Why You Need A Personal Branding Strategy

Personal branding is the process of consciously differentiating oneself from the lot and communicating this image to all after an exercise of personal discovery.

Irrespective of who we are or our station in life, we all are individual brands. Like Nelson Mandela, William Shakespeare or Rowan Sebastian Atkinson (Aka Mr. Bean), we can become good brands, bad brands or unnoticeable brands depending on what choices we make.   For the most part, many personal brands will remain dormant unless developed.

In order to achieve a great brand in one’s lifetime and beyond, a well-structured branding strategy can be quite useful. The following are some of the reasons why you will require a personal branding strategy.

1)      Setting yourself apart: The main purpose of a branding strategy is to differentiate oneself from the rest: In today’s ultra-competitive market for business and personal services, it has become even more important to stand out from the crowd.

2)      Communicate your brand and its credibility: A personal Branding Strategy aids in communicating your brand. This builds credibility for your brand and draws people to your course.

3)      Create Brand loyalty: Loyalty to your brand is also built and sustained through a personal branding strategy.

4)      Take control of the way people perceive you: Whether you make a conscious effort at personal branding or not, people are branding you anyway. Instead of leaving such an important task to others, why not take charge of that yourself since you know your brand best.

5)      Attract the right people to your course: A personal branding strategy will lead you to attract the people you need to help you reach your goals. You attract people to your brand by creating an emotional connection to your brand.

6)      Helps to maintain focus: It is easy to lose focus on the things that matter most when you don’t have a personal branding strategy. A strategy lets you know what is important to you and what is not. This way, you don’t spend resources on things which don’t matter.

7)      Personal development: Developing your talents and acquiring new skills to achieve one’s goals is facilitated by a personal branding strategy.

How To Develop A Personal Branding Strategy

Introspection: Developing a Personal Branding strategy starts with introspection. The following are some questions to ask of yourself as part of the introspection process. 

1)      Who am I?

Here, you ask yourself questions as to whether you are an introvert or extrovert. How do you react to situations? What are your temperaments? These questions help you know who you are. Knowledge of self helps you to stand out.

2)      What are your core values?

Do you value honesty, integrity justice or otherwise. Which values keep you going and which values will you never give up on no matter what. These values may be the driving force for your branding strategy.

3)      What distinguishes you from the rest?

Is it your writing style, the way you speak or your personality? Your people skills could be what distinguishes you from others. Since branding is about standing out you need to find out what makes you special and leverage it to the advantage of your brand.

4)      What are my passions, likes and dislikes?

What sets you on fire? Are you passionate about customer service, politics or human rights. Only when your passions are clear to you can you develop an appropriate personal branding strategy. It is easier to brand around your passions otherwise the branding process will only be a chore.

 

5)      What are my talents?

You may be naturally endowed or blessed with oratory, event management or interior decor skills. These skills when honed will help distinguish you from other people.

6)      What are my dreams and achievements?

Your dreams and achievements may be in academia, business or motivational speaking. These achievements and dreams help in building a robust brand for yourself.

7)      What are my strengths and weaknesses?

Apart from knowing what your strengths are you should also know your pitfalls. This will enable you to avoid them or know how to navigate them to avoid any damage to your brand. This is necessary because a brand once broken is difficult to rebuild.

The answers you give to the above questions will inform your positioning strategy.

Personal Positioning and Packaging

This is where you figure out how you want to be viewed by others or how you want to be perceived. For an artist, having a unique haircut may cut it for you. If you want to be a business leader on the other hand, you may want to wear an executive look. There is always the temptation to adopt a system that has worked for someone else like a mentor. You don’t to do that; build your own system that works best for you. Packaging is paramount here. The following are some questions to keep in mind.

1)      How do I stand out?

You have to figure out a way to position and package yourself in an outstanding way. You may decide to adopt a particular way of dressing or a particular hairstyle. The name Larry king evokes images or suspenders. Singer Will-i-am of the Black eyed peas also wears a unique hairstyle. Even the way his name is written is unique and distinguishes Will-i-am from others.

2)      What is the most effective way to portray myself?

People will always judge you by the way you portray yourself. The way you present yourself should be appropriate to your brand. Imagine talk show host Larry King wearing Will-i-am’s hairstyle. Chances are that his audience may perceive him as an entertainer rather than a journalist. 

 3)      What do I need to say?

To communicate your brand to your audience you will need to speak at some point.    To do so, you need to consider what you need to say and be mindful of what you ought not say. The language and tone are also very important.

4)      What opportunities are available to my brand?

There may be already existing opportunities for your brand, and in other cases you will have to create your own opportunities. The availability of opportunities or otherwise will determine the way you proceed with your branding strategy.

The responses to these and many other questions should guide you in positioning and packaging your brand.

