Some great points, especially about FaceBook. It's not my favorite medium (I'm a twitter gal: lisajohnson) but you have a potential audience of 160 million it makes sense to spend some time there making sure your site looks attractive to potential clients.
Thanks for this post!
Lisa
Mark
· 10 months ago
STRONGLY recommend checking out Retaggr - they're all about personal branding and making a good first impression.
They give you the "ultimate" profile... mixes social and business, you can put under your own domain name, comes with a lifestream, blog widgets, etc. etc.
VoteAudrey
· 10 months ago
Great tips.
For low cost high quality biz cards, check out www.overnightprints.com. Amazing resource, darling of any independent designer. Much cheaper than other (lower grade) competitors, you can design your own or use their template.
And no, that's not a paid sponsorship, I just patronize them!
Oh--my favorite classic on the subject: Scott Bedbury's A New Brand World.
Essential.
Dan Schawbel
· 10 months ago
@ Mark - do you work for Retaggr?
@ Lisa - it's all what works the best for you! :)
T Light
· 10 months ago
Great tips, as the business world is becoming turned up-side-down, it is becoming increasingly more important to develop branding skills!
Mark
· 10 months ago
@Dan - nope! Like VoteAudrey, just a fan - seemed relevant.
Dan, great overview of how to create your brand. Something new that I discovered was the DropCard. I will check it out. Great concept!
Nick Grimshawe
· 10 months ago
Thanks for the great article. I've learned quite a bit about other things I can do to improve my branding. I'll be clicking through the links for awhile I think.
Nick
CountryofCali
· 10 months ago
Shrug. Very "Coffee's for Closers". OK advice for 'cleaning up your act' and 'looking like everyone else.' But there's a big difference between being a good Sales Guy 101 and building a brand.
Audie
· 10 months ago
Thank you for another great article.
Q: What do you suggest to folks who do this for a living?
I have been building social media profiles for artists and companies for years and the last I want do when I get home is maintain a personal profile. When you write articles and blog posts all day - do you go home and write more? And how do you separate personal and professional life on FB and Twitter? Please advise.
All the best, Audie
Meir Marom
· 10 months ago
To showcase your testimonials/recommendations online, and also share your references securely with potential employers and customers, you can create a profile on http://mentionin.com . I created it expressly for this purpose (and it's free, obviously).
usd6
· 10 months ago
Read your article gave me much inspiration, I get a lot of help, before I always thought that brand building is very difficult to do ... Thank you!
vega
· 10 months ago
Branding is good but if you make one serious mistake people will remember you forever.
Interesting. It seems that poor grammar and spelling are a core part of Dan Schawbel's brand.
Colin
· 10 months ago
Here's a tip Dan:
Poor Spelling + Poor Grammar = Decrease in Brand Value
ted brothers
· 10 months ago
"9. Wardrobe: Your personal style is tangible and is extremely important for standing out from the crowd. Select clothing that best represents you because it will be viewable through your pictures/avatars online, as well as when you meet people in reality." - http://danschawbel.com/Images/headshot4_small.jpg . Ha ha haha hahahahahahahah ha ha.
KyNam Doan
· 10 months ago
@Ben, @Colin, Thanks for moving the ball forward and really adding something to the conversation!
But seriously, this is a good checklist. I've been working on building a personal brand and I've missed a few of these steps myself, such as the email and online business card. I have a retaggr account, but have never given it out.
Thanks, Ky
many
· 10 months ago
HAHA, thats really funny, is it another somewhat try for social engineering self expose guide here?
Dan Schawbel
· 10 months ago
@Colin @Ben - thanks for commenting on this post. It's great to see you reveal yourself through comments. I've learned a lot by you from the URL you left on your comments. Always good to see people include their last name for identification as well.
Thanks for the feedback :)
Kara Edwards
· 10 months ago
Dan,
There is great advice here, thank you for sharing! I look forward to reading more from you in the future!
Kara
Steve
· 10 months ago
These are all good ideas, but remember a person or business needs to have a product or service and a detailed business plan or a job seeking with a resume. Branding should be done after that is done.
Timothy
· 10 months ago
LinkedIn rocks
Craig
· 10 months ago
Many steps to developing your personal brand, these seem to be specifically for getting a job. Can you also develop multiple personal brands for different areas of interests?
Marcus
· 10 months ago
Never heard of Dan.. so it's hard for me to take his advice. Now, Beyonce, Oprah, Diddy, Martha Stewart, David Beckham, Tiger Woods.. those are brands I've heard of. Why not just hire a publicist?
Daniel Anderson
· 10 months ago
Great Article Dan
This is a question for you (or anyone else for that matter), Do you think it is possible to use Personal Branding in the IT Industry?
I am just wondering if I should go down the personal branding line or a company branding line?
Any thoughts would be most appreciated.
Cheers
Daniel
Kevin
· 10 months ago
Great, great read. The ultimate accessory for your brand is a short, memorable domain name. One that possibly isn't a real word ,but catchy nonetheless.
