3 Personal Branding Trends to Make Your Brand More Human in 2023

If you think it’s better to appeal to everyone, I’m sorry you’re wrong on this one????. Any great branding or marketing expert should agree with me here. I think the statement, ‘there’s????riches in the niches’ makes a lot more sense. 

I ran a LinkedIn poll and 90% of people do NOT think it’s better to appeal to every audience and 10% felt it was better to cater to anyone and everyone. PHEW, I’m glad my LinkedIn famiLEE is on the same page.

The more specific you are in who you want to attract, the easier it will be for you to attract the RIGHT client or audience and repel the wrong ones. 

Niching down leads to brand advocates, the holy grail of marketing   

Brand advocates are the people who spread your brand’s message through word of mouth. They are generally an audience who tell their colleagues, network, and unrelated acquaintances about the great products, services, or content that you provide. They do this WITHOUT you paying them…this is not influencer marketing to be clear.  

If I were to say Apple or Microsoft, you’d immediately have an opinion based on your experience with the brand. Even though I worked at Microsoft, I absolutely love my iPhone and MacBook Air because of the seamless, simple, and high-quality product experience. ‘m a brand advocate.  

When you niche down and get clear on the audience that is truly attracted to your brand, they will stay with you longer and spend more money. Some fun facts from SEMRush:  

  •  On average, word-of-mouth drives $6 trillion in annual global spending and is responsible for 13% of all sales. 
  • Word-of-mouth is even more effective than paid ads, resulting in 5X more sales.  
  • 28% of people say that word-of-mouth increases brand affinity (a customer’s common values with a brand). 

20% of your clients, drive 80% of your business revenue 

For an average business, research shows loyal clients account for 20% of your entire client base, but that 20% drives 80% of your business’s revenue. 

Do you know who your 20% is? What their want, need, and feel? If you don’t, start understanding it asap. This is your niche and these are the ones who will stick around during the tough times.  

Take industry leader and global brand PepsiCo, for example. They understood their top consumers had less money to spend but still wanted to indulge in their favorite soda, so Pepsi responded by adjusting the prices and quantity of soda they sold. They sold just slightly smaller, more affordable quantities.

Pepsi adjusted its offer to meet the needs of a key segment of customers they knew they didn’t want to lose.

How to niche your audience down?  

When you’re thinking about your personal brand, our target ????audience are the people who can relate to our unique background and experiences. This is your ????bullseye and it should NOT be aspirational. It must be centered on who truly is attracted to you, which may be different than who you want or think it is. For instance, my core audience includes professional business womxn, including mothers, entrepreneurs, and wives.  

Your target audience as a company brand are the people that are experiencing the pain points you solve with your business. So often, businesses get this wrong. They’re going after an audience they aspire to attract, not the current people who are purchasing or need what they offer. I highly encourage you to do some research, look at the data, and see who’s truly buying your product and service, and make sure you’re marketing message is speaking to them…not the ones you’re aspiring to attract.  

Here’s a few helpful steps to get you started: 

1. Ask yourself: Who relates to me? What problem do I solve and for whom exactly?  

People usually want to go after these aspirational clients. And then they ask, “Why won’t they come to me?”  

My truthful answer,“Well, you have no credibility.” 

Spend some time focusing on your target bull’s eye which is the people that can truly relate to your background, your experiences, and that can buy from you. 

When you do this your audience will end up trusting you, and in turn you’ll build credibility.  

Don’t try to cater to “anyone” or “everyone”, because different groups of people have different interests, needs, and values and your offer will only appeal to some. That’s the whole point. 

Look at it this way: would you rather have 100 followers that love your product or service and buy it again and again, or 1000 random people who don’t come back, engage with you, and never end up buying anything from you? 

The goal isn’t for people to like us. It’s about representing ourselves authentically and an audience will hear you! One specific audience is what matters. 

Repeat after me, “There’s riches in the niches. There’s riches in the niches. There’s riches in the niches.” 

