Every way you turn, you keep hearing about branding. However, do you really understand the importance of personal branding and what it means for your job search and career success.
In today’s competitive job market where the best of the best are challenged for top-paying positions and key leadership roles, you need a strong brand message that is clear, concise and consistent.
Here are the 5 “must-haves” in personal branding:
1. What are you offering and bringing to the table? Be clear on your strengths, skills, and talents and know how to best showcase them in your online and offline career marketing messages – describe your talents in a compelling manner.
2. Are you being authentic? Whether you are communicating with colleagues, employers or recruiters, everyone can spot a phony person in a second.
Powerful, personal branding is not about putting on a “front” or “facade” – when you are honest and present your authentic self to others, your confidence shows and confidence always sells!
3. What is unique about you and differentiates you from the competition? If you keep getting stumped by the question, “Why should I hire you?”, you have not thought carefully about your career distinction. Being qualified for the job is not enough; being able to do the job effectively is not enough; so what else do you have?
Review your career achievements and top contributions, identify your career trend or consistent theme, and determine how to best “sell” those qualities/abilities, time and time again.
4. Are you in the know-how? The business world and business environment changes over time so it’s important to understand and recognize trends in hiring, social media impact and the most effective ways of getting your message(s) to your target audience.
It’s a fact – employers do Google searches, LinkedIn profile are standard and using Twitter to communicate your personal brand is not anything new. Make sure you are leveraging all tools to keep your message upfront, fresh and relevant.
5. Are you focused? We all experience information overload, so use Twitter messages (Tweets) as the standard for your career marketing messages. Keep them short, have a laser focus on your key achievements and contributions and shift the most important part of the message in first few words.
Personal branding is still important and personal branding still works for all of us.
