Personal Image Vs Personal Brand - How to launch You Brand,Inc

 

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.

 

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.

 

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 ?