Personal Brand Site

This post is republished from the Genius Network Podcast

Episode Summary

Do you ever feel like the word “branding” is overused? Curious about the real value of an influencer site? The right personal brand website can massively boost your authority and create deeper connections.

Dmitriy Kozlov of Influex.com explains all.

Here’s a glance at what you’ll learn from Dmitriy in this episode:

• Dmitriy describes the results his company (Influex) delivers and the value of having an influencer site
• How a personal brand website can position you more effectively and help you more easily sell yourself
• One of the most important things you can do to increase your speaking engagements, PR and positive media exposure
• The biggest mistake entrepreneurs make when trying to build their reputation (and what to do instead)
• 3 key questions you should be asking BEFORE you create your personal brand site
• The Anatomy of a Working Website: What a great result-getting website should look like and do
• How to use a personal brand website to massively boost your authority and create deeper connections
• Dmitriy shares his perspective on his passion for fusing art, entrepreneurship, and marketing

Show Notes

• There is a lot of ego-based information sold to entrepreneurs around how to build a brand.
• Influence is what makes people make a business decision. Expression is more like brand essence.
• People make a decision to buy, based as much on the essence of a brand as the marketing message.
• The difference between a $1 bill and a $100 bill is the message on the paper.
• For coaches selling their personal skill set, their website is essentially the center of their universe. Even a separate business is connected to your personal brand and can be damaged by a poor reputation.
• A good personal brand is authentically expressed and is congruent with your true self. Incongruence becomes painful.
• Brand is the personality of the product or service.
• No true achievement-minded entrepreneur is interested in retirement. Most of them are artists and creators, and their business is an expression of what they are creating.
• Position your personal brand alongside whatever it is you’re making, sooner rather than later.
• If you have a great personal brand presence, you will have a lot of opportunities for speaking and presenting.
• There are three lenses to look through when developing your personal brand site: purpose, perception, and personality.
• Ask what is the primary and secondary purpose of each page of the website. For most people, the purpose is to build their list or get more speaking engagements.
• Perception is what experience you want your visitors to have.
• Your website should be a representation of your person. Most of the time, people’s sites are incongruent to where they are at.
• Most sites follow a very similar structure while being customized for your individual message.
• The more connected your opt-in is to your core statement of value, the more you will attract the kinds of leads you want.
• Most people don’t buy what it is you’re selling by visiting your website. They visit initially to explore, which is why you capture their information and continue the conversation.
• Your story is one of the first steps of building the relationship via your personal brand site. Start with your story before trying to build credibility.
• The purpose of your story is to build connection. You build credibility through testimonials.
• The footer on your website is often a throw-away item, but you should be very intentional with the content you put there.
• When you start your business, you get paid for what you do. Once you establish a great reputation, you start getting paid for who you are.
• Your home page should contain content that gives value up front. There are three ways to show people you can help them; you can tell them, you can show them, or you can help them.
• Take your wisdom and make it free to access. Your content is the container for the value you bring to the table.
• You are not the hero of your journey, you are the guide to the hero. You are the Yoda to the Luke Skywalker.
• The important thing to ask for every perception piece on your site is ‘how can I be a guide to the people I am trying to serve?’
• You don’t have to market the same way as some of the most popular marketers. Those people know their audience. Figure out what outcome your audience wants and approach them appropriately.
• Consistency is how you develop mastery, confidence and a reputation for solid work.
• For most people, a speaking page is a good idea even if speaking is not your main focus.
• A personal brand site is like a personal conversation over coffee. You are building the relationship that may result in a sale later on.
• Your contact page should include your social media links and be a catch all for any kind of inquiry to your site.
• The first ever site that Dmitriy bought was dmitriykozlov.com, which led to him developing sites for other people and building an agency.
• The process of creating an influencer site starts with essence, expression, and execution.
• The key questions you should ask when interviewing potential designers is ‘what platform do you build on?’ and ‘what happens if we no longer work together?’
• Most entrepreneurs are artists, they are just artists in business. Ask yourself how you can fuse your artistic talents with your business acumen.
• Stepping into your artist identity will accelerate your business.

Team Influex is proud to launch Alex Charfen’s new influencer site!

Not only does it look awesome, it also does a great job of differentiating Alex and his unique gifts from the rest of the pack.

