What’s up bloggers! Today’s guest is business coach & marketing strategist Kyla Roma.
She’s here to help us figure out…
- which social channels and/or marketing strategies are going to serve us best
- how to make our blogs and businesses “life proof”
- what on Earth “branding” actually looks like ????
“Branding” is a bit overwhelming for us as bloggers, but luckily there are a few simple questions we can answer to set us up for success.
Let’s brand.
And blog.
At the same time.
Here’s a transcript of my main takeaways from the episode!
What feels easy & fun?
You and I, we can’t be Gary Vaynerchuk. And what do I mean by that?
Well, that’s probably pretty obvious. But what I mean by that is, we can’t be all day, every day. Every social media channel, every content, medium platform podcasts, YouTube, Snapchat, blogging, Instagram stories, Instagram posts, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, everywhere.
We can’t be everywhere.
We don’t have the throughput to be everywhere all the time on all channels and our marketing, unless you have enough money to like, leverage that out and hire some people. I’m assuming very few of us actually do. We can’t be everywhere. So the question is…
And then becomes the Venn diagram. Imagine two-three circles. And we’re going to try and figure out where these circles overlap for us. The circle over here on this side is going to be what do I need to do in order to grow my business?
Something I heard about on the duty of a blog podcast, something I read about something I watched a YouTube video about something I understand I need to do SEO Pinterest, Instagram, anything in order to grow my following and grow my business. Everything in that circle, I need to do these some of these I might enjoy some of these I might not I realized I need to do these things, strategies action items to grow my business. Cool.
That’s circle number one, circle number two over there on the other side is what do I love doing? When it comes to blogging and marketing and business? What do I loved what feels easy and fun, not just like, Oh, I think I might enjoy doing that.
“I’ve been doing this for like three hours didn’t feel like that was easy and fun.”
Where do those circles overlap? He’s got I’m getting out here. What are the things that you could do to grow your business? are valid strategies, proven strategies, hashtag actionable? What’s the stuff you could do? Where does that overlap with?
What feels easy and fun? Try and find that overlap might even be a great exercise to print it out on a piece of paper or draw it on a piece of paper and try and fill it in. try and figure out your little sweet spot of doing marketing that works. And that also makes you happy and is less stressful and anxiety-inducing, right? Where do those things interrupt?
Try these questions to identify your “brand values”
And the second little takeaway I have here is about creating brand values. Doesn’t that sound like something that’ll be marketing book in a college marketing program or out of a Donald Miller branding, book?
If you’re listening to this in your blog, and you’re like, I don’t really know exactly what that word means. That sounds kind of nice. And I don’t really know what brand values are and how is this is worth my time and effort to think throug?
My answer is the same as Kyla’s.
Yes, I actually do believe it is a handy exercise to go through on a yearly basis or maybe even a quarterly or monthly basis if you so choose.
And to leave you with something somewhat hashtag actionable and practical that you can go do it would be asking yourself this question. It’s actually three questions.
- What do I want my blog to be and feel like and look like?
- What do I want my blog to be?
- What do I want my blog to read?
What I want people to feel when they come on my blog? I think the answer to that is your “brand values,” right?
What do you stand for? Who are the people you serve?
What do they have in common? What do they come to your blog for?
What’s going to make them feel comfortable something they agree with, that you preach on could be something polarizing like a political statement or an ideal about the world you have. I have my own blocking ideals, my ideals in terms of digital marketing, maybe you are attracted to them.
The fact that I don’t think income reports are all that valuable the fact that I don’t really like selling small value blogging courses that I don’t really like when other people do it as well. I don’t really think there’s a whole lot of value in that. I think there’s a lot of harm. And over I’m looking me ranting, wow, I turned that corner fast.
I was gonna say I think there’s a lot of harm in overselling success and overhyped promises that may or may not live up to it in a digital world where we take online courses, okay, I’m ending my rant here.
But if you agree with any of those statements, you are attracted to my brand, and I have a lot of other values that are more positive in nature.
I want to see the world changed by your blog content. How do you feel about that statement?
I want to make you a better writer, vocalist, video producer podcaster. I want to make you produce content that makes people sing and dance and follow you for life.
What do you think about that? Not a lot of metal bloggers are saying that I’m saying that. That’s part of my brand values. What do you think about that? What do I want my blog to be?
What I want it to feel like, what do I want it to sound like? What do I want it to read? Like, even? Those are your brand values.
So don’t make it more complicated than that. Just ask yourself, what is my thing? What is my thing? When people come to my blog? What’s going to make them say yes, this is for me, or no, it is not for me. That would be your brand values. What is your blog going to be like? What do you want it to feel like and be like.
Hopefully it’s a little bit more #actionable than reading something like usually go and identify your brand values. Right? Right.