2025 JANUARY
BOOK REPORT
INFLUENCER: BUILDING YOUR PERSONAL BRAND
IN THE AGE OF SOCIAL MEDIA
Reported by: Andrew Sia
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From the Desk of the Publisher
An influencer is someone who can motivate others to change, who can change people’s behavior, and who can make things happen.
As a publisher of a journal since April 2014, I have published articles to inspire readers and hopefully that they can take the ideas forward. In another word, it is a kind of influence that I have tried to bring to the people. Previously I had the chance of traveling, and I kept my annual visit to Hong Kong, once a year, to meet with the schools and the trade. In those meetings and conferences, I was able to share my ideas and hear back from the industry which was most valuable.
After the COVID pandemic, I was grounded for two years, and eventually I lost the interest of traveling and lost the chance for the interaction.
I like the idea to change the journal into a blog to share my ideas to a bigger group out there. Since then, I was looking for books to introduce the role of the influencer, and hopefully that I can learn the skill in expanding my contacts.
This piece can be useful for those who wants to do the same and the covers from end-to-end and operate it like a business. I would probably take a smaller approach and try to fit the journal into the blog for reaching a bigger audience out there. I believe that “different strokes for different folks” and let’s do things that we can feel comfortable.
Influencer: Building Your Personal Brand In The Age Of Social Media
The Writer – Brittany Hennessy
Available From Amazon
Softcover $33.79
Kindle $9.99
Introducing the Influencer
The book is essentially a practical guide to the influencer economy. As we know that influencer is an ordinary person like you and me trying to build a brand and make money on social media.
The writer, Brittany Hennessy, works as a Senior Director of Influencer Strategy at Hearst Magazines. She writes from the perspective of someone who had hired and managed influencers.
The book is about how to build an audience
How to create an engaging content
Turn the social media into a business
Show how influencers work with brands
How to price sponsored posts
Rules and regulations to observe
Normally, we envisioned influencers are just posting pictures in the social media, but they are also building a brand identity. The successful influencers are counted by their follower numbers. They make money through sponsored posts, affiliated links, brand partnerships, and events and collaborations.
This book is more practical and industry focused. You have to choose what suits you. It is suggesting you try to stay away from deep academic theory, philosophical, and social critique. You have to understand your audience first as they are not interested to drag on for too long.
Your market is working with brands and your audiences are individuals, unlike the traditional media. Everything is “instant”, and it is a new generation out there.
To become a good and successful influencer, you have to be good in authentic storytelling. It is a pop culture that you are tackling. I tried to read through the book and came up with the following that I can fit into the role that I would try to pursue.
Influencers can be broken out into two categories: content creators and lifecasters. Content creators are people who creating blogs, vlogs, and Instagram photos. Lifecasters are people who live their life AND people following them.
The book introduces us to ten types of influencers out from the two categories we mentioned.
Content creators fall into the following types:
Blogger – who has a blog and updates on regular basis through blog posts in Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, and Instagram.
Vlogger – who has a YouTube channel where videos are posted.
Expert – who is specialized in particular industry, most common in fitness, and beauty. This can be a blogger or a vlogger.
Animals, Toddlers, In-animated Objects, and Memes – who is using a smartphone to create witty contents among people.
Lifecasters fall into the next six types:
Special Talent – who is a chef, dancer, comedian, and showing their daily work.
Entrepreneur – who is in business and gives you the business experience in products, services, and meetings.
High-End Model – who is showing you the gorgeous and beauty and makes you follow him/her.
Celebrity – who can be a musician, actress, athlete, or a combination. It can be someone who is world famous.
Notable – who is a businessperson, politician, or activist.
Real People – who doesn’t fit into any other category on this list, nevertheless, they are just posting.
To become an influencer, it adds value to your career, it promotes your company, and it helps you to make money.
Create the Feed
First of all, type in your full name in Google.com and look at the search result. An update would be helpful as you may set yourself for your next journey. So far, I have only set up myself in the LinkedIn profile, and nothing from YouTube and Instagram.
On the video tab, I have found a video titled “Hong Kong Intimate Apparel Specialism” which I made ten years ago.
Going forward, I realized that I have to start to create.
I am also aware that there are many names under “Andrew Sia” out there. I may have to separate from them by adding the middle name, such as adding “Frank” as the second name for instance.
I come to notice that creating a “blog” is important for any aspiring influencers, and I am heading to set up a blog now.
Buy your domain – It suggests buying the domain name through GoDaddy.com which is charging $4.99 only. Through the domain name, all the others, like the website, email, security, and hosting can come along.
At this moment, I have two names to choose from:
Beacon Forum
The Wellbeing Forum
Set up the hosting provider – I can choose from the following:
HostPapa @$2.95 per month
Bluehost.com @$1.99 per month
Substack is free to use
Install WordPress as the backend of the host – and focus on writing
Install a theme – It is for increasing the flow of the blog and can use whatwpthemeisthat.com for idea.
YouTube Videos
Vlogging to me is a completely different world. I won’t rule it out completely. Every now and then I’ll post something on the YouTube with some very valid subjects.
I am not used to post anything of the Instagram although I have noticed that the youngsters have moved away from Facebook to Instagram, Pinterest, and even Snapchat. It needs pictures.
Grow the Audience
This is the daunting part of the whole thing.
It will be important to know how many friends we have made through the different social media’s platforms — Facebook, LinkedIn, and Pinterest.
We have to learn how to use hashtags to draw the followers’ attention. This can be an important tool to draw their attention.
Comments from the Community
Comments are the lifeblood of the creator, and we should get the audience into the habit of commenting. To create questions at the end of each post is perhaps the way to draw them to comment.
Our interaction is also important.
Conclusion
My writeup comes to an end at this point. The author, Brittany Hennessy continued with the branding, monetizing, and even including the setting up of the contract and assign the agent. She is taking this forward as a serious business for every influencer-wanna-be.
She is showing so many cases for in-depth study which can also be very useful to the ones who want to have a role in this business. I must comment that it is the book very well written and has made it so useful.
But for someone like me, I want to take the matter forward at my own pace. And I’ll use those points that I have highlighted in this report as my guidelines. Afterall, the journal has been meant as a tool for the people from our industry and I would like to develop this platform for the use of the industry for interaction.
I hope to see you on my blog one day.