Personal branding: Creating and promoting a personal brand. Personal branding - the path to personal development Personal branding

Being a marketer and coach, I couldn’t leave the topic of personal branding unattended. It is obvious to all of us that most of the standard branding techniques and tools have migrated to the personal one, however, managing a personal brand is complicated by the fact that you are a person, with all your advantages and disadvantages, and even with a certain unconscious, as Freud argued, tirelessly influencing your actions. Excessive persistence in the field of self-promotion can be fraught with the accumulation of internal dissatisfaction, awareness of an unfillable emptiness inside, a feeling of inconsistency between what is being declared and what is actually happening - of course, IF this inconsistency is real.

Before promoting yourself, you should really understand yourself deeply and find motives that correspond to your deepest beliefs and values and follow them, and not superficial and stereotyped statements. As the Tao Te Ching states: “he who praises himself loses his radiance”; Taking into account centuries-old wisdom, but still deciding to consciously manage a personal brand, it is worth repeatedly making sure that you “bring to people” the truth, what you are really convinced of. And if your goal is bigger than your ego and really makes the lives of others better, it will be much easier for you to declare yourself.

Personal branding:

We all know what a brand is, moreover, each of us has one. A brand is an image that is fixed in people’s minds and pops up when they hear a name, see a product or a logo. Brand from English is a mark that was used to mark livestock to distinguish one’s own from someone else’s. The modern understanding of the term brand comes from this meaning.

Personal branding is society’s perception of a person’s personality, abilities and personal qualities. Research shows that in order for us to form a lasting impression of a person, we need less than one minute, often no more than 20-30 seconds. After this, it takes about 20 situations that could make us change our negative impression. The term "personal branding" was first mentioned by Tom Peters in 1997 - most people credit Peters with creating the concept of the personal brand.

According to Dan Schwobel, there are three essential elements in the process of formulating your own brand:

Value proposition: Your value proposition is what you will be judged on as a specialist in your field
Differentiation: What sets you apart from the crowd of other candidates
Marketability: How attractive your brand is to potential employers. This is what will make them hire you and open up new opportunities for you.

Source: Dan Schawbel “You Are Your Brand” by Dan Schawbel.

Step one: Be yourself. A powerful personal brand must be authentic/unique and must inspire trust.

At the first stage, recognize your individuality and uniqueness. Assess your skills and strengths.
Always look for opportunities to further your education, gain additional skills, or take courses, especially in areas where your knowledge is not as strong.
Once you realize your true values, goals and desires, you will no longer be able to hide your uniqueness, and by ceasing to adapt to other people's expectations, you will finally reveal yourself as an individual and as a master of your craft.
True uniqueness is a key component in creating a successful self-brand.
Formulate your Personal Brand, critically analyze your interests, aspirations, long-term and short-term goals.
Review all your previous achievements, work experience and education and determine how this affects your choice of profession and future career. Integrate your past into your future by creating a detailed plan for career growth and achieving your goals.
By providing the most reliable information about yourself, you can win over employers and potential clients.

Step two: Expertise

What would you like to be famous for?

What are you known for today?
What skills and abilities set you apart from others? Which ones need improvement and development?
Determine what your true motivators are, what traits of your personality help you achieve your goals. Gather more information about your brand from the people around you, and be prepared to use this information as a road map to new achievements.

Step three: Define your target audience

Define your target market: The goal of successful branding is to gain long-term consumer favor. Since you are creating your own brand, you must decide on the market and work in that direction. You should market yourself to people who really want to know more about you and your professionalism.
Determine your target audience, this will help you spend your time and energy more effectively on creating your own brand.
Become visible and leave a good impression on your target market by making sure that the impression about you is as strong and vivid as possible.

Step four: Be aware of your competitors

Know who you are competing with. What makes you different from these people and how can you use these differences to emphasize your superiority?
Why should an employer choose you over other candidates with a similar level of competencies and equivalent skills?
Find and develop the traits that set you apart from the rest.

Step five: Be willing to take risks

Make a list of reviews your friends have about you. Do they perceive your brand as you expected? If there are inconsistencies, this may give you food for thought on where changes need to be made.
Find out what your colleagues think of you. What are the latest results of your performance evaluation at work? Consider feedback (formal and informal) from colleagues and managers when creating a personal brand.
Your brand should be backed by your experience and achievements. Identify your key skills and personality traits and ask a person (or several people) you know well to do the same. Conduct a comparative analysis of the results and refine your brand according to the findings.

Step six: Create a brand personality profile.

