How To Build The Brand Called YOU
Building Your Personal Brand
Is it okay to think of yourself as a brand? YES!!
The question is, are you consciously building and cultivating the YOU brand? If you’ve read any of my articles on branding, you know that a brand is an impression.
So, if I were to rewrite the question, it’ll be, are you building and cultivating the impression that you want people to have of you?
If you want to communicate trust and consistency and that you as a person will do what you say when you say you will, being a brand can help you to maintain that focus and deliver on your promises.
A personal brand is not measured by popularity as many would think although it plays a role, like other brands, it’s about the delivery on promise.
You are the CEO of the brand called YOU and what you want to achieve as a BRAND is to put a promise to your name and face.
Daryl Travis says, if you have a job, your boss is your customer, and Brand YOU is the supplier of services. Your wages become your sales, and it’s easy to see how it puts a new perspective on how you perform and conduct yourself. As brand YOU grows, in an attempt to cultivate it, you’ll need to sharpen your skills and acquire new ones that help you keep to your promise and remain relevant in your space.
15, 20 years ago, when jobs were more secure and there was more loyalty between company and employees before the adoption of the euphemism we now know as downsizing, people pursued a one-company career and placed a higher premium on promotions and climbing-the-ladder. The case is different these days.
Daryl tells truths from a publication by Tom, Tom Peters (ibid.) says, you might think of yourself differently. You’re not an employee or a staffer. “You don’t ‘belong to’ any company for life, and your chief affiliation isn’t to any particular ‘function.’
Your job description does not define or confine you. Rather, says Peters, loyalty is still alive and well, but it is loyalty to your project, your team, your customers, and yourself. “We are the CEOs of our own companies: Me Inc.”
He goes on: “ … the main chance is becoming a free agent in an economy of free agents, looking to have the best season you can imagine in your field, looking to do your best work and chalk up a remarkable track record, and looking to establish your own micro equivalent of the Nike swoosh.”
If you are a small business, you may want to build your personal brand based on a personal promise or what you do in the business. Some businesses have succeeded on the strength of the owner’s brand.
To build the brand called YOU, start by asking, what does my product or service do and how does it make a difference? Write this down in brevity (15 words or less)
Daryl and Harry playfully decided to write this promise for themselves, what we call a mission statement.
For Harry, Daryl wrote, “Nobody enjoys working as hard as I do to deliver consistently effective creative work.” When he showed these fourteen words to Harry, he crossed them out and wrote “My work will never fail to make you happy.”
Harry then wrote what he thought would be Daryl’s mission statement.
He wrote, “Leadership from ingrained integrity; results from great expectations.” Daryl told him flattery would get him everywhere, except in line for a bonus. He also said that he could have profited by thinking of himself as a brand rather than a part-time playboy who has been known to faint at the sight of a well-turned ankle.
His answer: “But that’s the Brand Me that everybody knows and loves!”
Keep your mission simple, original, personal, and most of all, keep it effective. And you’d have started building the brand called YOU.
The next thing to do will be to create visibility for YOU. I’ll write about it tomorrow. I hope you read.
