You have been hearing about the concept of personal branding
for years now, both in your professional arena as well as in your effective job
search. So what exactly is a Personal Brand? We can say that it is the value
that you create for yourself. It identifies who you are and what you do and
accordingly position you within the job market. It can also be an essential
tool to open new opportunities and achieve career satisfaction.
You can use
both traditional marketing strategies and different social networking channels
like Facebook, Twitter and Technorati, to promote your personal trademark.
So, in this blog, I would be giving you certain easy to
follow tips that would help you plan and develop your personal brand:
·
Be consistent and set achievable
goals:
Spend some time with yourself, understand what
your core strengths are and play with it. Build a consistent brand with your
core strengths, skills and experience. A
brand that is simple enough to define and connect with is always easy to
remember.
·
Value
yourself in sync with the market:
In addition to the contribution you can
make to an organization, your skills and experiences come with a price tag. Decide
what you are worth of, using knowledge of the current job market and the salary
paid for different skills.
·
Stand apart from others:
Do proper research about your target
audience and market yourself accordingly. Something that differentiates you
from the conventional, certain expertise that was not noticed by others is
something upon which you can plan your personal brand.
·
Diligently
choose your communication forums:
After completing your initial preparation,
it is time to decide how to launch you. It is not necessary to be present in every
social networking channel. Each of your
target audience is different and choosing your channel adds to your branding.
Start off with Linkedin and forums or Twitter and personal blog. Keep analyzing
these arenas and decide which one works best for you.
·
Plan and
execute your strategy:
It is now time to execute your plan for
personal strategy. Decide how often you should post, on your blog, Twitter and
on facebook. Give yourself ample time to plan the effectiveness of each
strategy.
·
Interact
with Aces:
Intelligent interaction always pays off.
Find out who are the most visited people of your blog or those who are
following you. Network with them and comment on their blogs or posts.
·
Schedule
your program:
Create a list of ‘work to do’ for the week. Do
you wish to have a certain theme or have more interactions? Every move should
promote the self branding positively.
The essence of this post is to create a brand of yourself
and educate your target market about the unique value that you can provide,
unlike your competitors. Also push yourself to keep innovating!