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A personal brand is a relationship with an individual who exists separately from the company and is becoming more and more popular. Not only celebrities, politicians, and actors need a personal promotional strategy, but pretty much everyone who wants to be professionally and socially relevant, or even get well married. Unfortunately, not everyone can do its own pitch well which might put some at a disadvantage and make a big difference to quality of lives.
Personal branding is an ongoing process of developing and maintaining a reputation and impression of an individual, group, or organization. A personal image is as complex as a washing powder brand. It requires promotion, PR, logo, business cards and many other tools manifesting the chosen image. The core features of the image depend on personality of the person and will to enhance, enrich or them. The personal brand has some goals to achieve and behaves in very similar way like any other product or service brand.
It can be tough to draw the line between "not enough" and "too much" when it comes to personal branding. We would recommend the following ‘must’:
- Use vivid language. Make Thesaurus.com your best friend.
- Tell a story. Wrap up your purpose and what makes you different into a narrative.
- Make it personal. Put your passion on display.
- Borrow brand value. Have you worked for a company with a strong reputation? Did you attend an illustrious school? Associate yourself with other strong brands to shine up your own.
- Repeat your positioning statement. Research shows that we tend to regard the familiar as good.
- Be consistent. Pick the one or two ideas you're trying to convey about yourself, and reference them on all your social and online profiles.
- Research. You won't know what makes you different if you don't research your space. Do your homework.
- Refer to yourself as a brand. Nothing will make people cringe faster.
- Make your positioning statement a catchphrase. Repetition is a good thing, but too much makes you seem robotic.
- Badmouth competitors. The entire point of a personal brand is to separate yourself from the pack, but you don't have to do it by putting others down. Focus on what you do, not what others don't.
- Talk only about yourself. Express your value in terms of your target audience. Your story should be as much about them as it is about you.
- Change up your positioning statement every week. For your personal brand to become memorable, you have to stick with a single message. Feel free to tweak and iterate, but not so often that you confuse people.
- Steal brand value. If you worked at Apple, you can borrow a bit of Apple's brand luster. But if you have no connection at all with the company, comparing yourself to Steve Jobs won't rub off positively on you -- it'll just look desperate.
We would also recommend some ‘mustn’t’:
- Refer to yourself as a brand. Nothing will make people cringe faster.
- Make your positioning statement a catchphrase. Repetition is a good thing, but too much makes you seem robotic.
- Badmouth competitors. The entire point of a personal brand is to separate yourself from the pack, but you don't have to do it by putting others down. Focus on what you do, not what others don't.
- Talk only about yourself. Express your value in terms of your target audience. Your story should be as much about them as it is about you.
- Change up your positioning statement every week. For your personal brand to become memorable, you have to stick with a single message. Feel free to tweak and iterate, but not so often that you confuse people.
- Steal brand value. If you worked at Apple, you can borrow a bit of Apple's brand luster. But if you have no connection at all with the company, comparing yourself to Steve Jobs won't rub off positively on you -- it'll just look desperate.
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