Telling your story

A four-part framework for building your personal brand for real estate marketing.

What’s a personal brand? Why do you need one? In a nutshell, personal branding is a marketing strategy to help you stand out. People “buy” people before anything else. Personal branding is an opportunity to show your prospects and customers exactly who you are and why you’re different. It’s the thread for telling your unique story. The cement for building trust. The starter fluid to ignite all your marketing efforts. End of year is the perfect time to jumpstart this process for 2023.

Even if you feel that you already have a solid and consistent personal brand, this four-part framework can help you do a gut check and refine your positioning. At the end of the process, you’ll have a clear path to your personal branding.

Ready? You can print out this blog and take notes, or jot down your thoughts somewhere as you explore these four parts:

• Professional Personality: What are you like, professionally?
• Extra-curricular interests: Who are you, personally?
• Giving Back: What have you done for others?
• Local Expertise: What do you know about the area?

Professional Personality: What are you like, professionally? This may feel like a big question without a simple answer, so let’s start with a word bank. Which of these adjectives would you check off to describe your professional work style?

• Caring
• Competitive
• Confident
• Creative
• Detail-oriented
• Flexible
• Friendly
• Honest
• Knowledgeable
• Likeable
• Motivated
• Organized
• Passionate
• Personable
• Persuasive
• Smart
• Successful
• Tenacious
• Thorough
• Trustworthy
• Understanding
• Well-known
• Other (write them down)

Once you’ve gathered your list of adjectives, start pulling the words together in a personal statement. Think elevator pitch. Prioritize which words you feel represent you best.

Example:

Hello, my name is [Jane Smith] and I’m a [knowledgeable] and [successful] real estate broker in your area for the last [5 years]. My many clients will tell you that I’m [passionate] and [honest] and most importantly [trustworthy]. What also makes me stand out is that I’m [caring].

Next, ponder what you want to communicate about yourself on a more personal level, such as what you like to do in your downtime. We can shift from adjectives that describe your work to nouns that describe your extra curricular interests.

Extra-curricular interests: Who are you, personally? Which of these nouns would you check off to describe your personal interests?

• Artist
• Baker
• Book reader
• Card player
• Coffee lover
• Designer
• Dog lover
• Fashionista
• Fishing fan
• Foodie
• Gardener
• Hiker
• Knitter
• Movie buff
• Music lover
• Musician
• Nature lover
• Parent/grandparent
• Runner
• Scrapbooker
• Sports fan
• Tea drinker
• Traveler
• Walker
• Writer
• Yogi
• Other (write them down)

Now, take your professional attributes from your Professional Personality and add your personal interests from your Extra-curricular interests to start rounding out a bio that’s unique to you. Be specific when you can!

Example:

Hello, my name is [Jane Smith] and I’m a [knowledgeable] and [successful] real estate broker in your area for the last [5 years]. My many clients will tell you that I’m [passionate] and [honest] and most importantly [trustworthy]. What also makes me stand out is that I’m [caring]. In addition to my work in real estate, I’m also a [dog lover] and a [runner], so be sure to [look for me on the local trails running with my new puppy, Henry]! 

With these professional and personal attributes working side by side you can now dive deeper into your storytelling through ways you Give Back and your unique Local Expertise.

Give Back: What have you done for others? There are surely countless ways, both big and small, when you have helped others. Take a moment to think about some of the moments you’re most proud of. Use these prompts to recall personal details:

1. Think of a family you worked with in the past. How did you help in changing their lives?
2. Think about your team. What’s an example of how you’ve paid it forward to another broker or agent?
3. Think about your community. What contributions have you made and how did they impact others?

Local Expertise: What do you know about the area? If you grew up in the town where most of your sales occur, let your prospects know. Give details: how long have you lived there? Which schools did you attend? What do you like best about the area and why? You can sprinkle in interesting facts to position yourself as a local expert with an authentic point of view.

Whatever comes to mind, the content from Give Back and Local Expertise are the kernels of your storytelling, which is a great technique for building your personal brand. Remember, people “buy” people before anything else and an effective way to “sell” yourself is through storytelling.

Now that you’ve explored the four-part framework for building your personal brand, let’s review some helpful tips and best practices for pulling it all together in a practical way.

• Hire a professional photographer. This will ensure that your headshots and images visually capture your personal brand. Give thought to the colors and styles you wear, such as clothing that won’t date the season. Your background can also represent your brand, so be sure to think about that too.
• Decide how you want to position yourself. Is there a specific audience you’d like to target? Do you speak a second language? Do you have relocation expertise, which might be a plus to military families? The answers to these questions can help you find an angle for your positioning and to decide where to market yourself.
• Focus on a personal detail. For example, what’s your favorite color, why is it your favorite color, and how do you envision yourself making it part of your brand? The sunny Weichert yellow has been our signature color for decades. Yes, it’s an eye-catching color, but it also represents what our founder, Jim Weichert, wanted to convey to his customers — happiness, friendliness, enthusiasm, positivity. All the things we stand for.
• Monitor your online reputation. Regularly Google your own name. If a search with your name on the first page contains negative information, you’ll want to take action to address the issue as soon as possible.
• Optimize your social media presence. Go for frequency and consistency. Leverage the personal brand work you’ve done and the photography you’ve procured to create consistency across all social media channels.

Weichert values the power of personal branding. We provide every affiliated brokerage with all the tools needed to help their agents develop their very own unique personal branding and marketing templates designed to leverage it. They are able to build their personal brand within the framework of your brokerage and under the umbrella of a powerhouse brand that people know and trust. It’s the best of all worlds.

Let us help you cultivate your agents’ personal brands to help them stand out from the competition.