Once you have decided on your brand attributes, you can begin to state your brand to reflect the totality of your value proposition. Brand statement (main statement/statement of the brand) combines the totality of your value for the target audience.
The brand statement must attract the attention of the audience, the brand must be unique and memorable. Be brief and persuasive, use bright, simple verbs.
Having concise and well-presented information will help your potential employer make the right decision and allow him to remember all your strengths.
A well-presented brand conveys information about the type of job you are looking for and what unique skills and experience you want to bring to further develop the target company.

Step seven: Promote your brand

Create promotional materials for communication with the employer. Work on bringing your entire branding tool together: this usually consists of a resume, cover letter, web card or website where you can list all the projects and events in which you have been involved.
Manage your online image. More and more employers are making their final hiring decisions using LinkedIn, Google searches, and social media. With the help of social networks, blogs and other information resources, you can promote yourself much more effectively.

Step eight: Develop your entrepreneurial skills

If your brand exists either with or without your active participation, then why not make it exactly the way you want it to be?
A brand is not just your words. They must be supported by your experience and achievements.
Find and combine all positive reviews about you. Here you are your own marketing director, but remember, what others say about you plays a key role.
Increase your visibility and visibility by participating in professional events and public speaking engagements. Appearance plays a role - how you look and talk, all your self-presentation skills will be extremely important here.
Actively use word of mouth - every act of communication is another opportunity to make an impression. Don't be shy about talking about your achievements, but use moderation and do it appropriately so as not to have the opposite effect.
Build a network of professional contacts to expand your brand's reach.
Participation in various organizations and associations allows you to stay up to date with the latest market trends and also be aware of the search for employees in your industry.
HR managers claim that up to 50% of employees are hired through personal networks. Thus, 20-30% of your time spent searching for a job should be devoted to establishing useful contacts.
Your connections are an important component of your brand, providing you with the opportunity to communicate with people who can appreciate you and your talents.

Step nine: Visualize your brand, talk about it, make it work

Start living your brand. Talk to others about it, ask them to spread this information.
Do something every day to support your brand, confirming your brand statement.
Spread your brand through publications, collecting reviews from clients, colleagues, friends and business partners. Be extremely visible.
Be able to briefly describe your experience. Work on your self-presentation.
Assess the current state of affairs at your work. Align it with your goals and your vision for your future.
Your brand must be supported by a consistent pattern of behavior that demonstrates that you are in many ways more capable than your competitors.

Step ten: Match your brand!

Personal branding is not a one-time event. This is an ongoing process that is part of managing your career. Even the strongest personal brand can become outdated or lose relevance over time. The brand must be constantly updated in order to fully meet your current goals and objectives.
It is necessary to constantly adapt to changes in the labor market. Research your brand environment and make necessary changes as per changes in your target market.
It is important to continually evaluate your brand to ensure it is relevant to your target audience. Continue to expand the list of your skills and promotional materials, taking into account your personal and professional growth.

The most important concept in marketing is the concept of brand. If you are not a brand, you do not exist. Who are you then? You are an ordinary commodity.
Philip Kotler, Professor of International Marketing

From the moment you wrote your first resume, you became a commodity on the job market. And in order to find a good job with a decent salary and be in demand, you not only have to develop as a professional, but also work on your personal brand.

What is a personal brand

A brand is what people say about you when you are not in the room.

Telegram became popular because it was made by Pavel Durov, not Petya Ivanov. They paid attention to Tesla because the project is being carried out by, and not some John Smith.

Did no one create instant messengers before Durov? Surely some talented student at a technical university had a better thesis project. Only no one knows about him, but everyone knows Durov. The same can be said about Musk. He didn’t invent electric cars, and Jobs didn’t invent the push-button telephone. All these things became popular thanks to brand personalities.

We can say that a personal brand is a certain image that is created over more than one day. And when people hear your name, this is the image they imagine. Igor Mann is the No. 1 marketer in Russia, Artemy Lebedev is the designer of all Rus', Maxim Ilyakhov is the creator of information style, and so on.

Great professionals need to develop their personal brand so that clients or employers hear about them. A personal brand is your reputation.

A personal brand should answer just two questions: who knows you and what they think of you.

When is a personal brand needed?

There are two main cases:

When there is high competition in your field.
When the payment for the services of a popular specialist is much higher than for yours.

People are willing to overpay for expertise and experience. And to overpay a lot. They want to buy peace of mind and confidence. And in order for people to want to pay, a lot of work has to be done to create a certain image of an expert in their heads.

There are a lot of professions where a personal brand is needed: from a hairdresser and stylist to a doctor and builder, from a lawyer and sales manager to a copywriter, designer and SMM specialist. It is especially worth mentioning the sphere of art - an artist or musician certainly cannot do without a personal brand.