An entrepreneurial master, Alex began his selling career at the ripe old age of 8 when he started selling items at the local flea market with his dad (not the worst place to spend your time as a kid)!

From that point on, Alex has had massive success in real estate and in teaching others how to grow their own real estate empires, no matter what the selling climate looks like.

Now, Alex is the author of The Entrepreneurial Personality Type, the handbook for quirky and often misunderstood entrepreneurs with an intrinsic need to move and build and strive.

He has spoken on the biggest stages, appeared on TV and in print for major media outlets such as MSNBC, CNBC, FOX News, The Wall Street Journal, USA Today, Investor’s Business Daily and AmEx OPEN Forum to provide his unique views and insights.

Even though Alex was at a decent point with his business before coming to Influex for a makeover, he still knew that something needed to change on his site to open the space for growth.

He wanted to reimagine his brand, and so he needed a new site to reflect his new (improved) brand.

Check out Alex’s old site here:

 

Slickness and cool factor aside, the main thing that Alex’s old site did not have was a super clear and powerful USP (unique selling proposition)… or as we say at Influex, a UMP (Unique Messaging Proposition).

Before the site redesign, Alex’s power statement was “Helping Evolutionary Entrepreneurs Grow, Scale and Thrive.”

That’s pretty cool… but could it improve?

 

Let’s take a look at Alex’s new site to see what changes were made…

First, we helped strengthen his positioning. You can see that there’s a much stronger UMP here. The emphasis is now on Alex as a thought leader when it comes to uncovering the entrepreneurial personality type.  

Alex’s message is now “Grow Your Business, Optimize Your Life, Make Your Greatest Contribution.”

 

Second, you can see that Alex’s opt-in is now honed in on downloading his book, “Entrepreneurial Personality Type”.

What entrepreneurs don’t want to know more about themselves to make the best decisions possible for their life and business?  Not me!

We designed Alex’s site to strategically gather more leads and attract higher-level clients.

His site also highlights his available programs and invites readers to book him as a Speaker:

It’s great that he can connect quickly with most entrepreneurs just based on this “above the fold” focus for his website.

Third, we made sure that Alex’s identity as a growth-minded entrepreneur came through clearly and honestly.  Alex now has a much stronger brand because of his more tasteful and iconic website.

How about you? Are you interested in seeing where your UMP can improve on your website?

The more you wait, the more your ineffective site is costing you in terms of missed opportunities. Schedule your Influex strategy call now.

 

 

If you want to create a brand that will remain relevant for the long-term (and one that converts site visitors into loyal raving fans), there's one strategy you need to build into every message, every content, and into every marketing effort you make: building trust.

But how do you do this effectively?

Enter Joe Polish…

Joe Polish is one of the most sought after marketers alive today. An exceptional “connector”, he leverages his networking prowess through his highly renowned Genius Network, and GeniusX masterminds with household guests like Peter Diamandis, Tony Robbins, Sir Richard Branson, Steve Forbes, and John Mackay coming in to share their wisdom with the groups.

Before we started working together, Joe already had a functional personal brand site. But Joe wanted us to rethink his site. He wanted one that would invite people to come into his world  — and then strongly inspire them to take purposeful, meaningful action towards living a grander, more abundant, more fulfilling life. 

Here we share the key principles we used to guide our redesign strategy for Joe…

1) Get Clear on Who You Want to Attract

First, we made sure we had a clear, super detailed profile of Joe's target audience. We discussed this in great depth during our onboarding process (we call this part of our unique, proven process the “Influencer Intensive”).

Joe wanted to attract givers, not takers. He wanted to appeal to real entrepreneurs, not those who say they want to build businesses, but don’t take consistent action.

Joe wanted them to feel motivated and inspired when they land on his site, but he also wanted them to feel disturbed by their own inaction and to feel they will be missing out on great opportunities if they don't subscribe and actively learn from Joe's knowledge.

We also made sure we understood why he thought his old site was no longer effective. Here's a shot of his old homepage:

Now compare his homepage to what we came up with… (click on the image to experience his site yourself)

 

2) Keep It Real

In order to build trust, we designed Joe's site so that it doesn't look “salesy”.

“What?!” I hear other designers say.

