Over the past few years a new buzz term has been gaining traction in the corporate world. “Personal brand” has become something of a phenomenon as people across the business–not to mention entertainment–world have embraced the idea of marketing oneself in new and innovative ways. Have you thought about your personal brand lately?
In the past, traditional networking was the way to build a profile in a profession. When it came time to apply for jobs, personal contacts were your best bet. Job-hunting meant scouring the classifieds section, sending a resume and cover letter, and hoping for the best. The application process essentially meant sending your resume into the unknowable abyss of an HR department and praying for a call. The resume, this short document of one to three pages, was all you had to show for the skills, knowledge and experience accumulated throughout your life.
Today, however, there are many different ways to apply for jobs and stand out, and this is precisely why personal branding is important. What may sound like a cheese-ball corporate-speak term actually has some validity; the idea being a personal brand is really a natural evolution of our ability to market ourselves as job candidates and build a public profile using the digital and online media tools available.
Increasingly, the process of locating candidates or applying for jobs largely begins and ends online, and personal branding is all about getting noticed in the online space. And locating candidates online doesn’t just mean sending and receiving resumes via email; it means employers are looking at your online presence before they ever call you. A U.S. man recently made headlines around the world after he was asked to reveal his Facebook password during an interview. While this isn’t necessarily the norm (yet), the fact that your online identity is part of the vetting process shouldn’t come as a surprise to anybody.
So, what is personal branding? It’s essentially polishing and attending to your online presence in the same way you would your physical presence in an actual interview. Facebook, Twitter and other social media accounts should be considered public because they are and maintaining a professional standard on each of them is important for the personal branding process. This doesn’t mean making everything squeaky clean; rather, it means crafting your own unique voice and identity online while also thinking strategically about what you’re presenting to the world.
Personal branding comes from the same ideas that make up traditional branding, including image (online profiles), product (you!) and messaging (the content you place online). Most people are familiar with Linkedin, but this is really just the beginning. Since everyone has a Linkedin account its novelty is lost. The trick with personal branding is to invest the efforts to create an online identity that is coherent, strategic and innovative.
For example why not create a more interesting online portfolio to supplement the standard fare listed on Linkedin? Sites like About.me, Flavours.me and Wix.com allow users to create easy to use portfolios and websites that can show more creativity and relevant work samples than Linkedin alone. Sites like these can become a hub for all of your online spaces, linking to all your social media profiles, showcasing your work and building the consistency needed for a standout personal brand.
Simple things like including PDF copies of your portfolio and resume mean curious potential employers can view and download what they need. Services like Contact Monkey act as an online contact card, meaning people can view and download all of your contact information (mobile, email, social accounts) with one simple link.
Personal branding also means moving into a post-resume era. This isn’t to say the standard resume is dead, but that there are now many ways to create something more interesting than the traditional list-style paper or Linkedin resume. By using a program like Prezi, you can build an interactive digital presentation to share with anyone online. Using all the same information, a Prezi resume-as-digital-presentation can become a media-rich, multi-formatted, interactive experience. And much like the information in a Contact Monkey link, your Prezi resume can be accessed by a simple link on a portfolio-style website.
All of this means you can create an online space that satisfies the image, content and product requirements to showcase your personal brand. By making your online presence strategic, creative and convenient, you’ll be showing recruiters and potential employers that you’re the type of person who treats your personal brand with the care and innovation they’re looking for.
The point of a personal brand is to stand out, so ditch the solo resume and start to build a dynamic online identity. Whether you like it or not, you likely already have a very public identity online, so you might as well spend some time making it one that truly represents your personal brand.
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Kiel Hume writes for Toronto Standard. Follow him on Twitter at @kielculture.
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