Why do you need a personal brand?

It's time for the millennials. Generation Y has entered an active consumer phase. And it seems that this generation does not believe in anything: neither in justice, nor in laws, nor in advertising. He needs personalities. Therefore, in order to remain at the top of the business chain, you need to develop not a company brand, but a personal one.

A personal brand increases trust. People buy more actively from other people than from abstract brands. Sales and new partners flow from trust.

A personal brand is like a student’s transcript in college: first you work for it, then it works for you. It's simple.

Types of Personal Brand

Expert

This person only talks about work and profession. You will not find information about his personal life and hobbies on social networks. Only professional regalia and mentions.

This image is ideal for those who are going to train their own colleagues. Therefore, it is important for an expert to build an image of a guru so that the whole sphere follows him.

Insider

This person combines his expertise with personality. He talks about himself, shows that he is alive, but everything is within the limits of what is permitted and does not undermine his expertise.

His audience wants to look the same, relax the same, live the same. But at the same time it remains a secret. For people, he is an expert and a tough guy at the same time, but nothing more.

Shocking man

Scandals, intrigues, divorces, betrayals - all this is about him. The image of most public figures is built on this approach. People love to pick at other people's dirty laundry, and they are given a reason to do so.

The difficulty is to maintain constant interest in yourself. Since there is no expertise here, the public easily switches from one shocking personality to another - who will surprise you more.

What does a personal brand consist of?

Expertise

This is your experience, skills, portfolio. What clients and employers ultimately want.

Without this point, you cannot create a personal brand. First you become the coolest electrician in your area, then in the city. Word of mouth brings new clients to you. People like your approach to work and its results. You show that you are a real expert and not a fake one.

Reputation

When your audience believes you unconditionally. You always back up your words with actions.

Reputation is the second most important point after expertise. It can be ruined by one small mistake, but winning it again is difficult. Therefore, it is important to watch what you do, what you say, and how you look.

Popularity

What is a personal brand without popularity? When you have proven that you are the coolest electrician in the area, an ideal reputation precedes you and brings new clients to you, it’s time to think about how popular you are?

Creating popularity is also work and an integral part of developing a personal brand. All potential clients and colleagues should know about you.

What happens if you neglect your personal brand?

Remember the recent scandal with the teacher who posted a photo in a swimsuit? After this, a flash mob began on Instagram, where other teachers also began posting their vacation photos.

The fact is that a teacher is also a personal brand. He has his own audience: students, parents, colleagues, management. And he needs to confirm his expertise in the media space in order to be an authority.

Recently, a friend told me about her failure to get a position as a marketer at an advertising agency. HR checked her social networks and upon meeting said that she did not seem like a professional. On her page there were publications of raffles for embroidery fabrics.

Simply put, if you don't manage your personal brand and maintain your reputation, you can face a lot of unpleasant things: from scandal and refusal to hire to low salary and lack of clients.

7 steps to create a personal brand

As written above, a personal brand is an image. He needs to be matched, he needs to be supported. No contradictions, only constancy, so that the image does not get destroyed in the heads of different people.

Choose the area in which you are best. Determine your specialization.
Tell your friends and acquaintances about yourself as an expert on your social networks.
Determine who your target audience is, your potential clients. Create a detailed profile of your ideal clients who bring you the most profit. You need to understand where they spend their time, what they read, what channels they watch.
Read books on your and related fields, increase your erudition, study foreign languages - become a person with whom it is interesting to talk.
Think over your external image. Just like a product, you, a brand person, should have certain features by which you will be recognized: a mustache, bright ties, pink hair, a braid, glasses, and so on.
Show up wherever your colleagues and potential clients are: participate in exhibitions, conferences, competitions.
Promote through different channels: start developing your own pages on social networks, create a website and a blog. Then go to industry platforms and online publications, give your comments, write articles. Create an image of an expert for a wide audience.

Ed.D. Progra Chair Human Resource Management, Franklin University, USA

As a professor in the subjects of leadership, management, coaching and team building, I have the opportunity to meet professionals across the world. I want to provide my support and recommendation for the expert services provided by Natalia Pereverzeva. Natalia is a highly skilled presenter of workshops and offers a number of training programs in topics such as Coaching Technology, Emotional Intelligence, Goal Integration, Personal branding and Effective communication. I highly recommend natalia Pereverzeva as a true professional in executive coaching, business coach and trainer in the field of coaching.

