Marketing a diva: the making of today’s diva
The ‘making of a diva’ first needs you to find your personal brand and that process is not so different to identifying a company brand. Know your audience, understand what it is they want from you and what you can give them. Then you need to be able to articulate how you do what you do, and how that can be differentiated from your competitors.
Here’s your checklist:
Have a focus. What is the main thing you want to be known for and for others to remember about you? Then make this your main focus: your articles, your presentations, your social content - engage in conversations about this and then people will remember what it is you do. (This doesn’t mean you don’t actually do other things but this is how people will remember you. You need to stand out.)
Amplify it. Don’t be too impatient in trying to identify what your version of ‘diva’ looks like. Your personal brand will become clear as you begin to build your reputation with your clients. Listen to what they say about you and amplify that. You are amplifying what you do and how you do it, so you need some experience in how you do it first. Equally, don’t wait too long!
Create your community. This might be different to the clients you are trying to attract but they will be influential in attracting those clients. Know what this community likes to hear from you and do more of it. Congratulate others in your community, engage with their content as you would want them to engage in yours. If you don’t yet know what you want to say to them, experiment with some ideas and monitor the feedback. Be warned though: not all feedback is given online. So ask about it when you see them too.
Look around you. You may have already identified the boffin, celebrity and visionary divas. You may already know which one you might like to become. It’s also likely that there are traits of all three of these divas that you like and you want to inspire you. Notice I say inspire, not copy. It’s become the cliche of recent times but “if you can’t be you”, how will you keep it up? It will be exhausting. And in any case, if your personal brand is really going to be personal to you, you need to bring your experience, your perspective and your curiosity. If it isn’t authentic, you’ll disengage those you are trying to reach.
Be consistent. You want people to talk about you - the word of mouth referral system is still the most powerful - but you want to be able to influence it. Regularly reminding people (your community) that you exist and on ‘your’ topic is crucial. You don’t have to publish content (on social media, on your website, in the press) every week but don’t disappear for too long. I know you want to know “how long is too long” - it depends! If your ‘targets’ prefer bite size snippets of content, then your window of absence is short. If your audience prefers more considered, longer pieces then you have a bit more time but I would recommend never allowing more than a month to pass without having said something.
Do all this and your diva will emerge. You might not have to make a song and dance about it, others will do that for you. But you need to give them something to sing about. Good luck.
