7 Benefits of Personal Branding

Corporations out there needs to understand that each and everyone within the business can contribute to the success of there corporate brand and what better way than to allow their staff to build a personal brand inline with the corporate brand. Now what benefits does a personal brand offer?

1) You get to know yourself better.

2) You increase your visibility and presence

3) You increase your chances of compensation

4) It puts YOU in charge of your environment

5) You have continuity

6) You achieve your goals

7) It is fulfilling

Entrepreneurial Branding

Entrepreneurial brand building is an area of study in its infancy. The nature of entrepreneurship which typically implies serious limitations on the availability of resources suggests that entrepreneurs need to take an unconventional approach to brand building.

When an entrepreneur brands his or her product, business or concept, inadvertently the entrepreneur himself often becomes associated with that brand.

Basically the decision is to determine which company relies most on you personally for its brand recognition.
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More on Brand and Authenticity

Quite a discussion is taking place on several blogs on the matter of branding and authenticity.

Starting with William Arruda on his excellent Personal Branding blog:

All successful branding is based in authenticity – that is – what’s true and genuine and unique about you. Brands are uncovered, not fabricated. The myth that branding is about spin or packaging and image management needs to be replaced by the truth that “you can’t be someone you are not.”

More on Bobby Lehew in Your Brand – Authenticity rules:

I think the field has been covered well, but to state (again) the obvious: branding is not about conveying something you are not but about revealing who you are.

Last, but not least on ThinkingSparks, excellent point raised by Pepita:

Authenticity isn’t necessarily good. Nor does it mean good. I think of Al Qaeda, IRA, ETA, the mafia, street gangs etc. They would qualify as an authentic brand

Creating a Personal Brand

Mark Nead in alwayson on [tag]personal branding[/tag]:

As individuals and organizations, we are defined by our values and actions, and it is these values and actions which define our brands, personally and professionally. Fortunately you can’t fake character or values, and technology has become a driving force in demanding transparency and disclosure. Word of mouth marketing has overshadowed and replaced traditional advertising. If you subscribe to and remember one principle of branding, make it this: your brand is not what you say it is. It’s what others say after you’ve left the room.

A strong brand foundation and strategy is essential to the success and effectiveness of businesses as well as individuals. It helps build connections with your audiences and enhances your ability to “own” a category in their minds. This sets the stage for others to become your brand “ambassadors”, which is the most effective means to promote and grow your brand. Nurture the power of referrals with care and respect.


Loyalty, Love and Personal Branding

Excellent article of William Arruda over at MarketingProfs.com:

When building your personal brand, you need to have a sturdy brand foundation of rational brand attributes. Those attributes illustrate your competence and make you credible. Even the most lovable among us won’t get too far without being able to demonstrate results.

But when building your personal brand, emotion is an essential component that will help you create greater loyalty among your various constituencies.

As a “careerist” you can build loyalty beyond reason with your employer, peers, managers, and among all those people who need to know about you so that you can reach your career goals. To do this, you must be keenly aware of your brand attributes, how others perceive you. What is your combination of rational and emotional brand attributes? What makes you lovable?

Here are five tips for inspiring loyalty beyond reason:

  1. Take inventory of your personal brand attributes (rational and emotional).
  2. Get external input on your brand attributes. This will help you validate your self-assessment and provide insights into how you are currently perceived. You can’t change perceptions if you don’t know what they are.
  3. Decide which attributes (that are authentic to you) are relevant and compelling to your target audience and are differentiating from those of your peers.
  4. Live in the inquiry. Ask yourself how you can inject more of these brand attributes into everything you do-every report you author, every email you write, every telephone conversation you have.
  5. Assess. Ask for feedback. Measure results. Are you being perceived more consistently? Are you more fulfilled? Are you more successful? More loved?

Read full article here.

8 Laws of Personal Branding

Big companies understand the importance of brands. Today, in the Age of the Individual, you have to be your own brand. Regardless of age, regardless of position, regardless of the business we happen to be in, all of us need to understand the importance of branding. Here is a list of 8 laws that should help you will create an effective – and lucrative – personal brand:

1. Specialisation: A great personal brand must be precise, concentrated on a single core strength, talent or achievement.

2. Leadership: Endowing a personal brand with authority and credibility demands that the source be perceived as a leader by people in his/her domain or sphere of influence.

3. Personality: A great personal brand must be built on a foundation of the source’s true personality, flaws and all.

4. Distinctiveness: An effective personal brand needs to be expressed in a way that is different from the competition.

5. Visibility: To be successful, a personal brand must be seen over and over again, until it imprints itself on the consciousness of its domain or sphere of influence.

6. Unity: The private person behind a personal brand must adhere to the moral and behavioural code set down by that brand. Private conduct must mirror the public brand.

7. Persistence: Any personal brand takes time to grow, and while you can accelerate the process, you can’t replace it with advertising or public relations.

8. Goodwill: A personal brand will produce better results and endure longer if the person behind it is perceived in a positive way.

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