Venera Gabova

expert in personnel selection and assessment, specialist in career development and planning, professional career coach, member of the Association of Career Professionals

The session with Natalia Pereverzeva was valuable for me! Instant rapport! Pleasant and easy communication! Sincere desire to help! Kindness and diplomacy! Faith in the best and manifestation of this faith! A New Look at Simple Coaching Techniques! And the most important thing is that Natalya managed to easily and delicately reach my deepest values (only a few can do this) And as a result, we outlined certain reference points in my professional development! I express my deep gratitude! And I will be very glad to cooperate!

Systems Analyst,
Saint Petersburg

Ilya Grinyuk

business coach, Co-Founder/CEO at Mobil 1 Center Podorozhnik Auto, master coach Moscow www.ilyagrinyuk.ru

Excellent master class by Natalia Pereverzeva “Personal branding. Connecting with yourself”! A mix of a creative and rational approach to the formation of a personal brand opens up new opportunities for effective promotion in the market! The result of the master class for me was the identification of blind spots, work on which will begin in the near future. Thanks again!

Grasevich Dmitry

General Director of DELEX GROUP LLC

On behalf of DELEX GROUP LLC, I express my sincere appreciation and gratitude to your company Style of Success for the effective, fruitful cooperation and assistance provided in the selection of personnel: engineers, logisticians, sales managers. I would like to note your professionalism, high efficiency in your work, maximum focus on wishes when selecting specialists. Your company is distinguished by its prompt approach and efficiency in solving emerging problems of any complexity, a good combination of speed and quality. I am confident in maintaining existing business relationships and further mutually beneficial cooperation in the field of personnel selection and training. I wish your company successful development and achievement of new heights in business!

Chuiko Valery Anatolievich

General Director of TRANSMAR TRADE LLC

The company "TRANSMAR TRADE" LLC expresses gratitude to the company "Style of Success" LLC for the services provided in the field of personnel selection. During the period of cooperation, the company showed and confirmed its professional level, high competence in quickly solving assigned tasks of filling positions with rare highly qualified specialists. I would like to note the efficiency, quick response to clarifying questions, attentive attitude towards us as clients, HR partner Anna Bondarenko. We recommend the company "Style of Success" to companies interested in fast and high-quality services in the field of personnel selection. We are confident in further productive cooperation!

Sergey Yurievich Lobarev

Ph.D., Chairman of the Board of the NP “Guild of Driving Schools”

Having experience in business for more than 30 years and considering himself a successful creative person who finds time to search for new forms and methods, both for personal growth and for the development of the company, classes with coach Natalya Pereverzeva not only impressed, but amazed me with their energy and an extraordinary approach to the learning process. Working with the assigned tasks fit surprisingly harmoniously into my busy schedule. Indeed, it is sometimes difficult for an experienced person who has a status in society to accept corrections, wishes, and recommendations for self-analysis over the years. When communicating with an expert, you feel tact, professionalism, and a desire to be useful. I am very pleased to have met and worked with this charming lady and consider her a very strong specialist in this field.

I usually leave these tasks for lunch or the end of the working day, settle down in a leather chair with legs, pour another 700 ml into my water bottle, immerse the straw and... open the lectures. I take full advantage of these tips and lessons for creating my cohesive personal brand. It turned out that I had already done some things intuitively, and some things inspired me to take a more serious approach.

Olga Mark

Alexandra Solovyova

A very cool topic for those who are undecided, who are lost, and in general for those who like everything to be sorted out. The tasks seem simple, but nevertheless they are aimed precisely at putting everything in its place in your head, helping you understand yourself, what you want and what they want from you. Understand how to present yourself correctly, what story to tell about yourself and how. Thank you so much to the girls for the idea itself, I will support you and super-curate it.

Alexandra Solovyova

Olga Nikolaenko

The course became for me a powerful, exciting quest into myself, into my mind. Sometimes a question arises in our thoughts, and we cannot find the right answer for a long time... Then “bang”! A certain book falls into your hands, and, reading chapter by chapter, you find the answer! The course of Elena and Nadezhda is a huge “book”, one might call it an “encyclopedia”.

Olga Nikolaenko

Anastasia Wenzel

I personally could not stop after the first course at the IDEA-class School and wanted to penetrate deeper and deeper into the smallest moments of this system. Until now, such a system of associative approach to the analysis of a person’s appearance, where they proceed precisely from the general impression of personality traits, was unfamiliar to me and I consider it absolutely unique in the sea of other systems! It's great to have you guys - keep up the good work!

