Keys to Building a Personal Brand

When you are an entrepreneur you don’t just have your business brand to look after to, but you have your personal brand too. A lot of people would ask, what is a brand, what do we mean by that? Well, your brand is what people say when you are not in the room. Intense right? So what do you want people to say about you when you are not there?


Now a lot of people would also say that a personal brand is not important when running a company. Think for a moment, you as a business owner would go out drinking every weekend and get completely drunk (let’s just say it as it is) and you would post that all over social media, now me as a customer before I would engage with someone in business I would always look them up on social media. Now imagine me arriving on your social media page and I am seeing all of these inappropriate photos of you, do you think I would do business with you? The answer is hell no

 

Your personal brand, what people say about you when you are not in the room will have a direct impact on how well your business brand performs.


I always say you need to take care of your personal brand as that is all you have, it will take you years to build a personal brand and get the credibility you want, but that personal brand can be destroyed in seconds.

 

5 tips on how to build a personal brand:

  • Be authentic - Just be yourself.
  • Decide which attributes you would like to showcase - how do you want people to perceive you.
  • Your values need to be aligned with your vision you have for your personal brand.
  • Get active on social media - social media is the biggest marketing platform in the world.
  • Find your niche - decide what is your message and who is your audience.

Remember - how you speak, how you look and how you act is what resembles your personal brand

ReadErna Basson