Executing Your Personal Branding Strategy

Execution is the concretization all the plans and results from your introspection and positioning processes. There are many tools which can be employed in executing your personal branding strategy. It could be your style of dressing, speaking or writing. With the proliferation of many internet based social networking as well as professional and personal websites, the boundaries of personal branding have expanded. 

Evaluating Your Personal Branding Strategy

Your personal branding strategy should be in constant review. You can measure results by observing people’s reaction to you. You can also get feedback from your audience and mentors. Though the packaging may change, it is important to note that your core values should always remain the same. That is how you maintain your credibility and create brand loyalty.

In Sum

Your personal brand is more important today than ever before. Like in every endeavor, you need a strategy to direct your path. This starts and ends with the right questions and answers. 

Go on, build your brand, strategize for success and brand your way to the bank.

Watch out for the next article on more personal branding tools.

NB. Personal branding could make or break that ‘multimillion dollar deal’ so seek professional help if necessary.

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I do not believe in Monopoly

I admit the popularity of the theory that infant businesses cannot stand the monopolies of giant companies and the same may be said of today’s leading professionals in our many different sectors; from the arts to the sciences. However, I must disagree with the notion that the big guys are doing so good a job at satisfying their customers, that there is little or no opportunity for today’s guys, in a changing and highly competitive country like Ghana. Well, I just do not believe in the concept of monopoly. I think there are too many opportunities out there that people have not yet explored; if they had then the country’s most basic problems would have been solved by now. These opportunities that I’m referring to I believe are the key to our individual and national prosperity, underlying the concept of personal branding. Ghanaian women can be more enterprising , our fresh graduates should create their personal brands, to beat the competition, and the already employed should excel in their positions and work towards achieving indispensable status. 

 Take the case of Vodafone/Ghana telecom. Sixteen years ago, they not only enjoyed the favor of the Ghanaian government but had absolute monopoly in the telecommunications industry. Today they share the market with Zain, Tigo, Espresso, MTN, Africa –on-Line and maybe soon Glo.  Why? -Poor pricing policy coupled with poor service delivery. And also, rather unfortunately, telecom services in general received in the country, at present, are still characterized by inadequate coverage, very poor internet connectivity services and just ridiculous price gauging that gives no consideration for quality service. What’s more, many of our other industries suffer from this and other similar corporate ailments which are mostly a result of low standards set at different levels. 

These low standards range from inappropriate corporate structures, to primitive work behavior of employees along with inadequate customer service delivery systems- which are very rampant especially in our ministries, 3 and 4 star hospitality facilities, legal and security systems and indeed a good many of our other sectors.  So, all I’m trying to say is that, as long as there is room for improvement in any economic structure, it cannot be claimed that it is choked or has little or no opportunity. And the long story short of this scenario is that, in my opinion, the current companies running our Ghanaian economy have failed to achieve monopoly status, and there is need for more competition to improve their standards. The same however, goes for all our professionals as well – companies in their desire to provide high class services, should endeavor to work with highly experienced and useful employees only.

 Okay, I hope I managed to communicate the fact that monopoly in reality exists only in a mindset. But, fortunately, we are talking about personal branding and not our traditional products and service providers. Tyler Durden from Fight Club once made a remarkable statement that I want you to visualize as you read out. “You are not special. You are not a beautiful or unique snowflake. You are the same decaying organic matter as everything else”. Okay, I know my entries on this blog are supposed to help people realize their potential to build their personal brands and this definitely cannot be done with a low self esteem. Exactly my point… In trying to be unique, we need to understand that we are not the only product …or so to speak, the only professionals on the market.  There are several others and we need to defend ourselves to people who patronize our skills, abilities and talents. And this is the whole concept. Because monopoly doesn't really exist, we can “also” make a difference where ever we may be, because there will always be opportunity to outshine others without involving them.

 Now, in the banking industry in Ghana, women far outnumber their male colleagues (which I don’t think was a deliberate attempt to just pad a national “minority” headcount but rather, I think that bosses just can’t trust their male executives) And here, I foresee a great opportunity for women, in the banking sector as well as in all other industries as well. This is why I get confused when I hear women talk about gender inequality issues. In two thousand and eleven, I really believe that women who face such hindrances are either not as qualified as they think they are or they are just too busy with other things at the expense of their careers. Yes, today, there so many opportunities for women in our country and across the globe. Thank goodness!  

Well do you also know that some folks describe our times as the millennium for women? Well yes! And instead of taking this for granted, women can be more appreciative of the opportunities given, for they've not always been there; and work hard and smarter to take their careers to the next level. To do this, women I think should be more enterprising.

 I must clarify that I am not referring to women starting their own businesses or anything like that, at least not in this post.