Anastasia Wenzel

Julia Dondo

I was pleased with the cooperation with IDEA-class. The load regime was comfortable for me. Feedback is good. I had no problems during the learning process. I especially want to emphasize the depth of presentation of the material. I did not study at other schools, so I have nothing to compare with, but the knowledge gained at the School not only expanded my horizons in the field of fashion and style, but also launched a mechanism for independent knowledge of the aesthetics of visual images in art, cinema, photo shoots, and the world around me .

The concept of a brand refers to an image that is fixed in the minds of people. The image pops up when they hear the name or see the product or logo. “Personal branding” or “Personal branding”, in turn, is society’s perception of a person’s personality, his abilities and personal qualities. Personal branding creates a certain impression about a person in people’s minds.

The concept of personal branding

Typically, most professionals think that personal branding is only for politicians, movie stars, entrepreneurs, etc. Of course, a personal brand is necessary for strong and independent leaders, but in fact, in modern conditions of life, personal branding is an indispensable tool on the path to success for every person, regardless of profession.

Definition 1

Personal branding is broadly defined as a completely planned and strategic process aimed at promoting one's own brand. The process of creating a personality brand is long and labor-intensive. This is a creative way of communicating with others, which makes a person special and unique. Personal branding involves hard work on yourself. Creating a personality brand is possible only when a person understands his strengths, including skills, values, preferences and knows how to use them correctly.

Why build a personal brand?

In the modern world, the level of competition is quite high. To stand out from the crowd, you need to declare yourself, you need to find your individuality and your style, to be noticeable in comparison with other people. Therefore, creating a personal brand contributes to the development of:

Popularity: build your importance and popularity.
Confidence: Develop self-confidence.
Status: strengthen your position in society.
Definitions: pay more attention to your business, business.
Reputations: Develop your authority and trustworthiness.
Self-realization: achieve your ultimate goals.

Combining a profession with personal branding opens up great professional opportunities. These include an increase in the number of clients and the quality of contacts for your company, advancement on the career ladder and higher paid jobs,

Who needs personal branding?

Personal branding is for all those people who are determined to achieve their own goals through honest work. Personal branding is a crucial path to success, regardless of profession and educational level. Apart from being a significant source of income, it can also provide name and recognition in society.

How to create your personal brand?

To create a personal brand, focus on your branding vision. The following steps will help you with this:

- Write down your values—everything that gives meaning to your life. For example:
- Relationships (family, friends)
- Society
- Mental capacity
- Hobby
- Ambitions or goals
- Defining your values correctly and accurately will help you develop a successful personal branding strategy.

Step 2. After listing and classifying values, it is necessary to determine their priority. When setting priorities, it is best to rely on personal interests.

Step 3. Determine your personality traits, which are understood as characteristics that describe internal (deep) characteristics. Below are the five most important personality traits:

Integrity, meaning the honest performance of one's formal and informal responsibilities.
Openness to new ideas and experiences, showing a level of openness and curiosity.
The degree of extraversion, which shows a person's preference to be around people.
A degree of self-acceptance based on the ability to accept oneself with all its strengths and weaknesses.
Neuroticism, which indicates the degree of tendency to be in a negative emotional state.

Step 4: In the last step, discuss your plan and strategy with people close to you, those who know and understand you.

How to promote your brand?

Note 1

Just creating a personal brand is not enough - the brand must be promoted.

To promote your brand, you need to follow these steps.

Create your own toolkit: profile, portfolio with images, etc.

Determine the environment for promotion. This is a very important aspect to consider. As a medium for promoting your branding, you can use: self-promotion, various agencies, print publications, electronic publications, etc.

Make your presence known online, such as by creating a social media profile.

Create your website. A personal website with a detailed portfolio is one of the best ways of personal branding. If you have a website, any search engine will eventually index your name and contact information.

Update the website regularly. Post interesting articles and publications to increase website traffic and attract new customers.

Share your updates on all social networking sites: post photos, messages, tweets and other information. Make sure your images are of good quality in advance.

Join an online forum that is related to your profession.

Review the comments sent to you to help improve your strategy.

Determine the target audience, that is, people who are specifically interested in you, in your profession, and maintain communication with them.

Attend all the events and seminars that interest you, meet different people and leave them your business card.

Organize promotional events when possible. For example, you can turn to specialists in promotion on social networks or print publications. It is an unlimited and highly effective source of personal branding.

Choose the right clothes: Your personal image, sense of style and body language are extremely important. Choose clothes that best represent you. Also, be polite enough to convince others.

Note 2

Personal branding helps increase your influence and improve your reputation in the market. However, it should be remembered that personal branding is a fairly long-term strategy that involves serious commitment. It will probably take quite some time before you see the first results. Although the prospects that open up after creating a strong personal brand are worth all the effort.