up a text-heavy resume and modernize its appearance. Small things like these can completely alter your resume’s appearance and professionalism.

3. Invest in a logo

Depending on how creative or traditional your field is, consider infusing a logo into your brand. It should be simple, like all effective logos are, and should also convey the mood of your personal brand. Commission a graphic artist or play around with Photoshop to create an image to perfectly capture your brand, suggests recent article 10 Resume Tips That Will Enhance Your Personal Brand on Mortgage Hired. A good graphic can be used on your resume, cover letter, and references for an impressive set of documents, as well as on your business card and personal website. The consistency will make your application look professionally put together compared to a stack of regular word documents, which can appeal to a hiring manager with many of resumes to review.

4. Testimonials speak for your brand

Career Realism suggests adding testimonials to your resume for an extra emphasis to your personal brand. Much like the Recommendations section on LinkedIn, excerpts of testimonials add a powerful touch to the credentials of your resume. Consider adding a few snippets to accompany relevant work experience. Choose coworkers, bosses, or clients who can speak to the true values your brand encapsulates. Consider a variation in typography and setting on the resume layout for a professional and easy to read appearance.

5. Don’t forget your website

One thing you should never leave off your personally branded resume? Your personal website. Always include your URL with your contact information in a prominent location. Because hiring managers often perform an online search before selecting candidates, leading them to your own website will impress them with your professionalism, excellence, and seriousness as a job seeker.

Don’t have your own website yet? Try Squarespace. With Squarespace, you can get outfitted with a yourfullname.com URL for maximum exposure and the best in web aesthetics. Plus, the benefits of a website are endless. A website allows you to expand on what you could not include on your branded resume. A website can house work samples and portfolios, testimonials and recommendations, a more thorough background of your experience, and most importantly it can allow you to tell the story of your brand. Let Squarespace present your brand to the world!

How do you apply your personal brand to your resume? Leave a comment and let us know!

1. You’re talking the wrong talk

A recent article on The Savvy Intern unearthed some reasons why your personal branding plan isn’t paying off.  Author Chris Westfall cites a reliance on social media platforms and lack of forward-thinking. More importantly, he stresses that too much energy goes into proving our importance and accomplishments rather than doing great things and creating a vision for the future. As Westfall puts it, “Personal branding is about your potential.”

Westfall’s point is valid. A brand that is too focused on past accomplishments won’t get you anywhere. A brand that is entirely based online is ineffective. Branding also needs to be through personal connections, networking, your work ethics, and through your actions. However, there is something to say about having a strong online presence across many different platforms. While you should definitely devote some time to branding your potential, do not neglect your commitment to maintaining a brand on all fronts – social media included.

2. You’re not staying updated

Contrary to Westfall’s advice, The Muse argues that not keeping up with your online presence could be detracting from your brand. Social media, blogs, and personal websites that have been pushed aside, forgotten, or even neglected look dated and don’t give a good impression for your brand. If a lack of time is what’s keeping you from engaging online, aim for quality over quantity. The Muse recommends staying updated at least once a week, but deems daily as “the gold standard.”

Staying updated and engaged is not just for your online presence. Make sure that you are also up to date with the happenings with your field. Be active in your field’s community, whether that be through networking, attending conferences, or speaking and presenting.

3. You don’t have a website

Your personal branding plan may not be working if you still don’t have your own website, says both Forbes and The Muse. Maybe you haven’t put a lot of energy into a digital presence. Maybe you’ve focused entirely on social media platforms. Whatever your reason may be, creating a personal website will yield a lot of power to your brand’s image.

Creating a website with a URL of your full name can first benefit your brand because it directs potential clients, networking connections, and customers to the right place. People are looking online, so make sure you present your brand to your best ability. A personal website will give your brand great visibility on search engine results. Plus, it lets you tell the story of your brand and biography, share a portfolio or work samples, and blog about brand-related updates in your own way.

Still don’t have a website? Try the award-winning Squarespace. You don’t have to know code to create a professional-looking, one-of-a-kind website customized to showcase your brand in your own name. Squarespace is mobile-friendly and was just this year nominated for a Webby Award for design, services, and mobility. Plus, it costs less than your Netflix account and comes with great support!

What do you think of these tips for your personal branding plan? Have any of your own secrets to success? Share them and leave a comment below!

