A Report on Personal Branding

 

By Deborah Ferreira

What is personal branding?

When it comes to the term “branding” most of us think the term refers to a business or organisation – but what is personal branding and how does it differ? In this report let’s jump down the “You” tube (because rabbit holes were so 1990’s) to find a clear explanation of personal branding.  

In simple terms “A personal brand is the unique combination of skills and experiences that make you who you are. It is how you present yourself to the world.” Caroline Castrillon. (2019). Why Personal Branding Is More Important Than Ever. Forbes. 

A personal brand is the unique combination of skills, experience, and personality that you want the world to see about you. It is the telling of your story, and how it reflects your conduct, behaviour, spoken and unspoken words, and attitudes. Werner Geyser. (2021), What is Personal Branding. Influencer Marketing Hub. 

For the average person online, you may think that personal branding is completely unnecessary to your life. This may be true. However, if you use Google, Facebook, Twitter, Chrome or any other online service that requires some of your private information, your persona is already being documented somewhere.  Jenn Chen. (2017). The Ultimate Guide to Personal Branding. Sprout Social. 

Sounds a little creepy, doesn’t it? However, on the flip side, it’s also a great opportunity to take control and create your own narrative of your personal branding. So, take a second to Google yourself to see what your online persona is saying. 

Interesting.. but why is personal branding important?

Personal branding allows you to create a public persona of yourself in a positive way with an aim to build trust and repour with prospective clients and employers. 

When it comes to personal actions like going on a date, being a candidate for an election or going for a job interview, chances are high that people would look online for more information about you. 

So, when people do look online, you want your personal profile to be the best it can be.

This YouTube clip below provides fantastic insight into the importance of personal branding, how it all works and 5 examples that help to inspire.

Brand Master Academy. (Nov 14 2020). “5 Personal Branding Examples To Inspire Your Brand”

How can I use social media for personal branding?

Social Media is a powerful tool to build your personal brand. In Australia alone, there are 17,000,000 Monthly Active people who use Facebook. David Correll. (Feb 2022). Social Media Statistics Australia – January 2022. Social Media News. 

With an overall Australian population of 25.69 million, that equates to around 66% of the population, Video is the second highest most popular social channel in Australia, with around 16.5 million visitors to YouTube every month. The complete breakdown of the top 10 are listed below.

Image source: David Correll. (Feb 2022). Social Media Statistics Australia – January 2022. Social Media News.

Yikes that’s a lot of users across lots of social channels – so where do I start?

According to the Digital Marketing Institute, there are 10 steps to follow when building your personal brand on social media. Some of these include giving all of your social media accounts a health check, identifying your passion or skill, regularly sharing information and creating content that is engaging and consistent to the voice that you’re creating for your personal branding. Digital Marketing Institute. (2021). 10 Steps to Building Your Personal Brand on social media. 

I’m missing a bit of flavour in my personal branding, what are some interesting examples?

Do you know who is currently Australia’s most popular person on Instagram? Go on, take a quick guess. A sports star, a singer, a politician? Nope - it’s Sydney born Miranda Kerr, with 13 million followers. Cristiano Ronaldo (a Portuguese professional footballer) takes the global lead on Instagram, with roughly 470 million followers.

Image: Miranda Kerr’s Instagram page (Mar 2022)         Image: Cristiano Ronaldo Instagram page (Mar 2022)                   

Each of these top running Instagram profiles is a fantastic example of personal branding – but why?

You can see from the snapshots above that they have not just focused on images from their professional lives, but also photos that allow the viewer to get more of an insight into their home, family and personal lives, which attributes to a closer connection to each of the celebrities and to see them as “real people”.

In summary, personal branding involves a range of different strategies across various online platforms and channels to shape and mold your own brand into the creation and reflection you want it to be.