Has your personal brand been created by accident? William has blogged here before about the importance of social consistency when seeking to influence. He makes some good points about the perils of inconsistency online. This made me think about personal brand image and how it is more important than ever to manage it.
We know that the impression given by an individual or company is wider than their physical appearance, shop front and portfolio. In the societal web, online impressions are given every time a company or individual is mentioned; they are also highly visible and long lasting – this might be your website, blog, comments posted on forums, Facebook pages, Tweets, LinkedIn profile and so on.
Your personal ‘brand’, the image you portray, is being created whether you deliberately manage it or not.
Consistency means that those who run across you know what to expect when they meet you. Consistency means that our likely response can be anticipated, consistency means that we influence others’ behaviour as they think through the issues that affect both of us.
The benefits of brand management include increasing your product’s perceived value to your customer, and in this case the product is you. By presenting a consistent image to your target audience, you facilitate a clear understanding of who you are and what you are about. This is as important for an individual trying to market themselves, as an expert in their field or as a credible candidate for a job, as it is for an established brand. Don’t leave your personal brand to chance.
Google yourself
Development of your brand image is a journey which starts with understanding what it is today. I would recommend starting with a Google search – are you visible at all? If you are, what impression is being created and is this the image you want to present? How do you come across in forums and in your web comments? How are others talking about you? Do these visual elements portray your values and create the image you would like?
If you have a website it might be a good idea to look again and think specifically about the tone of your content – is it positive or negative? Does it present your values? A good tool that gives a quick impression is a word cloud. This turns any piece of text into a visual image of keywords with more frequently used words appearing in a larger size. These free tools are widely available on the web, including at www.wordle.net, www.tagcrowd.com, www.worditout.com. Try inputting your website URL to any of these sites and see what your word cloud tells you – as a visual representation of your website does it give the impression you would like?
The next step is to think about how you want to be seen. Can you describe who you are? What you’re good at? What you’re passionate about? The trick to achieving consistency is to be honest, appropriately of course.
Get Busy
How and where you present this information will depend on who your target audience is. You may want to promote yourself as an expert, or to make yourself visible to prospective employers or clients. Consider where you want to be visible.
Write your personal profile – tell others who you are and what you have achieved. Don’t assume they already know. By the way this is not just your title and company name!
This is sometimes referred to as the elevator statement – imagine you find yourself in the lift with the one person you need to impress, you have the length of the journey to catch their attention, what would you say? You should end up with a short, concise statement containing relevant, specific and unique things about you. Many of you will already have a profile
There are a lot of places to find help with this online, not least Dan Schwabel’s Personal Branding blog.
Finally you need to make sure that your new profile is reflected online whether in business networking sites, social networking sites, forum comments and so on, so that in combination they present a clear, consistent picture of you.
Get some pictures taken and attach your image to your online profiles. This is a good way of bringing your online personal profiles to life.
Share your expertise and opinions by blogging or tweeting about things of interest to you – in other words, start conversations and get yourself known.
And finally…
I’ve said it before but it’s worth saying it again – be consistent!
