“Symbols speak for themselves, people need followers”.
When you apply for a job, you are just a resume and nothing more. When you apply as a brand, you are a symbol of your achievement. Now I know you must be confused as to what our intention is with these words. People are fascinated with brands and like to work with names that come with some knowledge and achievement. If you are to get noticed for that dream job you are looking for or want to amplify your career, you need to build your own brand that amplifies your work and thoughts. Below is why you should build your own brand:
- To get noticed as a SME of your domain.
- To build authority in your domain.
- To be recognized as a thought leader.
- To be able to work with other leaders.
- To be able to get exceptional career opportunities.
- To be able to get work on your own when career opportunities dry up.
- To establish a side income or expand your knowledge.
These few things will motivate you to build your own brand and be your own voice. To establish the concept with an example, find out thought leaders or influencers in your domain and see what other people think of them. While some might have negative perspective about these influencers, majority will admire the work these leaders do and the knowledge they have. So, this gives us a validation that influencers outside of show business, are admired for their knowledge and the work that they do.
Take for example: Robert Kayosaki. He’s know for this thought and work. Yet, he’s not a business tycoon. He’s just making few millions and gathers much more press and admiration than Jeff Bezoz. This is because he’s a brand and people like to associate themselves with such brands.
Image Credit – investopedia (link)
:max_bytes(150000):strip_icc()/robert-kiyosaki-7832587-FINAL-1-81f5aed1e0e1465f83d9be36d90bad05.png){kind=link}
Now that we understand the concept of why to build your own personal brand, let’ talk about how to build your own personal brand. There are 5 steps
- Brand identity & desired result.
- Build content strategy
- Identify channels
- Collaborate
- Amplify
1. Create Brand Identity & Identify Desired Result
You need to choose a logo for your name. Don’t pick a new brand name. Just take your own name and use an AI logo generator to get a logo. When you have a logo and identity, write down as to why you are doing this. Define your vision and what’s your end goal. Is you end goal to earn a million dollars via this in 5 years. Whatever it is, just identify it and work towards it. You also need to create clear goals for every action you do.
2) Build content strategy
A major part of reaching out will be via digital channels. You will need to build strategy around the type of content, volume of content, frequency of content and the theme of the content. For example: If you are into robotics, you can focus on creating articles, Instagram reels, videos, linkedin posts and a small ebook on how to build a small robot from scratch. Your theme in the content can be around to spread awareness about robotics as a career choice. Your content strategy will also be interlinked to the next point, which is choice of channels.
3) Identify channels.
Most likely you are going to use linkedin & twitter. For videos, you can use youtube. However, youtube journey is hard and time taking. So, it’s better to stick to linkedin & reddit. Whatever channels you use, create a posting plan, choice of audiences and the best posting time. For linkedin, you should post between office hours and not around lunch. This makes you reach the right audiences at the right time. You can also choose to run ads on Google ads for the right category of people. You should also create your website, social media handles and portfolio accounts.
4) Collaborate
Collaborate budding personal brand owners like yourself. Collaboration can be powerful as it can amplify your reach and utilize someone else’s audience to give them fresh content and obtain new followers.
5) Amplify
Go to events and network to amplify your brand. Attend seminars, ask questions and get highlighted. You can also seek out opportunities where you can become a speaker and talk about various things that impact the industry and how your work is impacting the world.
With these things, you should be able to get a personal brand for yourself.