Building your Brand, Business & Bottom Line!
Posts tagged personal branding
What is Personal Branding?
01163 days
Hi all!
Often times when I teach others personal branding and I ask what personal branding is exactly, I am met with blank faces or educated guesses. Which is okay because it affords me opportunities to share a little insight.
I found long explanations as to what it is and in fact here is one definition that I found;
Definition
Personal branding describes the process by which individuals and entrepreneurs differentiate themselves and stand out from a crowd by identifying and articulating their unique value proposition, whether professional or personal, and then leveraging it across platforms with a consistent message and image to achieve a specific goal. In this way, individuals can enhance their recognition as experts in their field, establish reputation and credibility, advance their careers, and build self-confidence.
The term personal brand is believed to have first appeared in the August 1997 issue of Fast Company Magazine, in an article by management guru and author Tom Peters, who wrote, “We are CEOs of our own companies: Me Inc. To be in business today, our most important job is to be head marketer for the brand called You.”
While I like this definition, allow me to simplify more.
Personal branding is the process of taking your name and face and adding value to it. It is a promise of value and you determine that value.
But the key to remember here is “process”. Personal branding is indeed a process and your brand will not be built overnight.
I had a guy call me up one day and asked me about personal branding. After I explained it to him, he ask if it would save his job which he could lose in the next 30 days. I told him that personal branding doesn’t quite work that way.
The process works more like a crockpot rather than a microwave. Remember, the more time you put into building your strong magnetic personal brand the better the staying power is of your branding.
Until next time….You are the BRAND!
Robert E Reed
The Value of your Brand by Jean Klett
01177 days
I ran across a neat article discussing the basics in personal branding. It really simplifies the process for the everyday person, enjoy!;
Two common buzzwords in marketing and advertising today are the words brand and branding. People banter these words around in many different ways with many different meanings. A definition of a brand that seems to work well, is “a customer’s expectation of consistent value.” Oftentimes people think of a brand in terms of a logo. A logo is a mark, a graphic element, that supports and helps to identify a brand, but it is not the brand itself.
For all intents and purposes your brand is your reputation. Regardless of what you say or write about your personal brand, your brand is what it is based on who you are, how you do business, and how you provide value. If you do not try to provide value, regardless of what your materials say about your brand, they are untrue. It does not take long for customers to realize that a brand promotion is false if they are not receiving value from you.
For that reason, the first step in building your brand is to ensure that in all of your business dealings you provide massive and exceptional value beyond the expectations of your customers. Providing this value over time will create a reputation for value and for excellence, and your reputation will spread. This becomes the foundation and the embodiment of your personal brand.
The first step in creating your personal brand is to identify how you provide value to your clients and customers. Sometimes it helps to talk to them and find out how they perceive you, and why they do business with you. Once you understand the value relationship that you provide, you can then begin to define messages that describe that relationship. This messaging effectively becomes your brand. Without defining an effective and consistent brand message, the process of branding is virtually impossible.
Once you have your brand messaging in place, the key is to maintain it in a consistent format for all of your materials and promotional efforts. Your website or blog, press releases, articles that you write and anything else that you use to promote your brand identity in the marketplace must be meticulously consistent, focusing on the same brand message. If you fail to do this, or if your message is ambiguous, people will not understand your brand and will not be able respond to it. The ultimate objective of personal branding is to build brand loyalty so that your customers keep coming back to you.
Jean Klett is a business coach and mentor based out of Bordeaux, France, that assists serious entrepreneurs in building a profitable online business with multiple incomes streams.
12 Principles Of Personal Branding
01206 days
Check out this SlideShare Presentation:
12 Principles Of Personal Branding
View more presentations from Robert Reed.
