by Dan Schawbel, Personal Branding Expert

The concept of personal branding is revolutionary and has changed our perception of those around us.  People, instead of products or corporations are now being regarded as brands, sharing similar characteristics.  Both personal and corporate brands have values, identities, personalities, an image and equity.  Today, this concept has been adopted by both recruiters and applicants alike, all for the common goal of capturing the best-fit match.  The competition in both the job and college marketplace has never been more severe.  In order to alleviate this fear and threat, students and professionals have turned to Personal branding.  According to a recent survey from Korn Ferry, personal branding accounted for over 11% of getting an executive recruiters attention.  

Personal branding describes the process by which individuals and entrepreneurs differentiate themselves and stand out from a crowd by identifying and articulating their unique value proposition, whether professional or personal, and then leveraging it across platforms with a consistent message and image to achieve a specific goal. In this way, individuals can enhance their recognition as experts in their field, establish reputation and credibility, advance their careers, and build self-confidence.

The audience in this equation is recruiters, other professionals or members of your network.  In order to brand yourself, you must have some form of differentiation, so that your audience can separate you from other applicants vying for the same position.

Your personal brand consists of three elements:

• Value Proposition: What do you stand for?
• Differentiation: What makes you stand out?
• Marketability: What makes you compelling?

Online personal branding (eBranding) focus areas:

YourName.com:  Your own domain should be your first focus area because it is a collection or central location of all your work and your branding materials.  After purchasing your domain and adding pages, such as your resume and portfolio, you need to communicate the site with your audience by using marketing tactics such as word-of-mouth.  Other tactics you may use is viral marketing through direct contact with others through email and phone mediums and by submitting your domain to search engines like Google.  If you already have a blog or another website, be sure to advertise your brand domain name on it.  Connecting with people in your network is also a smart strategy to drive traffic to a newly created brand domain.

Avatars:  These small graphical elements should be a professional picture of you.  Avatars are used in a variety of different ways on the internet, but are especially concentrated in social networks, such as Facebook, Twitter, Second Life and many blog networks. Your Avatar should display your professional photo.  Corporations use Avatars to illustrate their logo’s as a form of advertising. Whether you are posting in a blog or sending an email, you want your Personal Brand to represent your true appearance. Avatars have recently been deemed the standard in portrait displays for all of web 2.0 on the internet.  After developing one, it can be leverage in almost all social media websites, which is why it’s important that you make one immediately before investing in other parts of your brand.

Social Networks:  Today, most of the population is registered in at least one social networking website, whether it is MySpace, Facebook or others.  Issues do arise from messages that are posted that have a negative impact on Personal Brands.  If you join one of these networks, be sure that you set your privacy controls, use professional pictures and moderate comments and messages.  Recruiters view these websites and may turn you away after finding out certain information. 

Blogs:  A content distribution system, that not only creates a community of people that share similar interests, but acts as its own subscription service, where your words are syndicated through emails or other websites through RSS.  Blogging is one of the most remarkable Personal branding channels because the content is personable and direct.  When starting a blog, you may register with a host such as Google Blogger or Wordpress.  The idea with blogs and your brand is to stand out through taking a niche topic and blogging about it on an ongoing basis.  Blogs consist of posts that are either written or in a video format, where you can express your interest and expertise in a given topic.  Typically, you should avoid any ideas or visuals that would give your brand a bad reputation.  Photos and video’s should be used to re-emphasize your points, as well as links to other blogs that directly connect with your topic.  Be sure to comment on other blogs, as that creates a network, where you will get more visitors and more people writing on your topic.

Podcasts:  Video content is especially useful for your brand if you have a vivacious personality in front of the camera.  In the future, resumes may be formatted into multimedia, where individuals will have to pitch their core message in 30 seconds and forward it to a recruiter.  Podcasting is useful because it highlights your overall brand, in the form of dynamic content.

Forums:  Discussion forums give you the ability to learn from others, display your brand through an avatar and for self-promotion purposes.  By participating in forums, especially ones involving recruitment, you are able to connect with others who share your interests or recruiters that may have open positions.

LinkedIn:  A networking website that allows you to connect with previous coworkers, schoolmates or new acquaintances.  Your resume should be visible, including recommendations and a core message summary.  Your network is your most powerful tool to excel in your career, so make sure that as you meet new people you connect with them through this site. [Editor's note: Dave Mendoza of Six Degrees from Dave and Paul DeBettignies at RecruitingBlogs.com are very active LinkedIn linkers and experts.  Check them out.]

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