At first, the idea of encouraging your employees to develop their own personal brands can seem counterintuitive. You might think that spending time establishing individual brands could detract focus from your company, or you may worry about someone sharing something that reflects poorly on your brand.
These concerns, however, can be easily mitigated with a few simple tips and guidelines. Most employees will jump at the chance to improve their online presence, and they’ll be unlikely to speak badly about your company if you give them opportunities to learn new skills and grow within their career. In fact, when implemented correctly, strong personal brands can offer plenty of benefits for each employee and your company as a whole.
Benefits of Developing Personal Brands
Todd Kunsman, the director of marketing at Everyone Social, encouraged company leaders to focus on personal branding by sharing these eye-opening statistics:
- When brand messages are shared by employees rather than the company’s official profile, the reach can increase by over 560%.
- Brand messages are 24 times more likely to be shared if an employee posts the information instead of the company.
- About 84% of people trust recommendations and content from others they know.
When your team members create their own personal brands and expand their individual networks, it actually reflects positively on your overall brand image and improves your company’s credibility. IMC (Integrated Marketing Communications) expert Bonnie Harris explains that this branding strategy can lead to:
- Increased ROI. Employees with large followings can easily spread news and messages about your brand to an audience that already trusts them, making it more likely that people will interact with the content or share it themselves.
- Easier recruitment processes. If your employees build strong personal brands on social media, their positivity will make your business look appealing to those looking for a new job. Your team can interact with possible future hires and therefore reduce the costs of traditional hiring and recruitment measures.
- Stronger teams. Growing a personal brand requires unique knowledge and skill sets that your employees will have to develop over time. If your team works together to create and manage their individual brands, they will be able to collaborate more effectively on other projects as well.
- Increased employee loyalty. Investing in your employees’ personal brands will make each person feel valued and recognized in the workplace. When you actively help your employees improve themselves and give them opportunities to grow within their career, they will become more committed, productive, and loyal to your business.
Tips for Employers
- Help employees recognize their unique skills. “Building your personal brand is about sharing your authentic self with the world,” explains George J. Ziogas, an HR consultant and OHS specialist. “You need to know yourself if you want to build a strong personal brand.” Ziogas recommends asking your employees to reflect on their core values, passions, life experiences, and special talents to help their personalities shine through.
- Reward employee achievements. Recognizing and rewarding accomplishments is a simple way to boost morale and make your team members feel valued and appreciated. Sharing this kind of positive feedback online (such as announcing an “employee of the month” on social media) will reflect positively on your employee’s personal brand as well.
- Encourage original content. Approximately 50% of employees share news about their job or industry on social media already, but you can go a step further by encouraging them to generate their own blog posts, videos, or infographics to stand out as industry experts.
- Keep appearances in mind. To create a streamlined brand appearance, consider hiring a photographer to take professional headshots for employees to use as their profile pictures. Your team will be able to easily incorporate their occupation into their personal brand, and the consistency of the photos will make your website look more polished and professional as well.
- Provide adequate training and encouragement. You can’t expect your team to simply start creating content and increasing engagement right away on their own. Suggesting different “conversation starters” about news within your industry or other relevant topics is also recommended, at least until everyone is comfortable with creating original content.
Remember that creating a personal brand takes time to grow and develop. It may take some time before you begin to see the results of this strategy, but with the right tools and encouragement, you’ll be amazed at what your team can do for your business!