It doesn’t matter whether you are trying to grow your career in a traditional 9-to-5 job or establish yourself as an up and coming entrepreneur — a strong personal brand is essential. A personal brand tells others who you are and what you value, while allowing you to display your strengths and capabilities in a clear way.
However, showcasing your personal brand isn’t always easy, particularly if you work in a crowded space. Creating a compelling personal brand can make all the difference in helping you grow and achieve your goals — but you must lay the foundation to strengthen that brand in the first place.
1. Clearly Define Who You Are and What You Want to Be Known for
First, you must audit your personal brand. You want your personal brand to be an accurate reflection of your professional identity and your personality. This usually requires answering questions about yourself, such as what motivates you, what characteristics have others complemented you on and where you excel in work.
Writing for Northeastern University, Shayna Joubert also advises that you view your personal brand as “a roadmap of where you want to go. […] Forecasting where you want to be in five or 10 years — and the attributes you want to be known for — can help you better determine what steps you need to take in order to get there.”
2. Understand Your Audience
Just like with a product at a traditional company, your personal brand also has its own target audience. As part of strengthening your personal brand, you must consider who you are trying to reach. Are you trying to impress others at your company to increase your chances of promotion? Are you trying to showcase yourself as a thought leader in your niche?
As Luke Holder, head of customer happiness at Portrait Pal, explained during a recent conversation, “Understanding your audience will directly influence how you present yourself and how you communicate your brand. By understanding their expectations, needs and values, you can adapt everything from your head shot to your written communications accordingly. If your personal brand doesn’t align with what your audience is looking for, you won’t be able to have the impact you need to reach your own goals.”
3. Network Consistently
Networking is a critical part of strengthening your personal brand. It’s not enough to publish articles to try to position yourself as a thought leader or to develop a high-quality website. As valuable as those things can be, actually connecting with your audience (especially others in your industry) will go a long way in helping you grow your personal brand.
These in-person connections are ultimately much more memorable than how you present yourself digitally. Embracing networking through both formal and informal events will open up new opportunities that help you demonstrate your value in a more meaningful way.
4. Develop a Personal Brand Narrative
Everyone has a story — and one of the best ways to strengthen your personal brand is to develop the narrative that defines your experiences and the branding you are trying to convey. Illustrative stories about your experiences and accomplishments are much more persuasive and help you better define who you are and what you stand for.
As the Harvard Business Review notes, storytelling can occur in practically any setting — such as by expanding the way you answer questions to implicitly share your personality traits. Using storytelling as part of your branding and personal value proposition will make you more memorable and appealing, while also helping you foster stronger connections with others.
5. Close the Gap Between Your Reputation and Your Personal Brand
Quite often, there exists a gap between the personal brand you are trying to convey and the way others actually perceive you.
Executive coach and entrepreneur May Busch notes that identifying such gaps “gives you the basis for figuring out what needs to change. One way to do this is to ask a few people you trust to tell you the three words or phrases that come to mind when they think of you. Tell them to use positive words only. Then, compare this with your own set of three words or phrases. What’s the gap?”
Such exercises can give you ideas for personal improvement or help you adjust your brand accordingly.
6. Consistently Live Your Personal Brand
Once you’ve established a personal brand, keep in mind that everything you do will affect that branding, for better or worse. You must keep your personal brand top of mind during conversations, networking events and even in the emails you send.
Presenting yourself and communicating in a way that is consistent with the personal brand you are trying to build will strengthen your branding and build a concrete image of who you are. Failure to live up to your personal brand in any interaction will create cognitive dissonance with your audience and potentially undermine your branding efforts.
A Stronger, Better Personal Brand
Building a memorable personal brand isn’t always easy, but it is well worth the effort. By clearly defining your personal brand and how you present yourself to your chosen audience and then living that personal brand in every interaction, you can lay the foundation for becoming a memorable influence in your niche.