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Many times we discuss a business or a brand’s image on social media and popular culture, but little times we talk about how people do this.
People have brands too! Having an established personal brand and being able to easily market yourself is a great skill to have both professionally and personally.
You might then think, what is a personal brand and how can I make one for myself?
Having a personalized brand means being consistent, yet genuine, with who you are and how you portray yourself to others in every interaction you have.
It means that your presence and who you are can be noticed by others in your surroundings. Hearing this, it might be easy to say “sign me up, I want one!”, but finding your personal brand is a hard task, some people even spend their whole lives looking for it.
So, in order not to make this into a life-long search, I want to give you some tips on how to find your personal brand and turn it into a lifestyle!
Sometimes, I look at my accomplishments and my skills and I struggle in defining my born skills and abilities. I can’t say “I am a swimmer” or “I can play the guitar”, so I find myself stuck. Those words that define a person and give us the sense of a “brand” can be scary…
When we were little and they asked us “what do you want to be when you grow up?” we were always more lenient to answering one-worded careers like “doctor”, “lawyer”, “dancer”, etc, but never “event producer for sustainable and ethical businesses”. Yeah, no, that was too much of a mouthful for a little girl..
My point is that there are many other qualities and abilities that can define you and create your brand, than the things you can physically do. For example, I am a very good communicator and I have a way with languages (I speak 5), so, in my interactions, I tend to use these 2 main things of my abilities to engage with others. I might give off to others the sensation that they can talk to me and/or that they can rely on me for language learning, which is my secret intention in creating my brand. When I see this perspective of myself from others I realize that I am succeeding in branding myself.
Try to think of those things when you interact with others and even more when you interact on social media, because you might be starting to create your brand if you do it right…
Personal branding is much more than saying I can do x or y, it is about being yourself, on telling a story, and on living your brand.
By being yourself, I mean that you have to share what you got, not what you don’t; life will be much easier if you just share your own brand, because everyone else has their a different brand. This might be about being proud and open with your personality traits or about talking about things you enjoy or are able to do, the options are endless, as long as they are yours…
Telling a story with your brand is an important aspect of why to have a brand at all. Like any business’s brand, there is a message that is sent to an audience with how the brand communicates and the kind of content shared. Make sure that the way you are branding yourself can be told by someone else!
Lastly, my most important point is to live the brand you share, if you are branding yourself to be “that guy on twitter that shares pictures of bulldogs dressed as Michael Jackson” then live that life! Make sure people know how much you love being that guy, what inspired you, why bulldogs, why Michael Jackson, show them that this is your lifestyle!
At the end, you are telling the story of your life and you have to be the first person that wants to live it!
My point with all this is that a personal brand can get you many places and if you allow yourself to introspection, then “promoting” yourself as a brand is just you being you and other people noticing it.
No better story to tell that yours kids!
-Coti
