Personal Branding For Dummies
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How do you decide whether a blog is for you, and for your personal brand? Here’s a list of questions to ask yourself before building a blog:

  • What are your goals on the web?

  • Can blogging help you achieve your goals?

  • Is it important for you to be perceived as very knowledgeable in your industry, niche, or job? If the answer is yes and you work for someone else, is it okay with your employer that you have your own blog?

  • Who is your target audience?

  • Can you reach your target audience on the web? If the answer is yes, will your target audience read a blog?

  • Do you like to write?

  • Do you have time to post to your blog? If not, can you build a cadre of guest bloggers to help lessen your writing load?

Blogging is a great way to stand out on the web and build your personal brand. To date, more than 50 million WordPress sites exist on the web. (WordPress is the most popular blog content-management system on the web.) While not all these sites may have active blogs, clearly the blogging world is a big one, which means getting noticed online is tough.

If you’re running a business, having fresh content on your site frequently can help your site stay up in the Google rankings. One of the few places it makes sense to update content frequently is in the blog section. Also, providing valuable, informative content on your site can help you build a loyal following on the web, which can translate into customers.

If you’re part of a larger organization or company and want to start building your brand online, blogging can be a way for you to do so. You can write about your industry or your expertise. If you know you want to transition into a different industry or different type of job, you can blog about those topics as well.

A blog is one of the very few slices of real estate on the web that allows you to author your own content and, therefore, control it. It’s a place for you to share your knowledge, resources, and value. It’s a space where you can communicate your personality, strengths, skills, and passions.

If you can blog under your vanity name (such as rachelgogos.com), you achieve a higher-ranking Google result if someone searches your name. (Keep in mind that almost 90 percent of recruiting and employment executives Google people before meeting them.)

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