As a recent National Trial Lawyers branding article pointed out, people seek out brands. They love brands they trust and know and they tend to avoid generics. People love brands so much, they’ll willingly pay more for a recognized and accredited brand name. The same goes for your personal brand. If you consciously cultivate your image and reputation, you too can reap the benefits of a great personal brand.

Here’s a few of the many benefits you’ll reap from your personal brand:

1. Personalizing Business

A personal brand allows you the opportunity to infuse some personality into your image. Your brand is all about perception, so take your image into your own hands. Control what people see online by posting all the great things about you, like your strengths, accomplishments, and accolades. Customize your brand to tell your narrative. Let it speak for your style, beliefs, and ethics. By branding yourself, you provide a tangible reputation that will attract others.

2. Demonstrates Your Specialty

A good personal brand can be summed up in a few words or a sentence. If the focus of your brand is all over the place, it becomes too unrecognizable. When it comes to personal branding, it has to be focused, says Personal Branding UK. A benefit of a great personal brand is that it allows you to demonstrate your specialty to others. You’ll become known for your expertise and interests, and these associations can make connections with others for you.

3. Increased Interest

Another benefit of a personal brand is that when done right, it will do the work for you. A good brand can expand your audiences. It can attract new clients and more opportunities, according to Blog Her. And with a plethora of outlets on social media, it’s easier than ever to now expand your visibility. Share your reputation and your talents with the world. As the Huffington Post says, “Consider your brand as your digital reputation, resume, platform and an extension of your business card.” Let your brand do the talking for you.

4. Credibility

Another benefit of personal branding is that it allows you to both build and promote your credibility. Think about some brands that are known and trusted. You feed your baby Gerber, you buy in bulk at Costco, and you go to Disney World for a magical vacation. These brands have cultivated well-known and respected reputations. You can do this with your personal brand too.

Your brand can develop a powerful reputation through a great track record of work. Collect testimonials of clients and coworkers to gain the trust of future customers. For the best impact, promote these referrals and testimonials in a highly visible place – like your personal website.

Are you not seeing the benefits of personal branding yet? Give it the best possible digital presentation with Squarespace.  Squarespace is a fantastic platform for creating your own site and will be the perfect addition to your brand. You are what you look like online, so lead people to the right place – right to your customized, award-winning Squarespace website complete with samples of your work, your credentials, background, and testimonials to your brand. It will be the perfect first impression.

Apple and Steve Jobs

Apple is arguably one of the most brand-conscious companies. Besides having a highly visible and recognizable logo, the company is also known for its sleek, cutting-edge products. Steve Jobs, a cofounder and past CEO of Apple, was known for his hands-on approach and tireless work ethic. He had a personal brand while still representing the corporate brand of Apple.

So how does a professional represent both their company and their own brand? Marketing and Social Media Strategist Lina Duque recently wrote about personal branding vs. corporate branding for The Globe and Mail. As she puts it, “gone are the days when your personal brand is defined by what you do for a living.”

If your personal brand aligns with your company’s corporate brand, that’s great. But if you’re pursuing a passion of yours in your free time that doesn’t relate with your workplace, you have all the tools to accomplish that as well. She breaks her advice down into four sections:

1. Be open with your company

If you’re pursuing your personal brand in your free time, Duque stresses that you make sure your boss hears about it from you first. Many workplaces encourage employees to build a personal brand, so don’t hesitate to share your efforts. Plus, some workplaces have online and social media policies and you’ll want to be sure you’re following the guidelines. And of course, honor your commitment to your employer and keep personal branding in your personal time.

In Bloomburg Businessweek, career and workplace expert Dan Schawbel argues that personal branding amongst employees can be a win-win for both parties. The more you accomplish in the workplace, the more respect you’ll earn in your personal brand. If you cross promote, you can strengthen a personal brand to be used in the long-term for your career and your presence at your current company by engaging potential customers.

2. Keep it consistent

Whatever your personal brand is, make sure it stays consistent across the board and in all your posts, Duque says. Maintain your brand’s focused niche to stay on topic and build a following. Strike a balance between your personal brand vs. corporate brand. On anything you post online, distinguish it as your thoughts and not your company’s. YP Advertising Solutions has some great tips for maintaining consistency in your brand online.