By being enterprising  I believe woman can create a whole lot of avenues to grow their careers. - to not only satisfy their creativity but also they can aim at solving organizational problems that come at different levels; by furthering their  education, using initiative, being goal oriented, accountable and  adaptable to the changing needs of organizations in light of their areas of specialization. Finally, Ghanaian women should be more ambitious than many are today. I believe that nothing we do without passion is worth doing in the first place. 

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Your Personal Brand

First of all, it may amaze you to know that every human on planet earth is involved in a personal branding activity, knowingly or unknowingly. In our walk, talk, appearance and even in our direct or indirect association with events and circumstances, we constantly create a label that people will always remember us for. Personal branding is the (conscious or unconscious) art of marketing yourself to the world; it is an identity associated with your name that can prove to be an asset or a liability, depending on what your personal brand is. It can be associated with a person’s character, skill or talent.

To begin with, a personal brand can be a plus or a minus; an asset or a liability, depending on what the brand is. A personal brand is a plus or an asset, if it secures you business opportunities or gets you favors with your colleagues, employers or even loved ones. This is in fact the concept behind “human” networking. It is simply getting to know people in your area of interest in order to position yourself to receive favors from group members when the need arises and depending on their strengths and abilities.One’s personal brand in a group becomes very necessary if for instance, a team leader vacancy arises for a company; personal brands associated with members of the team will determine which individuals will be considered for such a position. And obviously it’s most likely for management to choose someone whose brand suggests that they can handle leadership responsibility, even if it means they’re going outside the team to find a leader for it.  Management will not elect someone who has no initiative or ability to handle the responsibilities of a team leader. So people naturally will only create opportunities for people they can trust and entrust with responsibility.On the other hand, someone’s personal brand can also be a liability for them. In say a situation where people generally cannot associate one’s brand with trust, faith or even ability, they may never be given any responsibility of essence. In a more detailed example; if an employee’s brand is associated with sloppy work, and it so happens that (for purposes of cutting down operating costs) a company decides to lay off some of its workers then the person who is known to be most unproductive is most likely the first to be sent packing. Why….? -Because his brand has become a liability.

Personal branding defines who you are and the same one’s character. Then also, character is the opinion you help create in people’s mind about yourself. Character is what you say, do and even fail to do habitually. Character is essentially a sum total of who you are. In other words, Personal Branding is the reputation you create for yourself and what you portray to people to be true about you. If a person spends his time doing good works, then pretty soon people will associate his or her name with good works, and the person is branded as good. If on there other hand a person is involved with bad activity then he or she becomes branded as bad. Mother Theresa is a good example of how one can build one’s personal brand through deeds. She is often described to have had a strong and independent character .The nun of Loreto Convent was certainly not the only missionary in Calcutta, but she, as a result of unusual dedication to helping the poorest in society, managed to win support from the Catholic church to begin her own religious venture outside the walls of the convent. What’s more, she continues to win the hearts of men and women all around the world. And as far as charity and helps are concerned, her impact will always be felt on many different levels. -Thanks to a well natured reputation. Like wise, when someone becomes addicted to alcohol, it doesn’t take long for people to refer to this person as being alcoholic, and even worse a drug addict if he or she tends to abuse un-prescribed drugs. One’s character is very important if one’s trying to build a personal brand for one’s self. Just like they say, you are what you do and not just what you say.

Personal branding again is what is associated with your name. Many of us have heard and perhaps even followed certain musical, football and fashion brands on twitter and other social media. These icons made a name for themselves through their talents, skills and natural abilities. It’s all about using your gifting to solve societal needs such as: the need for clothing, for entertainment, the need for companionship and so forth. Well, taking Maradonna for instance, most people identify this name with football talent, and as such Diego Amando Maradonna definitely needs no introduction wherever he may go. His name creates opportunities for him to do what so ever he may legally want to do. So what ever you’re good at, or what talent you have, or even what you’ve mastered skill in, you can surely be recognized in your field without being part of a general mass of people. Brands associated with talents or natural abilities are just as good as brands associated with skills. You can use them to your advantage in a big world that needs specialists to solve human problems. But remember that what ever you may do, you are creating a brand for your self. The brand will be created inline with what society needs as well as with what society dislikes.

Creating a personal brand is much simpler than general product brand creation. Personal branding doesn’t always need any special marketing or publicity. Our character    (consisting of our habitual activities) as well as our skills and natural talents can on their own get the word about us around such that the moment our names are mentioned, we are automatically associated with what we are accustomed to .Personal branding is thus very crucial and we cannot afford to be ignorant about it. We can plan our activities in line with what we always want to be remembered for. It doesn’t matter what field, from producing good music to being good team players in our jobs and communities. We can endeavor to have and maintain a good personal brand. Whatever the brand we create, we indirectly create assets or liabilities for ourselves. Personal branding is the future to being and remaining in business.  

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