Long tail domains are overrated!
Kevin
Peter Knight
· 10 months ago
"Your self-impression = How people perceive you"
could you elaborate on what you exactly mean with this?
self-impression can mean many different things.
Designer
· 10 months ago
incase u'll need a web designer to create a website to promote your brand then you should visit this site: RedesignYourBiz.com
Gerald
· 9 months ago
Yeah...and where's the news? I mean, I expected to read about a couple of really covert ego branding strategies. Instead I got Facebook and LinkedIn. Crazyyyyy!!!
Rachel
· 9 months ago
Facebook does NOT allow you to prevent others from tagging you in photos. The best you can do is let them know you don’t want to be tagged, and/or untag yourself from any photos you find inappropriate after you’ve been tagged. Not ideal.
Joseph Curran
· 9 months ago
Thanks for a great article. It puts a lot of things in perspective with regard to branding. It has given me a greater understanding of the importance of it and how it is accomplished. This is extremely helpful to someone still learning how all this social medium works... I for one thank you for laying out the steps. I noticed in one of the comments that someone questioned how you separate or maintain the difference between a professional life and the personal life with social media such as Facebook, etc. I am wondering if maybe, there really isn't a difference with social media, since it is so open and immediate. Seems we all need to be careful with both. Some here also laughed about the clothing comments in the article... Least we forget, many people still judge the book by its cover.
@carlplant
· 9 months ago
Brand identity...check....business card....check.....blog...check....FB/Linkedin ...check....wardrobe..err...err..ahh I may have spent too long on here doing the rest!
Amadou Sy
· 9 months ago
Hi there, thanks for this interesting post. I also think that the step after creating its own brand, is to monitor it carefully. A simple google alert is a good starting point. After all you will see what people see when they google your brand. Maybye this is a subject for another post. .:| Amadou |:.
sydney
· 8 months ago
what are you talking about branding what is it i do not know that this is important to me right now
Business Card
· 6 months ago
I need to add my branding to all my correspondence. I was missing a number of profiles and email signatures.
Jack Smith
· 6 months ago
If you are going to make sure to have some form of your domain in Step 4, then shouldn't you also use Google Apps to host your email so your email address can be first.last@yourdomain.com rather than first.last@gmail.com. Perhaps it is poor form to judge, but I always wonder about professionalism when a business owner hands me a card with @yahoo.com, @gmail.com or whatever.
ritaroni
· 6 months ago
Maybe some of that is common sense, but what an amazing article. I have a lot of work to do yet.
jordan shoes
· 4 months ago
creat my own brand, that deserves a try.
Antjuan.LaShawn
· 2 months ago
Thank you for this helpful information. My company; Empyrean Perspectives Inc. has a new client that is in need of some personal branding. If this site truly helps you'll begin to see and hear about e.d. mondainé. Hope to hear more from you.
Thank you again, Antjuan. LaShawn
alisonjuli23
· 2 months ago
We help you discover topics that best fit your industry niche. www.contentunltd.com
All Comments
Thanks for this post!
Lisa
They give you the "ultimate" profile... mixes social and business, you can put under your own domain name, comes with a lifestream, blog widgets, etc. etc.
For low cost high quality biz cards, check out www.overnightprints.com. Amazing resource, darling of any independent designer. Much cheaper than other (lower grade) competitors, you can design your own or use their template.
And no, that's not a paid sponsorship, I just patronize them!
Oh--my favorite classic on the subject: Scott Bedbury's A New Brand World.
Essential.
@ Lisa - it's all what works the best for you! :)
Regarding using gmail addresses - what's your take on getting info@yourname.com, or firstname@lastname.com (if you can get it), or some variant of that?
Nick
Q: What do you suggest to folks who do this for a living?
I have been building social media profiles for artists and companies for years and the last I want do when I get home is maintain a personal profile. When you write articles and blog posts all day - do you go home and write more? And how do you separate personal and professional life on FB and Twitter? Please advise.
All the best,
Audie
Poor Spelling + Poor Grammar = Decrease in Brand Value
But seriously, this is a good checklist. I've been working on building a personal brand and I've missed a few of these steps myself, such as the email and online business card. I have a retaggr account, but have never given it out.
Thanks, Ky
Thanks for the feedback :)
There is great advice here, thank you for sharing! I look forward to reading more from you in the future!
Kara
This is a question for you (or anyone else for that matter), Do you think it is possible to use Personal Branding in the IT Industry?
I am just wondering if I should go down the personal branding line or a company branding line?
Any thoughts would be most appreciated.
Cheers
Daniel
Long tail domains are overrated!
Kevin
could you elaborate on what you exactly mean with this?
self-impression can mean many different things.
you should visit this site: RedesignYourBiz.com
...check....wardrobe..err...err..ahh I may have spent too long on here doing the rest!
.:| Amadou |:.
Thank you again,
Antjuan. LaShawn
www.contentunltd.com