3. Use your time wisely

When you’re already working full time, the last thing you’d want to do is commit more time to your personal brand. However, devoting a small amount of time each day to work on your personal brand can mean a lot for your online engagement. By carving out a few minutes everyday, you can target high traffic hours online to maximize your posts. If you’re short on time, social media management tools can post for you at a scheduled time and date when created ahead of time. Search Engine Journal has a great post breaking down the ten best programs for social media management.

4. Create great content

The way to establish a strong personal brand is through quality content, says Duque. Whether it’s through blog posts, podcasts, videos, or tweets, your brand will only get stronger and reach a larger audience through engaging content. Because people connect with other people and not necessarily brands, as Paul Chaney says in his article, Balance Your Personal and Corporate Branding, be personable in your content and don’t hesitate to reach out to your audience for more involvement.

What do you think of Duque’s advice for personal branding vs. corporate branding? How do you balance between the two? Share your thoughts and leave a comment below!

In her recent Women’s Agenda post, Your Personal Brand Matters, Dalla-Camina stressed the importance of personal branding development for all professionals. Whether you’ve already put some time into your brand or are just beginning, her advice is a great starting place for beginners and a good refresher for those looking to reevaluate their brand. Here’s what she says:

1. Start with an authentic foundation

The key to a successful brand is ensuring that it is an accurate representation of you. If you’re trying to be something else, you may find yourself in the wrong job, with the wrong expectations placed on you. Stick to your strengths and strongest qualities for your best brand and professional wellbeing. Not sure how to define your personal brand? Career Cast and Wet Feet both have great advice on narrowing it down. Bottom line, keep it authentic.

2. Utilizing your brand in the workplace

Dalla-Camina’s second personal branding development point is to make the most of your brand in your career. Can you do that in your current role and your workplace? Do you utilize your strengths regularly, and do you feel fulfilled by what you’re doing? If your work seems to stifle your spirit or passions, or just doesn’t work with your brand, you may be in the wrong career. Empower yourself and see where your strengths can take you. A career change may be a better choice for your brand and wellbeing.

3. Own your niche

As Dalla-Camina points out, you and your personal brand have got to be known for something. Having a niche or defined area of expertise makes your brand recognizable and memorable. An expertise makes you credible and prompts others listen. As Personal Branding Blog points out, an expertise also requires maintenance and keeping up. Stay relevant with industry news and be active in the community. Being a thought leader in your niche can gain respect for your brand. Reach out to others in the community of your field to widen your base and expand your network in the right direction.

4. Solidify your brand with character

Your brand is comprised of how you represent yourself, and that representation is largely made up of your actions and behaviors. Create a good track record for your brand by being generous, punctual, respectful, and showing gratitude to others always. Actions speak louder than words, so keep your behaviors consistent across the board. Your brand and reputation are at stake.

5. Take it online

Dalla-Camina’s last personal branding development point stresses the importance of reflecting your brand online. Google yourself to see what appears, and do what you can to remove anything negative. Then, take the steps to portray your strengths online. Fully represent yourself with a blog, LinkedIn, other social media, and your own website. Like Dalla-Camina says, an online first impression can make or break your brand. Invest in the best possible digital representation with a Squarespace website. Their designs are award-winning, and with a domain in your own name, you’ll have the best possible first impression on the web.

What do you think of Dalla-Camina’s advice for personal branding development? Did she leave anything important out? Let us know what you think and leave a comment below.

Dressing for your brand means something different to everyone. Not only does it depend on the essence of your brand, but your style is also influenced by your working environment, body type, age, and personal preferences. If your career is in finance, you probably have less wiggle room to brand your working style than someone in the creative field. Take these factors into consideration when building your branded wardrobe.

Standing out with style

In a recent post by Ariella Coombs on Career Realism, she wrote about the importance of dressing the part for your personal brand. Coombs suggested using style as a tool of expression in the workplace. While many employees try their best to blend in, few venture out of the standard working apparel. Even those with strict dress codes can make small gestures for a big impact on their brand.

Coombs proposed professionals wear eye-catching and on-trend items. Shoes and accessories are easy ways to work around tight dress codes. Accent colors can have a powerful affect on an outfit’s entire look. Coombs also suggested branders wear current and trendy outfits to present themselves as modern, innovative, and confident.

