These 13 Skills Will Improve Your Branding Efforts - Personal Branding Blog - Stand Out In Your Career

These 13 Skills Will Improve Your Branding Efforts - Personal Branding Blog - Stand Out In Your Career What skill could an entrepreneur learn in his or her spare time that can help them improve theirbrandingstrategy or efforts? The following answers are provided by members ofYoung Entrepreneur Council (YEC), an invite-only organization comprised of the worlds most promising young entrepreneurs. In partnership with Citi, YEC recently launchedBusinessCollective, a free virtual mentorship program that helps millions of entrepreneurs start and grow businesses. 1. Improv Brandingis all about presenting yourself in a calm, confident and articulate manner no matter the circumstances. Improv class is a great way a founder can hone the skill in their spare time. Not only does it help you think on your feet, but it can help you grow your public speaking confidence at the same time. Quick thinking and performing on cue is something founders can always keep improving on! Kim Kaupe,ZinePak 2. Basic Principles of Psychology You dont need a degree in psychology, but it helps to know what motivates people. Reading books and articles, watching videos and taking basic classes on subjects such as social psychology, group behavior and motivation helps you understand what people respond to. This overlaps with advertising and copywriting, as the best copywriters have to know something about psychology. Shawn Porat,Scorely 3. Public Speaking Building a brand is creating emotional connection with the customers. Since communication is so important for connecting with the audience, one skill that every entrepreneur should learn is public speaking. Clear and precise communication creates a positive impact on the audience. Your audience remembers you based on how you present yourself and your business to them. Liam Martin,Staff.com 4. Charisma People often think that charisma can’t be learned, but there’s plenty of evidence that charismatic leadership techniques can be learned. John Antonakis, a professor of organizational behavior, is a leader in this field and entrepreneurs will find it rewarding to familiarize themselves with his work. Vik Patel,Future Hosting 5. Content Creation I spend lot of my spare time in creating valuable content: Digitalbrandingis huge these days, and everyone is looking for brands online. By learning what content needs to be created, and how to create and market the content, you can build lot of digital value for your brand. I have increased traffic to our brand by 150%in one yearby writing and promoting new content, so it was very helpful for me. Piyush Jain,SIMpalm 6. SEO Spend time really understanding the value and role of SEO in marketing. Many think they understand it, but in reality, there is so much there to learn. This can be done online and through various courses. Peter Daisyme,Due 7. Copywriting Copywriting â€" the ability to communicate out to an audience clearly and effectively, evoking emotion and telling the stories that matter â€" is essential to improving yourbrandingstrategy. It doesnt matter what youre selling or which brand youre trying to leverage, if you cant talk about it succinctly and in a way that moves people to interest and action, your efforts will be fruitless. Erin Blaskie,L-SPARK 8. Basic Coding Even if you have people coding for you, it never hurts to have skills in this area. Knowing the basics about coding helps you recognize design flaws in websites and gives you insights into solutions. There are many basic coding courses online that can give you a working knowledge of this important discipline. Kalin Kassabov,ProTexting 9. Research Other Brands When you arent working on building your own brand, spend time studying what other successful brands are doing to promote themselves. Check out popular social media accounts that are, or arent, related to your business and brand, and spend time on their websites and blogs. Examine how those strategies are working for them and how they might, in turn, work for you. Kevin Conner,BroadbandSearch 10. Organization Getting things done as quickly as possible, and knowing each and every day what you need to get done can go a long way in improving abrandingstrategy. Andrew Schrage,Money CrashersPersonalFinance 11. Graphic Design Its important to have a consistent brand strategy, and the best way to get your vision across to your team is by creating a brand guide that includes everything from logo, sizing, fonts and brand-specific styles. Graphic design skills will allow you to have a better idea of exactly what you want and how to get there without having to rely on other people to get you there. Jared Brown,Hubstaff Talent 12. Candid Photography Having good candid pictures to help you with your social mediabrandingis an easy skill to develop. Its also really obvious to your followers when you dont know how to do it. The best way to get better is to just force yourself to take a certain amount of pictures daily until you start to develop instincts. Its both easy and necessary. Matt Doyle,Excel Builders 13. Web UX/UI This is a great skill that is rapidly growing in demand. With technology ever changing, brand and design is no longer a flat plateau, but a dynamic landscape.Brandingbecomes more than just what you want the messaging to be, but what kind of interactions and experiences you are capable of creating. Nicole Munoz,Start Ranking Now