Personal Branding: building ‘unique you’ brand

By Rania B. Kudsi 

HR Professional and Career Coach 

Initially, let us define what personal branding is and its effectiveness to get you hired. 

According to Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, “Your brand is what people say about you when you’re not in the room.” Personal Branding, in other words, the YOU brand: it is communicating the uniqueness you offer to the world, Personal Branding highlights your skills, experiences, qualifications, strengths, passion, goals and your positive attitude sets which differentiate you and let you stand out from the crowd. 

Why build your Personal Branding? And how does it relate to your career ?

• It helps you understand and define yourself, which leads to connecting yourself with your values, qualifications, skills and allowing you to pursue whatever it is that you are passionate about.

• It helps you figure out what makes you unique and differentiate you from the crowd. 

• It provides a clear focus for personal development.

•It changes your mindset and makes you think outside the box.

• It helps the employer get to know you better, as Personal Branding serves as a CV demonstrating your skills, values, attitude, qualifications, and passion.

• It makes it easy to connect with you; as an active strong branded candidate, employers will be attracted to your profile which will make it easier for you to reach the hiring manager through networking and not through the “apply” button. In fact, they might get in touch before you even think of applying or notice any job opening.

• Personal brands attract recruiters. Most professional recruiters now use social media to do a lot of their scouting, so having an attractive personal brand could draw in potential job opportunities.

• “Developing your personal brand is the proactive way of controlling your career development and how you are perceived in the marketplace.” 

How to build an attractive strong Personal Branding 

Whether you like it or not you have to be active on social media. We are living in a digital age which I believe, made it easier for candidates to market themselves and create their unique identity.

According to lucaspsg.ca, below are some tips how to get started: 

• Get involved on multiple platforms (Especially Linkedin) and align your presence on every channel, building your profiles as fully as possible.

• Follow and engage with leaders and influencers in your industry and join groups and discussions to demonstrate your expertise. This will show that you are an engaged and active part of your professional community. For example, look for groups on LinkedIn relevant to your specific field and engage with other professionals.

• Post frequently and update your profiles regularly. Also, be purposeful in what you share; posting content that adds value to your audience.

• Develop your brand with a professional foundation but showcases the traits and habits that make you unique. If you have a fun hobby, show it off! Just avoid posting anything risky, potentially offensive, or something that might make you seem unprofessional. In other words, be yourself, but use good judgement.

• Learn all that you can and become the expert in that area. You can never stop learning. Read, absorb and teach.

• Share your knowledge: Leaning is not enough; you have to help others. Share your knowledge and be a leader within your field. 

• Do not be afraid to talk about yourself, you have to master the “promote yourself” method and attract hiring managers’ and recruiters’ attention not by bragging but by knowledge, expertise, volunteering, values and interests. 

A successful personal brand is ubiquitous, continuously evolving and has a strong narrative. 

So, what is your story?  What do you want people to associate with you when they see your name? Once you understand how you want your brand to be perceived, you can start to be strategic about it while remaining authentic to who you are.

Below are some social media platforms to build your social branding:

1.   Linkedin 

2.   www.steller.co

3. Personal website: It can be two to three pages, which includes your resume, accomplishments and links to all your social media platforms.

4. Twitter

5. Google+

The writer is the founder of Global HCI and a human resources professional