Community Employment Resource Centre

 

Personal Branding:  The Good, The Bad, The Ugly

Personal Branding is a new trend that is quickly developing for job search.  The concept has been around for eons regarding marketing products, but the focus is now switched to marketing ourselves.  Why is branding becoming so popular?  Mainly because the workplace is not what it used to be – 26% of people surveyed are confident in their job security, 54% are currently looking for their next job, and 90% are considering making a career change.  Whether you want to keep your job, rise up in your current environment, find the right fit in your new environment or get new customers for your business, personal branding is an approach worth investigating.  This article identifies:

¨      ¨       The Concept of Personal Branding

¨      ¨       The Benefits of Personal Branding

¨      ¨       The 7 P’s of Personal Branding – identifying specializations

¨      ¨       Developing a Personal Brand Statement

¨      ¨       Who can use Personal Branding

Concept:

Personal Branding is intended as a way of communicating Who You Are, What You Do and How You Add Value in order to differentiate yourself from other job candidates.  It is all about creating a memorable impression of the unique characteristics you possess.  In effect, much as perceptions were created for products, personal branding involves generating precise, meaningful perceptions of you (the product) to the right audience (potential employers).  To succeed, your key traits must be objective, authentic, specific, clear and concise to name a few.

As quoted by Falak Amrani, “There are so many qualified candidates for most positions that, to really get the attention of the hiring manager, you need to stand out.  Thinking of yourself as a brand and promoting yourself accordingly is an effective way to convey value as a potential employee while highlighting what makes you exceptional.”

The ultimate goal with the personal branding is to identify your values, passions, strengths and skills and then seek out potential employers whose philosophy and code of ethics match your assets.  This way your self-promotion will be easily identified as filling a need within the selected organizations.

Benefits:

There are many benefits that are tied into this concept.  Perhaps one of the subtle benefits is the increase in confidence and self-esteem due to awareness of skills, strengths, passions and values.  Other benefits include:

¨            Clarity on who would be interested in your talents

¨            Improved visibility and presence

¨            Individuality

¨           Increased efficiency of the job search – selecting organizations that need what you have – more             direct and specific rather than random and large scale

¨            Helps tie together links of personal history and punch up your key assets into clear, concise bullet           points

The 7 P’s of Personal Branding:

1.     Personal – values and passions – What excites you most in the world?  What angers you most in the World?

2.      Perception – attributes – self-discovery, asking others whose input you value and who will be honest

3.      Potential – skills forgotten from the past

4.      Positioning – specialization, target audience (companies not hiring generalists)

5.      Performance – developing personal brand statement (PBS)

6.    Packaging – presentation (personal appearance, appearance of resume, cover letter, portfolio)

7.      Planning – professional development

Developing a Personal Brand Statement (PBS):

The basics of the personal brand statement is that it should be no more than a single sentence, easily understood by a 12 year old and able to be recited without error or hesitation.  There are four main steps involved in determining your PBS:

1.      Set the scene – develop your context, your vision/purpose

2.      Unearth your brand – know yourself, know your competitors, know your target audience

3.      Express yourself – inspiring, reader oriented, consistent, resonate, large as life

4.     Evaluate and evolve – assess if you are achieving goals, evolve through new services, how you communicate, etc

A personal brand statement is organized into 6 elements:

1.      Field or industry – looking to enter

2.      Target audience – who makes hiring decision at any one company

3.      Brand Personality – top 3 attributes

4.      Brand Insight – where is the need/gap

5.      Brand Position – how are you going to satisfy need

6.      Support – how are you going to back up your credibility

A successful statement needs to pass the 10C test:

¨            Correct – accurate and authentic

¨            Concise – 1 (at most 2) sentences

¨            Clear – what it is, but also what it is not

¨            Consistent – always the same message to all

¨            Constant – it is always visible

¨            Compelling – relevant

¨            Clever – highly unique, intriguing

¨            Connected – networking

¨            Committed – long process, in for the long haul

¨            Current – based in today with room to evolve tomorrow – don’t be stuck in the past

Who:

Up to now most of the people using this style have been corporate employees, professional job seekers, independent service professionals, personal service businesses and value added product sellers.  With the growth of this trend though, the technique can be applied by anyone – career changers, long term unemployed, returnees to work, students, those exploring self-employment and those simply seeking to follow their passions or seeking greater work life balance.  As Tom Peters summarizes:  “We are CEO’s of our own companies:  Me, Inc.  To be in business today, our most important job is to be head marketer of a brand called “You”.”