Everyone of
us at any time in our busy day to
day schedule get in touch ,might be using now or are enticed by the brands captivating our
senses and imagination ranging frm simple cereal brand Kellogs served on our
breakfast tables to the racy luxury brands like Gucci ,DKNY ,BMW
,Harley-Davidson etc ruling our minds . But what about ourselves getting
branded and recognized in the Global society we are interwined now.
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Here does the concept of Personal Branding comes
into play. Personal branding is
basically the way you market yourself to the world. Your personal brand is what
other people think of you. In some ways it’s outside your control, but you
obviously have some influence over it.
It is unavoidable and
can be as simple having a conversation with a friend or family member ,typing
an email ,the way you dress and talk all contributes to your personal
brand,social media quotient etc.It is the projection of your personality and
behaviour towards the milieu you live in ,often described as the summation of all the associations about you that
are stored in people’s minds.
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So ,it becomes
inevitable to groom and nurture yourself as a brand with a view to have a happy
and successful life both in terms of relationships and professional aspirations
.Basically ,it all zeroes down to simple 3 steps which needs to be planned
& implemented in an assiduous manner
1.
Discover
your Brand
Most of us commit the mistake of branding oneself
for the sake of doing it without identifying our passions and interests in
life.We all need to invest time in researching and understanding our
capabilities and interests in life.
Brand Discovery is all about figuring out what we
want to do in life ,setting goals ,writing down a mission ,vision and personal
brand statement with a view to sustain and promote it over time.
2.
Create
your Brand
·
Treat your Personal Brand as an
investment
The
way we brand ourselves (Personal Brand ) has the potential to last longer than
our own lifetime.Eg – Co-founder of Apple Inc (pinnacle of American Tech & Entrepreneur
story ) Steve Jobs will be remembered for many generations not only for creating iconic brands like Apple ,Pixar he created but also to the astounding success he achieved throughout his life facing
innumerable challenges and pitfalls .
·
Set Goals for your public image
–
Depending
on your personality and ambitions in life ,we can define and frame goals by :
1) How
we want our potential customers/client to think of us .
2) How
will we be publically branding ourself
·
What you are all about.
·
Expertise/Circle of Competence.
·
Style statement.
·
Keep ur brand fresh and personally
ubiquitous without overstreching yourself.
·
Continously learn and update your
knowledge with the changing environment around you .Adapatablity and agile
response is the key factor here.
·
Don’t
follow any theory/person/institutions values blindly because with time
only few of them survive in the long run.Most of the brands infront of us are
an infatuation and ephemeral struggling
with the sole objective of “Survival of
the fittest “.
·
Make your target audience interactive
with the networking capabilities and personal brand quotient you build with
time.
3)
Promote
your Brand
This
is the final and the most decisive step in sustaining your brand which needs utmost priority. The conventional
technique used to be meetings ,group discussions ,letters and word of mouth
campaigns. But ,with the rapid changes in technology ,digitization and socially conscious branding pervasive in
our society ,promoting our brand through social brands has gained enormous
traction and relevance now.
·
Tradeoff b/w Personal
and Professional brand – You can position urselfs based on
your target audience and strategies to sustain
its brand equity over time.
·
Run a blog /website which defines U
– First impressions and launching a blog/website is of paramount importance
which helps in building and retaining your audience /customer over time.The
level of success you achieve here will be reflected up in Google search
rankings by the blog /website name you assign.
·
Resume/Cover letter/Documents
-It needs to be prepared in line with the
professional aspirations in a succinct and brevise manner and upload it on viable social and
professional medias to ultimately leverage the professional opportunities we
seek .
·
Business Card-
It doesn’t matter whether we are students ,working part-time or Consultant of a
renowned organization ,the thumb rule here is to make a card with our
picture(not mandatory ),personal brand statement and preferred contact
information and corporate logo if necessary.
·
Wardrobe-
Your personal style is as important as the branding we do on ourself. Select and refine your dressing style statement
depending on the people with which you socialize or have a binding
relationship.
·
Facebook Profile
– It is the most ubiquitous and powerful social media to brand yourself with
more than 1 billion Fb accounts active now world over. The catch here is to
entice your audience with Fb statuses ,pictures and other social media integrations like youtube,
twitter etc which appeals to the gamut
of audience you are positioning yourself and expanding their horizon. Most of
us fail in capitalizing this opportunity by restricting and narrowing our
interests we share and discuss on this platform ,often driven to prove ourself
more Cool and Smart .Your brand equity ultimately wanes interest with time and
gets secluded to a limited people in your friend list.
·
Twitter profile –
The connect here with the audience is different as it entirely depends on the
swiftness and brevity with which we interact here. You need to have a fitting
personality picture ,distinct background and a catchy description of oneself.
·
Portfolio –
It mainly serves as a platform to convince and showcase the past
accomplishments and upcoming projects we are involved now.We can use CD ,web(Video
Resume,online portals) or print portfolio.
So its ur take whether U need to brand urself now. I care.What about
U ?
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