subject: 4 Ways To Brand Yourself As An Expert [print this page] To brand yourself as an expert, you need to hit four specific areas. Does your marketing plan have you covered?
Personal Development
The top two reasons why network marketers fail are lack of money and lack of leads because of not knowing how to market. It's important to work on marketing, learn about it and get comfortable with it, because there is often nothing you can do about a lack of money except get more paying customers. A good network marketer is always reading and learning.
Read books about marketing. Watch videos, listen to audio, find articles and journals. Be sure you are consuming relevant material, though. Don't read books simply because the word "Marketing" is in the title. Check it out, make sure it's going to benefit you.
If you need to learn how to do a specific task for your business, find videos, books and articles that will help you with that specific task before you pick up a very general book. Pick learning materials that will make you practice the skill you're learning about, not just read about it. You can learn all the theory in the world, but if you never do anything, you'll never really know how it's done.
Article Marketing
Writing articles is perhaps the oldest and most widely used method to brand yourself in the marketplace. It's a great way to brand yourself as an expert because it gets the word out and it gets your name out there. It's one of the most exciting moments in the world when you Google a topic and your article comes up on the first page for the world to see.
When you write articles, you can submit them into many different article directories that get a lot of traffic. This way, many people will see your articles and your name. When you write an article, make sure you give something of value on a topic you are knowledgeable about. Include a resource box at the end of the article with contact information so people can get in touch with you and your business.
Video Marketing
YouTube is the third most trafficked website in the world, and people everywhere are going to YouTube to watch videos on their topic of choice rather than read articles. Brand yourself as an expert on YouTube as well as Google and give customers one more way to find you. After you create and upload your video, tag it appropriately so it comes up when people search for the topic. Be sure to use the description box on YouTube and include a link to get to your website. Include useful information about your company or yourself and be sure to include contact information for potential customers.
Social Media Marketing
Facebook is the second most trafficked website in the world--right above YouTube. Social media marketing is a great way to establish yourself as an expert and connect with other experts. You can network and build relationships with potential customers and other experts in the field.
After you give something of value on a social networking site like Facebook or Twitter, include a link to your website or other contact information for potential customers who read it. Don't do this on every post, though; use it sparingly. If you do this too often, you will look like a spammer. People hate spammers. Give people good, useful information so they get to know you and trust you, and include a self-promotion only every once in a while.
