Up until now I have talked about various aspects of branding including small business branding and branding for churches and non-profits but did you know that you can be a “brand” yourself? Yes, you! The concept of “Personal branding” is becoming more and more popular in recent years especially with the ability individuals now have to have a voice on the Internet, social networks not to mention at lot of entrepreneurs have always recognized the power and responsibility of “personal branding.”

Maybe if you think of people that are their own brand the names of CEO’s, actors or talk show hosts will come to mind but such branding is not restricted to the world wide famous people no more than branding is restricted to companies like Apple, Coca-Cola or Toyota.

Online I have pretty much standardized on a user name I developed a few years ago. I go by the name, Linkerjpatrick for a few reasons;

• It’s more unique than my given name which quite a few other people may have
• Interest in web design and blogging through “linking”
• Efforts to link up with other people in my community
•  I was also inspired as a fan of the Myst series of games

I think an important thing to remember is that personal branding happens all the time. We may not go out of our way to develop ourselves as an Oprah or Steve Jobs but every day we make our “personal brand” known.  Ever since I have become more aware that I have responsibility for everything I say or the way I dress I am more careful. I see social networks, blogs and forums as less of a way to vent or have fun and more of a way to share knowledge and my “personal brand.”  If you are a business owner or even an employee you are an asset, dare a say a “product” of your company. Is your personal brand attractive? Are you known as someone who listens and solves problems or is your personal brand known for being a live wire, insincere, etc? Does your personal brand stand out in way the has positive ramifications?

If you are interested in reading more about what it means to have a “personal brand” check out the article by Tom Peters called, The Brand Called You, written back in 1997. It less of a “self-help” concept and more of a “self-packaging” concept. You also may want to read and subscribe to Dan Schawbel’s  Personal Branding Blog and also his personal branding magazine. You may also want to check out the recorded Tele-Seminars from the Brand Your World Global Summit on Personal Branding.

I wrote about this subject a few months ago in an article called, Linkerjpatrick - My Personal Brand. This expands on that as part of this branding series. I’m currently working on an official Linkerjpatrick web site but it’s not done yet. Meanwhile feel free to follow me under my “brand name” at Twitter, Flickr, Linkedin  or Facebook among other places.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, February 19th, 2008 at 2:38 pm and is filed under Innovation, Internet, Tips, blogging, branding, marketing, networking, social networks. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.