PERSONAL BRANDING – THE ART OF SELLING THE BRAND “ME”.

Trust is the life blood of any relationship be it social, commercial, spiritual or whatever. In national politics if your people lose their trust in you they pass a vote of no confidence. In marriage if partners lose trust in each other they divorce. At work if your employer loses trust in you he fires you. In business if your partner loses trust in you he or she will not renew the agreement when it expires. Many relationships fail because of serious trust issues. It is therefore, mandatory to always make deliberate efforts that aim at creating, preserving and enhancing your image in the eyes of others especially those you target for some important reasons. This is were Personal branding becomes relevant because it uses social media to establish an individual’s reputation and credibility.

Personal branding – the ordinary level.

At an ordinary level this is done through the creation of compelling personal profiles that showcase a professional's expertise, credibility, and integrity on sites like Linkedin. The fact that millions of professionals are already on professional networking sites demonstrate that many are consciously or subconsciously aware of the importance of trust. But this is just a basic approach to personal branding that everyone else is doing and wont do much in setting you apart from the crowd. The purpose of personal branding on professional networks is to project yourself as unique from the vicious competition in say the job market. There is therefore, a need of an approach that can really show how special you are basing on your merits and capabilities.

Personal branding – the advanced level.

A blog run thoughtfully is capable through articles, videos etc to project you as in deed the fairest of a thousand. Created using Web 2.0 a technology best for facilitating interaction between a site and its visitors a blog has capabilities of selling your story to the right audience. The story of your professional journey is as unique to you as your finger prints. Though not everyone will passionately relate to it, the right person will soon notice and your world is never the same again.

What’s in a blog post?

A blog post unlike a CV it’s a demonstration not a claim of your knowledge and insight. Through your article, videos etc prospective employers, clients, partners or anyone you are targeting will see you as a subject matter expert because of how you are articulating issues. When you meet they will approach you more from a position of respect and this is a big plus. This is the reason why football stars like Messi, Christiano who when joining a new club do not do trials. They just do nominal inductions and they go straight into the field of play.  So a blog make you a star in the eyes of your target audience thereby setting you apart from the rest.