If you clicked your heels three times like me, then you are my people????.  

 2. Get clear on your value proposition  

Focus on the people who are most likely to buy your product or service based on the pain points you solve, and make sure you’re speaking directly to them. If you try to speak to everyone, instead of choosing a target audience, you may not be heard????.  

Hubspot lays out writing a brand value proposition nicely: 

  1. Identify your customer’s main problem. 
  2. Identify all the benefits your product offers. 
  3. Describe what makes these benefits valuable. 
  4. Connect this value to your buyer’s problem. 
  5. Differentiate yourself as the preferred provider of this value. 

This is critical in you niching down and building advocates. With your personal brand value proposition, we love using our XYZ statement formula which helps people build their LinkedIn headlines.  

I help X (audience) do Y (product/service benefits) so they achieve Z (the outcome value).  

This is mine: Brand marketing ladyboss who builds your personal brand, LinkedIn strategy, and confidence so you can change the world   

Use our fun headline analyzer tool HERE.  

3. Step into what makes you different and be okay with the haters 

A lot of times people don’t realize they’re different. I find this a lot with working professionals who say ‘I’m no different than anybody else.’ But there’s only 1 of you!! I promise the more you step into your uniqueness, the more your audience will be attracted to you.  

On a personal brand level, think about languages you speak, where you were born, education, awards, certifications, etc. There’s all sorts of things that make you different and helps your audience relate to you. Step into those superpowers and use them to build your target audience. 

On a company brand level, don’t try to be like everyone else. Don’t let driving demand and ROI dictate your brand DNA and what makes you different than your competitor. It’s a very crowded market out there, and the more you try to fit in, the more you DON’T stand out.  

In conclusion, build an emotional connection  

At the end of the day, your audience and clients want to connect with you on an emotional level. The stronger sense of self and values you have, the more your brand will attract the right people to you that become advocates.  

I can’t tell you the number of times I’ve connected with someone because of our family member pup, Frankie. He’s one of my “niche” superpowers. 

More Than 875 Million Members in 200 Countries and Regions Worldwide

Not only is he the best cuddle bug, but he’s part of what makes me different. 

Kevin Costner was right, ‘If you build it, they will come.’ But … like, for real, they will. It takes some time just like any relationship, and we’re a true testimony of building your target audience.  

Our #famiLEE is our biggest advocates and they mean the world to us, but it didn’t start out that way. We’ve nurtured the heck out of our #famiLEE and they really are an extension of us. 

So niche down. Get clear on who you are. And those riches will come.  

Need help niching down so YOU become a standout authority? 

We know identifying your audience and message is hard work. That’s why it’s the first part of our onboarding process with clients and the most important step in becoming a standout authority.  

If you feel like you’re not getting visibility, engagement or conversions, then you likely have an audience and messaging issue. To support you in this process, I’m inviting you to our Standout Authority Experience where we’ll help you 1:1 on defining and engaging your audience.  

If you’re an ambitious, high-powered business professional whose referrals are drying up… 

❌ Your Facebook ad budget is draining your bank account every month with NO ROI… 

❌ You’re tired of getting zero visibility, zero engagement, and zero conversions… 

 ❌ Or maybe you’re unsure of what type of content to put out there to attract and make powerful connections with decision-makers…  

And you’re looking to:  

✅ Define your personal brand, map your message and audience, and rock your LinkedIn profile 

✅ Find your ideal audience and learn how to create engaging content that gets you seen and heard 

✅ Create relationships and get micro-commitments from your audience that generate new opportunities 

Then this is exactly what you’ve been waiting for! 

JOIN THE VIP WAITLIST NOW

Live Event - Create a Career Reputation That Gets You Promoted

???? We only have 20 exclusive spots available due to the fact that you’ll have DIRECT ACCESS TO ME AND Joshua B. Lee (The Dopamine Dealer of LinkedIn). PLUS we’re providing all of our secrets and templates that drive thousands of dollars in business for our clients.