“You mean no over the top flashing red arrows or big glaring headlines with multiple exclamation points? (Double gasp!)”

I know, right? What a travesty.  😉

Jokes aside, Joe himself even said he “didn't want to look too polished” (hrhrhr got the joke? An endearingly punny man, Joe is.)

He cared more about being real, being authentic.

That's why we used doodle-ish fonts and hand-drawn graphics for his brand. That way, it exuded his relaxed, friendly, fun, light-hearted attitude.

 

One thing Joe is famous for is his proven framework on how to build ELF businesses – (Easy, Lucrative, Fun) vs. HALF ones (Hard, Annoying, Lame, Frustrating).

So when visitors see the site, Joe wanted them to feel more “woooooh!” (excitement, curiosity to dig deeper) and less aaahh (angst, frustrations).

So we (in collaboration with Joe's team) created the site so that it invites people into a world that shows them they can become better and overcome their problems, as well as connect with themselves and with others.

We wanted visitors to experience the possibility of a solution to their marketing problem.
Joe wanted people to feel motivated and inspired, but also disturbed by their own inaction (you know that “sh*@t – I really need to change now or else” kind of feeling? Yep.)

So how can you do this effectively?

 

3) Share Your Struggles When You Tell Your Story… But Don't Make it Exclusively About You.

Joe's About Page is a fine example of how to hook people into your world when you tell your story.

 

Here are just some of the reasons that made Joe's About Page effective:

• It revealed Joe's struggles as a person and as an entrepreneur.
• He shared his aspirations as well as his flaws.
• He displayed the right balance of vulnerability as he described the obstacles he encountered as he fought his way to achieve his goals.
• He prevented his About Page from becoming a narcissistic yawn-fest by telling his story by giving clues as to how others too could figure out the same struggles that he had wrestled with.  He featured real people he had helped and the results they gained by applying Joe's teachings.
• The page mentioned his other offshoot projects and passion-based businesses that continue to fulfill his sense of Purpose.

 

4) Let Others Build You Up

While it may work well to persuade people when you talk about your own accomplishments, it works much better when you let others do the talking for you.

And let's face it – it makes you sound less of a douche, too 😉

So if you want to win over your prospects' trust, include a page in your personal brand site that builds your social proof. Showcase your clients' case studies and/or testimonials.

We made sure to feature well-known people in a wide range of industries. It's a very clever way of conveying that Joe's marketing know-how do not just work in the carpet cleaning industry – without us actually saying the words. Whenever you can, employ that subtlety in your messaging. It works better to persuade your readers: because they arrive at the conclusion themselves, they have more buy-in.

Of course, the fact that Joe is known to multi-million dollar bestselling authors and world-renowned speakers makes out job way easier…

When featuring video testimonials, be mindful of the fact that some people would prefer to just read the text on the page and not play the video.

To anticipate this tendency, we included the snippets of the most important (i.e., trust-inducing) part of the testimonial on the page. That way, the goal of the page is likely to be met regardless of the readers' behavior patterns.

 

Does Your Personal Brand Site Need a Makeover?

Are you an influencer who wants to create an omnipresent brand online?

If you feel your personal brand site is not built to boost your credibility and perceived authority, schedule a strategy call with us.  We'll identify the ways we can help you create an online presence that builds your authority, gets you more inquiries, and attracts more of your ideal clients.

You might also want to download our free Photography and Storytelling Guides here.

And if there's nothing else that you take away from this featured post, let it be this (we found this inspiring quote inside the Genius Network HQ):

“Be willing to destroy anything in your life that isn’t excellent”
~ Joe Polish

 

Are you an expert, consultant or entrepreneur who is unhappy with your current personal brand site? If so, here is one Influencer website makeover story that you could learn from.

Sachit Gupta is an entrepreneur dedicated to showing podcasters, authors and experts how to grow their audience and make a living from their art. Through his proven processes and mentorship, Sachit takes entrepreneurs to the next level by unlocking hidden profit centers in their businesses.

Like you, Sachit already had a business website but he knew it needed an overhaul. He needed it to be more effective in terms of generating leads, establishing his credibility, and selling his services and programs.

But for a long time, it remained the way it was. Sachit said: 

Building a personal brand site is something I’ve wanted to do for a long time but never really got around to doing, because:

• I wasn’t sure what to put on there. I didn’t know how to construct the foundation of a really good personal brand site.

