Building your personal brand

Simphiwe Ngema.

I was lucky in that my audience formed over a period of time when I was on local television often, and people were learning my name. As my fame grew, so did my profiles, and I’m lucky that for the most part, my audience is loving, encouraging and positive.

Here are a few tips on improving your following and brand:

1. A brand takes planning

Firstly, take the time to decide what kind of brand you want to become and stick to it. Find your image and the type of work you would like to do and build on that basis. It also helps to work with brands that you believe in and admire.

2. Be authentic

I have always remained 100% authentic to who I am across all of her social media platforms. I’ve shown the good and the bad – and whilst it ultimately is about attracting a following, it’s critical to be yourself at all times.

3. Don’t go quiet

Over the course of my career, I've always kept my followers updated. You need to remain active – your followers come to expect certain patterns in your communication, or at the very least, a certain amount of updates in a week. Decide on what that will be and stick to it.

4. Keep it interesting

This seems like an obvious one – but pay careful attention to what you choose to share, or keep private. You need to have a line defined in your own mind that dictates what you keep private and what you share with your audience. During the Covid-19 lockdown, I went live with publications like Glamour Magazine on Instagram to have a candid chat with their online editor about being a Gold Series brand ambassador, how I keep busy during the lockdown, how I keep fit, happy and helpful.

5. You can’t control everything

You can’t control everything when it comes to social media: you will have fake accounts, you will have a lot of negative comments and a lot of direct messages (DMs) that you won’t always have time to respond to. The key is to stick to what you can control: reply to comments where you can and block unnecessary or nasty responses.

It comes down to having fun and enjoying yourself. Managing your own profile online shouldn’t feel like a task. There aren’t a lot of “ do’s and don’ts” in the industry these days, I think you should always do what you are comfortable with and only publicise what you want the public to see.