what I’m reading: influencer: building your personal brand in the age of social media by brittany hennessy.

I am not an influencer. I don’t have any current plans to become an influencer and I’m not on a mission to become an influencer. But I picked this book up from the library because I was curious as to what it takes to become an influencer.

Brittany Hennessy has written a book that details how to become an influencer, be it on Instagram, YouTube, blogging, Facebook. She takes you one step at a time and shows you how to build your brand and make it profitable.

The book details a lot of good ideas and things to do. Hennessy provides examples and scripts to use when reaching out trying to connect with people – I love scripts because they tell you exactly what to say and then you can just tweak it a little to make it sound like you. The author basically goes step by step of how to become an influencer once you have a following. The book is easy to read and the steps are easy to follow.

Brittany Hennessy, an influencer herself and the Director of Influencer Talent at Hearst Digital Media, knows what she’s talking about. It was obvious that a lot of research and interviewing went into this book. There’s a wide range of influencers offering advice – I found the stories from real people that discussed how they built their brands to be the most interesting parts of the book.

Most of the book’s attention does go towards posting on Instagram and building a following on that platform, but I think that is just because it’s what is hot right now. I’m sure if this book was written 10 years ago the main focus would have been on blogging. Who knows what will be relevant in another 10 years?

While Hennessy offers practical tips, most were geared towards people who already had tens of thousands of followers and are looking to make the transition to a paid influencer. Even though it was not necessarily applicable to me, I still learned a few things that I will be using to spruce up my blog and maybe gain a few new Instagram followers.

It’s evident that Brittany Hennessy knows her stuff so I would pick up this book if you are looking to become an influencer.