• If you’ve ever done a website project, you know that managing developers, designers, writing copy and managing the entire process is really frustrating and complicated.

• I do client work so I never really have the time to manage the whole process.

So his personal brand site didn't get done for a long time. Fortunately, Sachit stumbled upon Influex.

But at first, he was very skeptical…

When I first saw the offer from Influex, I thought it was too good to be true because they offered to handle everything: design, development, giving you instructions on what copy they need, even helping you on how to get photographs… It was like this one-stop-shop thing. I thought it was a crazy offer.

So I thought maybe this offer is by some new company who didn’t know what they’re doing.

But when I went to their site and saw their portfolio… holy crap! They work with the best like Mike Dillard, Frank Kern, Yanik Silver…so they knew what they were talking about.

It was a crazy offer so it was a no brainer to jump into it.

Here are a few things showing what we did for Sachit’s site and how you too could apply the same principles to your personal brand site makeover.

#1: Create a Stunning Homepage that Conveys What You Do and Who You Serve—Within 5 Seconds

Why 5 seconds? Because research shows that most users will click away if they don't establish your site's relevance within that time.

Remember that when prospects land on your homepage, the main questions in their minds are: “what's in this for ME? Why should I pay attention to this? How can this person solve MY problems?”

So when you get your homepage designed, the first thing you must establish is relevance. Fail to do this and you'll be looking at high bounce rates (bounce rate is the percentage of site visitors who click away from the site after viewing only one page).

 

A well-designed homepage helps build trust and credibility right from the get-go. Just like the way you dress, the way your site looks speaks volumes about you, and this is one subconscious (but powerful) way how your prospects judge whether you're worth their attention or not.

 

Sachit's old homepage had decent copy, but the design looked plain. It used an image that looked generic – one that gave off a stock photography vibe to it. The design also failed to strongly reinforce what was being conveyed by the copy.

Another important thing is to spare users from having to think more than they have to. A common crime amateur designers/web developers do is to complicate stuff.  In effect, the page gets muddled with superfluous elements and the core message gets lost or buried.

We humans are cognitive misers, so make your homepage simple and easy to understand. Aim for clarity more rather than trying to look cool or sounding clever or worse, pretending to be someone you're not.

#2: Use Well-crafted Stories to Bond with Your Audience on a Deeper Level

Our brains are hardwired to process stories. Just like our instinct for languages, we have an innate drive to hear stories and tell stories. When you have a story to tell, people of all ages are prone to engage and listen.

Want to get your prospects to understand how you can help them without making them feel sold to? Tell them the stories of your best clients.

The best stories are usually about people who want something (a goal) or they have problems that they feel they're ill-equipped to deal with. At its most basic form, a story's main ingredients are: character(s) + obstacle(s) + resolution + transformation.

When you tell your clients' stories, a common mistake is to try to make yourself the hero of the story. But if you want to create a deeper impact in your prospects' minds, make them or your clients the heroes of the stories instead. Then position yourself as the guide who steps in to help them deal with their problems, show them the way and help them get what they want.

Making your clients and prospects the heroes in your story doesn't necessarily mean you don't talk about yourself at all.  In fact, many people value knowing things about you that are outside of what you do professionally.

Case in point: Sachit's site gave very little information about him…

If you want to create an opportunity to bond with your audience on an emotional level, share some things about your personal life as well. This invites your audience to identify with you in a way that goes deeper than just the professional level.

 

#3: Use Powerful Calls to Action

You know what site visitors want from you when they click through and visit your site?

They want you to take them somewhere. Are you creating a worthy experience?

Don't expect people to think for themselves. Guide them.

Know your prospects well enough that you're able to anticipate what information they need and at what stage in the process they'll be looking for what information.

So lead your site visitors from one stage to the next in their journey with you. Then, tell them what to do and what's next after that.

Make every call to action clear and compelling.

 

#4: Grow your List and Generate Leads!

People will rarely buy from you or hire you within the first interaction with your brand/site.

That is why it's essential you capture their contact details so you can keep the conversation going and build the relationship over time. You can do this by emailing them useful information and follow up messages.

Your email list can be one of your most powerful business assets, so one of your website's top 3 goals should be to build a list of high-quality, highly-qualified prospects.

