| Personal Branding
Challenges
You already have a personal brand. The strength of this brand depends
on the decisions you make every single day. Strong personal brands
don't just materialise overnight. They need to be nurtured. This
requires commitment. The question you need to ask yourself is whether
you are willing to make the sacrifices need to build a strong personal
brand that stands the test of time. Are you willing to overcome the
challenges that will inevitably arise as you start to build your brand?
Having invested considerable time, effort and money researching the
main reasons why certain professionals are more successful than others,
I have identified 10 obstacles. misconceptions & limiting
beliefs
that you will probably encounter when starting to build your personal
brand.
1.
I'll alienate my
family & friends
You may think that embarking on a focused process of personal brand
development requires you to behave in a way that may alienate your
family & friends. After all they love you just the way you are
don't they?
However, as you move through the process of building your personal
brand, you will find that your relationships with family &
friends
will actually be strengthened. Why? Simply because you will be clearer
on what your core values are. You will also be clearer on how the
people most important to you can help you to build your brand.
Its worth keeping in mind the following quote from Anthony Robbins the
world famous personal development guru.
"Whoever you spend time with is who you become"
If the people that you have around you on a day to day basis are having
a negative influence or holding you back then you need to think about
the ways in which you can change your environment so that you spend
more time with people that share the same aspirations as yourself.
As Anthony Robbins also says very succinctly, "love your family, pick
your peer group". You can't choose your family but you definetly can
choose who outside of your family you associate with. If you want to
build your brand find people who have a higher set of standards than
you. This way you will have no choice but to raise your game in order
to build rapport with these people.
2. I'll be perceived as
ruthless &
arrogant
I
speak to many people who
are very resistant to the idea of personal branding because they
believe that you need to be ruthless & arrogant in order to
stand
out from the crowd. They say its a tough world out there and to get
noticed you need to be prepared to trample over a few people in order
to get noticed.
This couldn't be further from the truth. In any walk of life the most
successful brands are those that are sensitive to the needs of their
marketplace. They recognise that trust is at the foundation of a strong
brand. Ruthlessness or arrogance is very much at odds with trust.
Just ask yourself this question. How many people are likely to want to
build a relationship with you if they believe that you are ruthless?
3.
Creating a
strong personal brand will take too long
Yes, it does take time to build a strong personal brand. Therefore you
need to take a long term view on the positive results that it will
deliver.
Real results never come quickly. If you are good at a particular sport
just think how many hours of practice you've put in over the years to
get good. When you started at University or College you knew that you
were committing yourself to several years of study.
However, its worth remembering what those years of study and practice
have enabled you to do. Would you be in the job you are now if it
weren't for the results you achieved earlier in life?
They key to building momentum and energy around your brand building
efforts is to "chunk down" your plan into smaller short term goals.
This way you avoid losing motivation when you hit the inevitable
challenges that will arise along the way.
Nonetheless, many professionals get into a comfort zone in their
career. They simply stop investing in themselves. Maybe you're one of
these people or maybe you know someone like this. Why does
this happen? Success is one reason. You enjoy a certain level of
success in your career and then settle for that what you've got. The
urgency and drive that you had earlier in your career disappears.
4.
I don't want to seen as a
show off
I've come across many people how associate personal branding with
"showing off". Perhaps this is a culture thing. In many countries we're
actively discouraged from publicising our achievements.
The truth of the matter is that personal branding & showing off
are
at 2 separate ends of the communications spectrum. Showing off is the
least effective way of communicating your uniqueness to others. It
requires minimal effort and thought and is likely to weaken your
relationships. A well thought out personal brand on the other hand will
strengthen your relationships.
Its our individual achievements that make each of us different. We
should communicate these achievements to others. However, we need to
carefully consider HOW they are communicated.
5.
I don't know how
to start building my personal brand
If you think this then you're not alone. Personal Branding is not
formally taught in any schools, Universities or Colleges. Furthermore,
very few businesses have yet to recognise how they can improve employee
moral and productivity through personal branding
Personal Branding is still in an embryonic state. There are only a
handful of professionals who are pro actively coaching and training
others in Personal Branding. Consequently, one of the fastest and best
ways to find out where to start building your personal brand is by
speaking to a coach who specialises in this area.
