April 12, 2013
A Lesson on Personal Branding: It’s About Leadership, Not Self-Promotion
We’ve all heard the buzz words ‘professional branding’ or ‘personal branding.’ Some industry leaders have been singing that tune for years, while others are finally joining the wave of modern methods of job seeking and career advancement after recent focus of how can be and should develop a brand image for themselves.
Though social media is an ever-booming and easy tool to use in creating and promoting what you uniquely offer the world, it’s not the end-all be all to cultivating the brand that is you, especially if you want to see solid results. Forbes contributor Glenn Llopis writes about this notion, saying “Unfortunately, personal branding has become a ‘commoditized’ term that has lost its intention as people have irresponsibly used social media as a platform to build their personal brand and increase their relevancy. They believe social media can immediately increase their market value for their personal brand rather than recognizing that the process of developing their personal brand is a much bigger responsibility; a never-ending journey that extends well beyond social media.”
He goes on to detail what personal branding truly means —going beyond self-promotion and into demonstrating a ‘consistent value’ to the market as a leader—and how you can best develop and leverage a longstanding, competitive presence in your field.