When fashion hurts your brand

Interestingly, another article written this week argued against wearing trendy clothing. CEO Richard A. Moran wrote on the woes of fashion missteps in the workplace from a man’s perspective in his article, "Skinny Suits and Interviews." Specifically, he called out men who wear very on-trend skinny suits, which he claim only look good on Justin Timberlake, Ryan Gosling, and men in GQ magazines.

Moran’s point is valid. Wearing trendy apparel in the workplace can work sometimes, if the attire fits well, is comfortable, and is appropriate for the working environment. Despite Coombs urging women to reach for trendier attire, this advice must be taken into consideration of the brand for each professional.

Branding your work wear

The Art Institute offers great advice for building a branded work wardrobe. When it comes to personal branding in the workplace, your closet has no room for clutter. Start by clearing out old items that don’t earn their place in your wardrobe. Donate anything that isn’t worn often or doesn’t best reflect your brand to make room for your new branded style. Working with less allows you to customize your look to match your brand.

Transferring your personal brand to your closet can be a daunting task. However, focusing on small, doable changes can ease you into the look you want. Think of designing your wardrobe like the design of your business card. It should demonstrate your professionalism without dismissing your personality and style.

The Fashion Spot advises you find a signature piece or look and keep you outfits consistent. Maybe you have a certain color you wear all the time. Maybe you wear wacky socks, a strand of pearls, or a type of bag. Style doesn’t have to be excessive – a minimalistic look with a statement item can be a powerful call to your brand.

Style is important for promoting your brand in real life. But are you matching that style online? Find the perfect fit with a Squarespace website. The award-winning platform is a fantastic support for anyone looking to take their personal brand online. All templates are mobile-ready to take your brand anywhere. Dress your brand up with an aesthetically designed Squarespace website for the best digital experience online.

When it comes to personal branding in the workplace, style is an essential. How do you incorporate your personal brand into your work wardrobe? Share your ideas and advice and leave a comment below!

Why Twitter?

There are so many social media platforms to utilize, but Twitter is one you should definitely invest some time in. Interns Over 40 recently made some great points on the benefits of Twitter over Facebook for branding. Twitter tends to be less personal than Facebook and its sharing potential is practically limitless. Think of Twitter as a micro-blog for your brand. You can tweet brand updates, links to articles, and interact with other influencers in the field easily in snippets of 140 characters.

Perhaps the greatest benefit of Twitter is its user’s visibility. Unlike some social networks where your updates are only seen by a certain designated few, your tweets can be read and retweeted by millions of Twitter users.

Brand meets Twitter

Personal branding is about consistency across the board, and that applies to your Twitter account. Use your professional name and stick to whatever handle, or username, you’ve been using on other social media sites to maximize visibility. Use a professional photo for your image and link to your website, LinkedIn, and blog.

Likable Daily and Web Ink Now both stress the importance of utilizing the bio of your Twitter account. This will be one of the first things others will see and should be utilized to make your account a stand-out. Some Twitter users make a watered-down list of their resume while others utilize search engine optimization with buzzwords. Don’t be afraid to experiment with hashtags, quotes, or snippets that will demonstrate your brand’s personality and attitude. Mashable has some great advice for coming up with the perfect Twitter bio.

Branding one tweet at a time

Personal branding on Twitter, like all outlets, should be focused. There’s not a lot of wiggle room in 140 characters, so learning the art of concise tweeting is essential. When building your brand on Twitter, do not deviate from it in your tweets. Tweet only updates on your brand, links to your website or blog, relevant retweets, and links to applicable articles. This way, other users will know exactly what they’re getting into and will be more likely to follow you.

Building a following

On Twitter, numbers are perceived as power. That’s why some celebrities and politicians pay for followers. Having a substantial following is eye-catching and demands respect. Aim to build a following by consistently posting tweets relevant to your brand. Post regularly and frequently. Keep your posts thought-provoking, interesting, and engaging to build a reputation for quality content on Twitter. Utilize the hashtag function and follow like-minded influencers in your field. Many times, they will follow you in return and could even retweet you someday, passing your message along to their larger audience.