 

#5: Make Your Offers Clear

After explaining what you do and who you do it for, don’t shy away from selling!

Here you'll see how Sachit's old site described the value he could offer, but it didn't clarify what the prospects could invest in to make their desired transformation happen. (There wasn't even a call to action right where he explained what he could do for prospects.)

Don't leave your readers guessing. Make your offers clear. Show them what they can get, what options are available to them, how they'll get it, how you'll deliver the value they want and when, and what their investment is going to be.

#6: Follow a Proven Process

The whole point of redesigning your personal brand site is to transform it from a mere brochure to an effective marketing tool that sets you apart from the competition, helps you build trust and authority with your tribe, and generates targeted leads for your business.

Influex has a proven, tested process for making all that happen.

As Sachit shared:

I didn’t know what pages to put on there, and I didn’t know what information needed to be on each page. But by working with Influex and by going through their processes, those became clear. 

So if you work with Influex, don’t skip any of the processes because you’ll just end up hurting yourself.

Sachit adds:

What I really loved about my experience working with Influex was the team took control of the entire process.

I remember from the moment I made the payment, they laid out exactly:

“Here’s what you need to do, here’s what we need from you, here’s how everything’s gonna work…”

If you hire someone and they have a process and they tell you exactly what’s gonna happen, it just makes you feel you’re in good hands. And that was how I felt from start to finish.

 

Redesigning a site is a creative process. Due to its nature, it can be messy, unpredictable, and, given the conflicting preferences and tastes of those involved, the process could even be confusing at times.

They really care about their work. I could tell that from the very start. 

A great example is when we were working on my 404 Page or my Contact Page. I expected them to do one or two designs and I just pick one. But no, we ended up doing many revisions – for a page that most people wouldn’t even really think about!

For the Home Page, About Page and all the important pages, we went through multiple rounds of revisions and they were always happy to do it as long as I was clear about what I wanted.

That just showed that they cared and wanted to create something beautiful and that’s exactly what they did and delivered on what they promised.

 

Here’s what Sachit has to say about his experience after he decided to get his site redesigned:

https://youtu.be/HNWCuJkR4Fg

Redesigning your personal brand site could be a long and stressful process. But it doesn't have to be so if you have an experienced and competent team working with you. We'll let Sachit have the final word:

If you’re someone who’s looking to build your personal brand site, you have two choices:

One is you try and do it yourself.

In which case, you’ll need to figure out what exactly goes where.

Then you need to find a designer. Then you need to find a developer. You’ll need someone to write the copy and then you’ll probably need a Project Manager to manage everything and everyone.  

And you do all that while running your own business!

That’s just too stressful!

So either you do that or just work with Influex and they handle everything from start to finish and in the end they deliver a good product and that’s what matters.

So yes, I highly recommend you work with them!

If you want to see more of the personal brand sites that we have created for other influencers, check out our portfolio. 

And if you're ready to have your personal brand site redesigned by our team, simply fill out the application form here.  You will be asked to book your Alignment Assessment call with Dmitriy to see if we are a good fit.

Sterling Griffin helps service providers serve more and get paid more while working from anywhere in the world. If you're a coach or expert who has ever struggled marketing yourself, Sterling can guide you to a thriving 6-figure business just as he had done for many others.

Before Sterling worked with us to build his Influencer Site, this was his situation, in his own words:

“Over my first year in business, it was a wonder I survived with such a janky website. Because in the industry we’re in today (especially if you’re a coach, consultant or service provider, there is so much competition right now around what you do. There are dozens of thousands of people that are offering the same service. So how do you stand out? That was the question that was in my mind when I came to Dmitriy.”

To solve Sterling's problem, the Influex team created a brand site that makes Sterling's brand stand out, exude credibility and be known as an authority.

Apart from the stunning design, these are just some of the key things that make Sterling's Home Page so effective:

1. An attention-grabbing, impossible-to-resist offer right above the fold that generates targeted, high-quality leads for his business.
2. It passes “the grunt test”. What is the grunt test? Basically, if a caveman were to look at your website, could they “grunt” exactly what you do just by looking at the homepage? Sterling's new home page conveys who he is serving, what value he can offer them, and how he delivers it – all in the span of 5 seconds.
3. Even the section where he was supposedly talking about himself was crafted from the perspective of the reader's interests, issues, and concerns.
4. The copy builds rapport with the reader effectively and establishes credibility and trust without overwhelming the reader with superfluous messaging.

