Before I get into why Attract posts challenge clients or how you can build a personal brand for private people, let me give you a brief summary…
Whenever I’m breaking down a content strategy for a client, there’s always one part I can almost guarantee they will get caught up on: Attract posts. Before I dive into why this happens or how you can succeed at building a personal brand for private people, let me give you a very brief summary of that content strategy breakdown.
A client-winning content strategy is built on…
Attract posts: These posts attract your target audience to your profile. They encourage engagement and show LinkedIn’s algorithm that you’re a profile people want to see. News commentary, trending topics, and personal stories achieve this.
Nurture posts: build credibility through value, usually using insights or tools that educate your audience while demonstrating your expertise. How-tos, comparisons, or ‘why’ explanations achieve this.
Convert posts: directly promote offers, but they keep a focus on your target audience. They prove you have a clear understanding of your audience’s pains and are committed to finding a solution. Posts that achieve this are social proof, loaded polls and lead magnets.
The problem with personal content
There actually is no “problem” with personal content but people still tend to have a personal problem with it. Attract posts show the person behind the profile. They increase relatability and familiarity. People have issues with this type of content for two reasons. They either don’t believe personal content belongs on LinkedIn, or they aren’t comfortable sharing their lives online
Having dealt with both kinds of people and both have gone on to become happy clients. I didn’t force them to post personal stories on LinkedIn. I showed them how building a personal brand (and sharing Attract posts) isn’t what they thought it would be.
How to build a personal brand if you’re a private person
The first thing I help people realise is that “personal” doesn’t have to mean sharing family, friends or holiday pics. Mastering the personal brand for private people is all about understanding that “personal” means a unique persona or perspective your audience can’t get anywhere else. If you only want to weigh in on industry trends or news, that’s fine. Just make sure you are adding your unique voice to the conversation.
Strong, unique voices build successful personal brands. And you can have one of these voices without revealing if you have kids, pets or hobbies. If you’re looking for more ways to create content that truly stands out, Ahrefs offers a comprehensive guide on content marketing principles. Yes, those things will make you relatable to certain types of audiences but if that’s not your audience then shift your focus. Yes, those things will make you relatable to certain types of audiences but if that’s not your audience then shift your focus.
Learn more about building your personal brand with one of our upcoming Epic Content events. You’ll start with the basics of a successful content strategy and then learn how to adapt it to the personal brand you want to build and the audience you want to attract.
