4 Misconceptions About Personal Branding You Need To Abandon Right Now

From Fast Company, Erica Breuer share four misconceptions about personal branding.  The first one is: 

1. "I’M NOT THE KIND OF PERSON WHO NEEDS A WEB PRESENCE"

This is the lie I hear from my clients most frequently. It’s usually paired with the mantra "I’m really kind of a private person" or "I hate social media." The worst case I’ve run into was a super talented woman targeting a digital marketing job—and she was doing it without an active Twitter feed. Yikes!

If you’re in any vein of technology or marketing these days, you have to be active on more than just LinkedIn. But you don’t have to be the type of person who shares pictures of your lunch or tweets every thought you have to build your brand on the web. You don’t even have to churn out lengthy blog posts to start branding yourself as someone who’s engaged in an industry.The truth: You can have an active web presence without baring your soul.

All you have to do is select one to two social platforms that work for you and engage with content that’s relevant to your area of expertise. Simple shares and comments every other day or so.

See the full list and read the full story at  4 Misconceptions About Personal Branding You Need To Abandon Right Now

5 steps to build your Personal Brand

From PeopleMatters, Shibani Belwalkar offers 5 steps to build your personal brand.  She starts by recommending you identify your passion and then align your brand with your personal values.  She writes:

Identify your Passion

What makes you tick? Call out your strengths and label them. Get as close to the basics as you can and be eloquent about what it is you believe you have on offer to the world. Several attempts could be made before you can zero in on what really defines you. But what is important is to believe in the fact that you had a purpose in life before anyone had an opinion about it! Start where you are, use what you have and do what you can. Keep characterizing yourself. Precise, concise and consistent. 

Scale your Values to Articulate your Identity

Once you have defined yourself, you need to articulate your identity with your values. The Greek Philosopher Heraclitus had said that ‘Character is fate’. After all, if people like you, they will listen to you, but if they trust you, they will do business with you. Reputation matters tremendously. Admit mistakes if you make them. Work with all stakeholders to create mutually beneficial solutions to forge deeper relations. The base of all interactions should be Trust, Respect and Humility, fundamental human values. Every interaction should reflect your values.  Brands don’t just live on the page anymore.  They are living breathing things. It is important to build your brand that is aligned with your values so that your actions are aligned with the message you are putting out there.

Read the full story at  5 steps to build your Personal Brand.

How To Build Your Brand Online

When you have developed your brand, you may want to build it online.  Fortunately, FreeWebsite.com  developed the following infographic to help guide you in building your brand online. 

If you have trouble reading it, it also appears at How to Build Your Brand Online as part of Job Search Infographics

How to Build a Brand of Awesomeness

Mackwebsolutions.com has prepared a great infographic on how to build a brand of awesomeness. Start with defining your goals and don't forget to measure and analyze your results.

For more infographics, see Job Search Infographics

What Does Your Brand Stand For?

While developing your personal brand, you might think about what kind of character your brand is.
eswstorylab prepared the following infographic that summarizes twelve basic types of characters.

If you have trouble reading this here, it also appears at What Does Your Brand Stand For? as apart of Job Search Inforgraphics with other infographics.

Your Digital Footprint And The Permanent Job Search

From Talent Culture, Andrew Heikkila discusses hows your online activity affects your brand and your ability to find a job.  Your digital footprint plays a significant role in determining your pesonal brand.  He offers 7 recommendations to clean up your online activity:

1. First, Google yourself. See what pops up. If your name is common, add variations including your hometown and high school. If anything that you wouldn’t want an employer to see pops up, contact the site and ask them to take it down.
2. Beef up your privacy settings. Think of them as the new business clothes of the real world.
3. Remove risqué content. This one is most essential for high school and college graduates, but everybody on the job hunt would do well to give their “photos” section a once-over.
4. Delete your inactive profiles. They make your footprint look sloppy and serve as nothing more than security risks.
5. Check blogs and forums too. While your social media profiles might look pristine, those two or three unscrupulous AngelFire blog posts from ten years ago might still be around.
6. Use a pen name. There’s nothing wrong with having hobbies not considered “business professional.” For the most ardently adventurous, romping-ly risqué, and wonderfully weird subjects… consider a pen name.
7. Stay vigilant. Concerts, bachelorette parties, weddings, and nights in Las Vegas won’t stop happening just because you got a new job. Just make sure your media is under control, and you won’t have to scrub again.

Read the full story at Your Digital Footprint And The Permanent Job Search

5 Branding tips from the Presidential Election

From Inc.com, Name.Kitchen offers 5 branding tips gleaned from the presidential election, including using a variety of domain names.  My two favorite tips are: 

2) Go for feeling over facts

Many companies fear that an emphasis on entertainment will detract from the seriousness of their message, but experts say they need to get over that. "We like to tell ourselves we are thoughtful, rational, careful and deliberate,” says Alec Beckett, creative director of Nail, an advertising agency in Providence, RI. “If anything, we’re the opposite: impulsive, emotional, even irrational.” That means that, often, what draws in consumers is not a reasoned argument about why one option is better than another; it’s about what makes them feel better.

On the GOP side, Beckett credits Donald Trump's success to the fact that, "He’s not selling a thing, he’s selling a feeling," which is largely anger against the establishment. On the Democrats' side, Beckett considers Bernie Sanders's "America" spot, which has garnered more than 3.3 million views on YouTube, "the most effective piece of campaign communication I’ve seen. It has no content--it doesn’t say what he’s for or what he’s against--it just evokes a really nice feeling.” 

The lesson for companies, Beckett believes, is that “when you’re just trying to get people's attention, go for a feeling" rather than pitching the specific virtues of your product or service. 

... 

4) Don't just broadcast: Engage

Remember that the point of digital platforms is to create the opportunity for dialogue. “It’s not about putting out your talking points,” says Horizon’s Olson. “It’s about saying something relevant to an issue and then inviting people into a conversation.  

Consider voter.guru, a new website that tracks candidates’ public statements and voting records to help users determine who they should vote for. Launched with backing by Horizon, some 6,000 people per week are taking a 14-question quiz that helps match their viewpoint to candidates’ platforms, says co-founder Ben Krakow. Naturally, the results are easily shareable on social media. "Think of it as a simple yet nuanced dialogue between voters and the candidates' platforms and voting records," Olson says.

Of course, oftentimes digital dialogues are anything but nuanced. When businesses invite engagement they open themselves up to comments of all kinds. That means you have to be prepared for negative responses, and have a smart strategy for responding.

First, says Etori, resist the urge to hide; instead, respond as quickly and as sincerely as possible (while, as he says, resisting the practice of certain presidential candidates to respond by attacking your critics). The next step is to be accountable. Even if you have a social media team that normally handles your posts, make sure they reflect your voice and truly take responsibility for whatever went wrong or was miscommunicated. Step three is to step back. "Get in front of a complaint or other issue at the beginning and then let it go," says Etori. "You don't have to keep apologizing over and over."  

Read the full story Slick & Smart: 5 Digital Branding Tips from this Election Season