Here's what Sterling has to say about his experience with Influex: 

“When I came to Dmitriy, I asked for a site that looks good and functional – one that would give me [better] conversions and create results for my bottom line.

Not only were the entire team a joy to work with, they made it EASY. I  just told them what I wanted and it got DONE. I had total peace of mind throughout the entire process.

After my site was done, I was thrilled that people coming to my site were now seeing me as an expert and my brand as a distinct, different, more powerful and unique within my industry.

It also produces results for my bottom line. I get more email and chatbot opt-ins way more since we did my new site.  

So if you’re thinking, “who’s the person I need to work with to up-level my personal brand so that I can set myself apart in the marketplace?” I don’t know any better than the Influex team!

Your brand deserves a major upgrade and these people will not only do a great job but they’ll also do it at an amazing price!”

You can view Sterling's site at SterlingGriffin.com

And if you are now ready to have an influencer site that expresses your essence, generates leads 24/7, builds trust, boosts your authority, and makes you truly stand out…

Join Sterling Griffin, Frank Kern, Mike Dillard, JJ Virgin, Yanik Silver and many other leading online influencers now and get your own Influex site. You can find out more here.

I’m staring an active volcano with my good friend and Maverick NEXT President, Zion Kim, with a burning desire for self expression. There’s a fire in my belly. It’s December 2016 at the Maverick M3 Summit in Hawaii, we’re celebrating the past year together and setting intentions for 2017.

I have a little purple pill in my hand.

“I commit to my fullest self-expression this year!”

“Why?” Zion asks.

“Because I want to feel free. I want to FEEL that fire in my belly fully expressed in the world.”

“Why? What will that do for the world?”

“It’s how I’ll give my greatest gifts to the world. My greatest service will come from my greatest expression. I want to liberate my voice, and through that, give my heart’s greatest gifts and my mind’s highest wisdom to the people I serve, to the world I love.”

I pop the pill.

That night, I freestyled. That weekend at the Maverick annual meeting, I used my voice and spoke my truth fully in a way that deeply served the Maverick EcoVerse and expanded my personal freedom.

In the coming months, I stepped into my poetic gifts more than ever and really discovered what it was like to liberate my truth… including writing and performing my one man show to reveal my teenage trauma in coming of age.

A couple of months later, I finally launched Influex (the name itself is Influence + Expression), supporting other big voices with their personal expression and influence. With bringing their visionary voices to the world.

One of those people was my friend Robbe Richman. He was there in Hawaii with us, and gave me that first little purple pill in a ceremony which inspired me to clarify my deepest intentions for the coming year.

Today, I’m proud to announce that Robbe’s site is the first Influex site that we’re publicly launching.

While it’s not exactly a “personal brand site” – I felt so connected to the project through my personal story, that we wanted to include it in our first 25 Influex sites… and synchronistically, it’s now the FIRST official Influex site.

Discover what this little purple “Xpill” is all about – including it’s origin story at Burning Man – and how some of the biggest names in the personal development industry rave about it at the brand new Xpill.com website, artistically designed by our creative team here at Influex.

Before Xpill was a thing, I actually met Robbe at a Maverick retreat in Vegas over three years ago, where he taught us a lot about culture and leadership when we were visiting Zappos. His background is in building epic company cultures. Here’s more of his official accolades:

He became most well-known for being a manager and culture strategist at Zappos.com where he co-founded Zappos Insights, an innovative program educating companies on the secrets behind its game-changing employee culture. Based on his experience working with hundreds of companies on their cultures, he wrote The Culture Blueprint: a systematic guide to building the high-performance workplace. He took Zappos Insights from an idea to a multimillion dollar business line. Since then, Robbe has spoken to and consulted for Google, Toyota, Eli Lilly, Whole Foods, Intuit and many other companies.

Culture is our top priority at Influex and Vision Tech Team – and we eventually intend to share our own insights about company culture and more on our upcoming “Influencer Insights” podcast and this blog. Robbe is an inspiration to us and we’re proud to support his work with our digital artistry.