Of course, take our advice with a grain of salt and don’t entirely rely on Twitter to promote yourself. Twitter is great for promoting your brand in a micro-setting, but don’t put all your eggs into a social media basket. Instead of relying on a platform of which you have little control, take your brand into your own hands with your own website. Squarespace allows you to customize your site in your name for the optimal digital experience. Give your brand the best first impression possible with a streamlined, aesthetically designed and award-winning Squarespace website.

What do you think of personal branding on Twitter? Share your ideas and advice and leave a comment below!

The digital era has changed the way we communicate and the internet is now the means by which we mainly interact. Building your online presence is more essential than ever to maintain relevance and establish your brand. People are looking online, so give them something worth looking at!

Here, discover just how much personal branding can be amplified with the help of a blog or website.

Professional presentation

In a recent post on Personal Branding Blog, branding pros Mark Cenicola and Brennan White discussed the necessity of a blog or website when it comes to personal branding. A website, and more importantly a dot-com website in your own name, is the key to your personal brand, especially in coming years. While many branders depend on free sites for their blog and content needs, these sites are oftentimes associated with recreation. As Brennan White advises, “dot-com sites always appear more professional than identical sites on Tumblr or other subdomain sites.”

Think of it as an investment

Making use of these free platforms is good for your brand – they others connect with your brand on all levels. You should utilize these resources online and create a consistent brand across the board. Mark Cenicola points out the huge advantage of a personal website or blog in that it is entirely in your control when you own the domain. He adds, “when done professionally, [a website] shows you are serious about your brand. Invest in your brand by investing in your own personal website.”

When it comes to personal branding blogs and websites, we like Squarespace. This year, it was nominated for the Webby Awards for design, home page, mobility, and services. Squarespace is known for its great imagery and finished layout. And with its drag and drop design, it’s easy enough for anyone to build a website that works as hard for your brand as you do. When it only takes a visitor two-tenths of a second to decide whether or not they like your website, make sure you are providing them the best first impression possible.

Your online base camp

On SocialBro, Cassie Hayes recently wrote about the necessity of a blog or website for personal brands too. Think of the site as your “base camp” or “launch pad” for the digital realm. It can link to all your profiles on other free websites and social networks, but it should also contain the bulk of your content as well. Elaborate with content on your site, then use social media and other platforms to promote it and share it in other capacities. You should also dedicate a portion of your site to introducing yourself, your background, and accolades with recommendations or referrals. Use this space to expand on your experience to craft your narrative into part of your brand.

Create a posting schedule

Hayes also stressed a regular schedule for posting and updating your personal branding blog. The Huffington Post reported an overview on the optimal times to post on various social networks and your website for traffic and social shares and found many variations between platforms. Play around with it to see which times, such as afternoon versus evening, work best for you. Workdays and weekends can differ greatly in the traffic you can accumulate too. Once you find a good posting time, stick to it to build an audience and create a wealth of quality content.

Keep it concise

When it comes to creating content on your personal branding blog or website, make sure that it is both focused and engaging. Your content, like your brand, should be narrowed down to a small niche. Visitors to the site should know what to expect when it comes to content, so keep focused on your area of expertise. This will keep visitors returning for more content.

Ask for feedback

Hayes also brought up a good point in that you can only post non-engaging content for so long. Reach out to your audience to make sure you are meeting their needs and to sustain your content. Get to know them by asking for comments, feedback, and suggestions. Posting prompts and starting discussions is another good way to keep your visitors coming back to your site time and time again. Cater the content to the audience.

What tactics have you used on your personal branding blog or website to increase audience, improve content, and strengthen your brand? Let us know and leave a comment!

Much like this classic American Gothic, the world has transformed drastically in the past few years. The way we communicate has been infiltrated by technology, increasing access to the internet, and most importantly by social media. Social media has changed the medium we turn to for communicating and has even changed the way we talk and the language of our communication. It's so widespread, there are one billion users for just Facebook and Twitter alone.

With social media taking center stage in networking, it’s a no-brainer to market your personal brand in the world of Twitter, YouTube, Pinterest, Facebook, and much more.

Trust ethics on social media

On Muckrack Daily, social media consultant Jason Mollica recently wrote about the importance of applying your personal brand to social media. As Mollica pointed out, trust is of the utmost importance when it comes to social media. WIthout trust, all your efforts to craft the perfect tweet or post are fruitless in reaching your audience. Establishing trust on your social media platforms will ensure that your brand will not only be seen, but it will be recognized and respected.

