Build Your Brand

Building a strong personal brand is one of the most important things you can do when growing a business or establishing yourself in your chosen industry. A personal brand allows you to market the qualities you want and minimize the ones that are less important so potential customers, partners and employers are left with a strong concept of who you are and what you have to contribute.

There are a number of different ways to approach the task of building a personal brand, especially in the modern digital age that provides so many outlets for getting your name out there. To begin, start thinking of yourself as a brand. Decide what ideas and concepts you want people to associate with your name. Once you have a solid concept in mind, you can begin to create a strategy for building a brand.

Next, familiarize yourself with your online presence. This is where most people are going to look first when they want more information on you, so it's important for your online activity to correspond with your personal brand as much as possible. Audit your Facebook, Twitter and other social media accounts to make sure that they are telling the story you want them to tell. You can always make a second private account if you want a platform where you can converse more freely with family and close friends. Additionally, try searching your name in a search engine and make an effort to clear out any unwanted results. Search for your name regularly so you can continue the cultivation process.

Once the basic idea for your brand is in place, make sure you give people a reason to care about it as well as a desire to find out more. Post social media content regularly, but make sure that everything you post aligns with the story you want to tell about yourself. Try to create new content whenever possible, but reposting interesting or funny content is also fine. Just make sure that whatever you repost is properly credited and in line with your brand.

Finally, don't hesitate to reinvent or evolve your personal brand. If something you're doing isn't working, find a way to change it or a new way to convey the same idea. Introduce new strengths and interests as you go to create a narrative. Many of the most successful long term personal brands are those that have changed quite a bit over the years.

Building a brand is increasingly important in a world where practically everyone leaves behind a digital footprint. Considering the inevitably of interested parties being able to learn about you by searching online, it is essential to leverage that information into a viable, profitable personal brand.

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