There are also a number of books that have been written on personal
branding. Check out the resources section on this site where I've
produced a list of books that are worthing reading.
6. I can succeed
without a strong personal brand
If you hold this believe then I would say good luck because you will
most definetly need it.
Given the rate of change in todays marketplaces, what worked for you in
the past in unlikely to work as well for you in the future. The skills
& knowledge that you've developed to date will in all
likelihood
hold minimal value in 2 to 3 years time.
Skills are as much a
commodity as any
product or service. There will always be someone else out there who is
one step ahead of you in learning the latest skills in using a
particular product. More so now that we live in a global marketplace
where the same job can be done just as easily in India as it can in the
UK or USA but at a fraction of the cost.
If you want to stay ahead of the pack then you need to start investing
in building a strong brand identity for yourself. A strong personal
brand gives you the edge when others are suffering from the effects of
organisational downsizing, rightsizing and outsourcing.
7.
My achievements
aren't worth talking about
In many countries we're encouraged to be humble about our achievements.
"Don't brag" is the message I was given as a child.
The irony is that if we don't talk about what we've achieved then how
will anyone know what makes us different from the person standing next
to us in the queue for the job that you really want.
Committing to a process of personal brand building will help you to
identify achievements that you previously considered unworthy of
sharing & how you communicate these achievements to
others in
a
way that builds respect.
8.
I just don't have
time or motivation to build my personal brand
At our core, human beings are motivated by only 2 factors.
1. Pleasure
2. Pain
Every action that we take during every moment of the day is driven be
the need to gain pleasure or avoid pain.
Why would you therefore embark on a process of personal brand
building? The answer will be different for each person. However, you
are either looking to move away from some degree of pain that currently
exists in your life or your looking to achieve a higher degree of
pleasure. In either case you need to be sufficiently motivated in order
to reach the outcome.
Typically, many professionals will wait until circumstances force them
to take action. For example, personal brand building may only become
relevant as a result of redundancy. Alternatively, you may have started
your own business but are struggling to generate any sales. Either way,
their is enough pain for you to take action immediately.
However, there are many examples from history that illustrate that its
easier to find help when you don't need it than when you need it
immediately. Things may seem just great right now in your
life.
There may not seem like any need to worry about your personal brand.
However, your future prosperity is far from guaranteed. Only by
anticipating what is likely to happen in the future can you
be
more assured of continued success.
Rather than procrastinate , taking action now to start building your
personal brand will help to ensure that you avoid pain in the future.
9.
I don't have the
money needed to build a strong personal brand
How much money do you think that you need to build a strong personal
brand?
In 2005, a British student called Alex Tew was looking to find a way of
paying of his student loans. He created a web page called "Millionaire
Dollar homepage" which cost him £50 to set up & asked
friends, family & businesses to purchase pixels on the
homepage. As
more businesses purchased space and more traffic came to the site, its
value sky rocketed. From being a debt ridden student with no
visibility, Alex Tew's personal brand is now going to ensure that he
has a vibrant career ahead of him, all for the price of £50.
The lesson this example presents is that building a strong personal
brand is about working smarter with the money you do have.
Communications technology offers many low cost ways of building your
brand. Just like Alex Tew, launching your own website doesn't cost much
money. Furthermore, promoting it won't either. Creating a simple
newsletter and sending it to your entire contact network can be
achieved for less than £50.
10.
Personal
Branding is just a load of marketing spin
The marketing industry is great at producing new phrases and
strap-lines to describe ideas that have been available for generations
aren't they? As a marketing professional I'm well aware of the tricks
that can be used to sell products and services.
Its perfectly legitimate to question whether personal branding is just
another spin on self development ideas that have been freely available
for years. There is no right or wrong answer to this question
because personal branding does indeed pull
ideas and strategies from other other areas.
What makes Personal Branding so powerful however is not the ideas that
are being used but the way they are applied. Personal Branding is
results driven. It understands that any brand is only successful if it
builds some form of loyalty and a degree of trust with the people who
purchase it. Personal Branding is focused on the long term. It doesn't
promise to transform you life in 30 days.
For this reason only the truly motivated professionals who are
genuinely committed to get the most out of their careers will follow
through on building their personal brand.
If you are such a professional then Matrix Business Coaching would be
delighted to discuss how we can help. For more information please
complete the contact box below.
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