Precision posts

To establish trust and brand your social media platforms, Mollica suggests first taking inventory of where you’re at right now. Are you reaching your desired audiences? Are you posting as much as you’d like? And are these posts as engaging as they could be? 

Examine the quality of your posts too. As Forbes suggests, make sure they all carry the values of your brand. Brand-specific posts will mean more to your audience and establish your credibility more than an array of random posts. Clear out or adjust your privacy settings on old content that doesn’t fit the bill to brand your accounts.

Know your audience

Another key to applying your personal brand to social media is knowing your audience. Who should you brand be connecting with? You can see what exactly people are looking for with Google Analytics, but you should also know the people behind the searches and cater your content to them.

Mollica suggests reaching out to your audience to get to know them. Simply thanking them for following you is a great way to start the conversation. Creating engaging content is also a good way to get a feel for your audience, and as Meme Burn pointed out, it can lead to a positive impact for your brand’s clients as well as testimonials and credibility for you.

While social media can be a great tool for personal branding, don’t let it be your main platform of operation. After all, you wouldn’t build on rented land, would you? A personal website puts the control of your online footprint in your hands and allows you to put your best foot forward for the digital world. Try Squarespace for the best in personal websites.

How have you applied your brand to social media? Tell us in the comments below.

Laying the groundwork

First things first – the site itself. We like Squarespace for its clean look and ease of navigation. Anyone can create a site that looks good, and when you want this to give a first impression for your brand, this is no place to cut corners. Check out their templates and set your name as your URL to get started. Whether it’s a sleek professional look you want or a nontraditional, stand-out site, Squarespace has tons of looks you can easily pull together for your perfect site.

Next, sign up for Google Analytics to track your website’s traffic if you haven’t already. This way, you can cater your content to exactly what people are looking for. By meeting your audience halfway, you’ll boost your visibility and expand your audience, according to Social Media Today. Sprinkle the site with keywords and phases to utilize search engine optimization and create a web of links to similar and complimentary content in your field to get your website showing up in Google searches.

Website must-haves

Once you get people to your website, you’ll want to provide a few features for them to check out. Make sure you create an About Me page. This is the place to show what you’ve got, but unfortunately it is oftentimes left off the table. Add your personal branding statement or go all out on your personal narrative. No matter how in-depth you’re willing to go, always link your strengths, experience, and qualities back to your brand’s ethics and values. Don’t hesitate to share the good and the bad – people appreciate the honesty and expect transparency.

Invite visitors to your site to engage. Prompt them to leave comments to your posts and invite them to join your email newsletter, which is another great way to keep them coming back to your site. You’ll also want to display your social media badges badges to allow visitors to experience your brand on all levels. Installing a small Twitter feed to run your latest updates along the side will further inspire your visitors to follow.

King content

When it comes to the content you create, make sure to focus on quality rather than quantity. As Social Media Today points out, nobody shares boring content. And with the potential for good content to go viral with a few clicks on so many social media platforms, you can’t afford to not make it top-notch, infectious, entertaining, interesting, relatable, or all of the above.

Personal Branding Blog recently posted about the importance of featuring guest bloggers. If you feel like your site could use a little shake up or your audience isn’t where you want it to be, consider reaching out to an influencer in your field. Don’t have the connections you’d like? Start networking and reaching out. Don’t be shy about it – these connections are mutually beneficial to both parties. The guest blogger will receive more publicity and have the opportunity to be featured on another site, and your personal branding website will generate traffic because of it.

A guest blogger can give a fresh, new voice to your site. They can also expand your audience, as the guest blogger will carry over their own followers. Because they’ll plug their blog postings on their own site, your website will see an increase in traffic and visibility from the added links. A guest blogger can also provide credibility to smaller and newer websites.

Don’t feel like your website has to feature blog posts only. There are many ways to create content that’s engaging, informative, and interesting to all kinds of audiences. Consider creating infographics to lay out hard facts in a visually interesting image. Or, take your traditional blogs and transform them into video format, which is becoming increasingly popular. Transform your videos into webinars by including presentations you’ve made to make them more informative. Check out Search Engine Land for some great ideas about adding variety to your content on your personal branding website.

How have you improved your personal website? Let us know! Leave a comment below.