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Personal Branding Tips

Guest post by: John Williams

Article Overview: A great deal of time and energy are expended to create memorable brands that add value to company marketing strategies and (in the case of public companies) pique the interest of the investment community. While company brand equity is certainly important, the significance of personal branding should not be overlooked as a key to success.

Personal Branding Tips

Here's a simplistic example that underscores the importance of personal branding. Let's say you own a franchise of a well-known quick printing company. Your logo is recognizable and the attributes of your parent organization are well documented through a dynamic national marketing campaign. While you may gain first-time business based on name recognition alone, if customers don't like you-if you are unable to positively establish your personal brand-you may never see them again.

As would be expected, personal branding is most important in service businesses, from which customers demand a high level of personal attention. Your ability to establish and maintain rapport with your customers will result in long-term relationships as well as coveted referral business. In addition, when your customers know you and like you, they are more likely to give you the benefit of the doubt if anything goes awry.

The Defining Process

The most important step to creating your personal brand is defining yourself. This includes taking stock of your strengths, values, goals and personality to determine the personal messages you want customers to take away from their encounters with you.

When you consistently present yourself based on the messages you've identified, you will have created an effective personal brand. Those who interact with you will have a strong sense of who you are and what you stand for...and that can be any number of things, both within and outside of the business realm.

The beauty of personal branding is its uniqueness. While some of your personal brand attributes may overlap with others', your overall messages should be one-of-a-kind, for that's what will differentiate you and make your personal brand stand out.

Components to consider for your personal brand include your leadership abilities; your special strengths, talents, or achievements; your personality traits; and your distinctive qualities. Think outside the box, and be as specific as possible, so your brand doesn't mirror anyone else's.

Getting the Message Out

Once you've determined your personal brand messages, you need a strategy for broadcasting them to your target audience. Visibility and persistence are key to ensuring that your personal brand is communicated to your customers. That means you must live your personal brand all the time; if that is challenging, then you probably haven't been honest during the defining process.

You have endless mediums at your disposal for getting your personal brand message out, but the most powerful is face-to-face communication. Personal interactions provide the greatest opportunity to make a memorable impression. If your customer base is too large or too spread out for that to occur, you can use other communications vehicles-including e-mail, direct mail and personalized letters-to get your messages across. Remember that all the choices you make, from your language to your font, have the capability to enhance, or detract from, your personal brand.

In the best circumstances, when you're able to successfully project the image you've defined for yourself, you've made yourself the most important part of your company's brand. That is critically important for entrepreneurs as well as anyone else who wishes to differentiate themselves from their competition by building personal brand equity.

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