Creating Your Personal Brand

Developing your personal brand is a topic that has navigated its way in Public Relations Society of America (PRSA) and International Association Business Communicator(IABC) chapter meetings. In a recent article, posted by PRSA your brand is how you appear to the world. This seems easy enough to understand, yet when we attempt to build our brands we are lost. I assume, it is because we haven’t found what we are passionate about and do not have knowledge of the target market.

While attending the April IABC meeting, guest speaker Matt Clayman, Director of Client Partnerships at Innovation Protocol stated , “a personal brand needs to be able to have legs and speak to a specific market.”

In my observations on twitter feeds, I began to notice that the industry thought leaders had done a great job of branding themselves. Each of the people who had success, took a topic and commented on posts, engaged in twitter feeds and curated analysis and opinions of their own. For example, @angelgonzlz, he is a fashionista and you feel that brand in everything he posts.

Angel Gonzales, iss a Hollywood stylist/fashionista. His focus on posts and engagement have to do with style and fashion. Frequently he will comment on how celebrities are dressed or what makes for a great on camera look. He takes it a step further and documents his work life as he styles celebrities and news anchors. This strategy has created a brand for himself.

The idea is to take what you love, are good at and develop a brand around it. The brand doesn’t have to be your employers brand, its all about you. If you love technology, then become that tech expert who is commenting about tech devices and what is hot in trends. In the process, according to Lauren Marinigh you will have social consistency and will be looked and it will help you become an expert.

Personally, I think this is the ticket to ensuring you stay relevant and marketable in your career. If you know your category well, and can engage an audience any company would be fortune to employee you. Here is a helpful worksheet to guide you along. Those of you who remember completing the Galup strengths and weakness, and the CISCO personality test can use those attributes to guide your branding process. Not a bad summer project if you ask me.

As the school year ends, let’s all take some time and do our own homework on how to develop your personal brand? Mine would be all about travel, destinations, and hotels—what would yours be? I would love to see what type of experts we have at here at USC.

Fight On!