Personal Branding

Important of organizational branding
Brands are often an organization’s most valuable asset. A strong brand can generate a loyal consumer and positive sales. It is the responsibility of the marketer to create a brand that consumers view as positive and valuable. In order for the brand to be valuable to the consumer, it needs to simplify the decision making process and reduce the risk for the consumer. Positive branding can influence consumer behavior. Having a strong brand will result in better earnings and profit performance, which will generate greater shareholder value for the organization.

Personal brand in 21st century
Personal branding is important within the 21st century. Many hiring organizations research employees on the Internet and find unsettling information that could have been prevented by the individual had they monitored their personal brand. Personal branding can have a tremendous affect on how an employee, celebrity, or public figure is viewed. A negative brand can cause job loss, rejection, or public humiliation for individuals. To create a successful personal brand, individuals can research their name online to find and remove negative information associated with them. In addition, they could enhance their current online presence and create content that promotes their best assets. Furthermore, individuals could promote their brand by having peers and organizations recommend and bolster their positive skillsets to others. This can be done by networking and creating friendships with industry influencers.

Branding process
The term personal brand was first introduced in an article by author Tom Peters in 1997. The process was developed to help individual’s use critical thinking and analytical reasoning to enhance their career planning. Within brand credibility, third-party endorsements have a tremendous affect on generating credibility for individuals as well as businesses, which assist with spreading positive brand awareness. Individual branding is different in that it requires a positive attitude and relationship building. Unlike business branding, which recommends posting a social ad or banner on a webpage, billboard, and in magazines, personal branding requires networking. Networking can be done via social networks, local group meetings, and events. In addition, during these networking sessions the individual needs to be likable and must present good character.

Branding involves creating, maintaining, and enhancing brand awareness. Marketers can purchase advertising targeted at audiences based on behavioral indicators and key performance indicators. This method is often used in online social media spaces by large brands. This practice does not differ based on the type of product or if that product is a person or an intangible asset. In addition, endorsements help enhance consumers’ attitudes and behaviors toward the brand. Attitudes toward the brands message have an impact on the consumers’ purchase and behavioral intentions. To promote the brand, marketers could invest in advertising, which is a more general means of communication for promoting the brand.

A perfect example of marketing based on consumers’ brand attitude and publicity is the beats headphone brand. The brand was introduced without a large budget and focused on building credibility through celebrity and word-of-mouth. As the consumers accepted the credibility as positive, they spread word about the product as being a commodity to those interested in owning the popular brand. With the help of social promotions, celebrity credibility, industry targeted publicity, and brand messaging; the brand has developed into a multi-billion dollar company.

Marketing-oriented publicity enhances positive and negative cognitive responses of a buyer. A positive cognitive response enhances the brand messaging for the consumer, which has an impact on their purchasing decision. Consequently, a negative attitude and cognitive response toward the brand messaging reducing the likelihood of a consumer purchasing.

A personal brand is a presentation of an individuals unique skills, knowledge, experience, and expertise that make the individual memorable to other. These unique assets influence employers to hire and professionals to want to work with individuals. In order for individuals to expand their social brand and generate brand awareness, they can start by creating or cleaning up their social media pages. On social media pages individuals should not post anything that they don’t want employers to see. This includes both text and images. In addition to social media pages, individuals should create digital portfolios and personal websites. The benefits of these are that employers can easily find websites and it allows the individual to present themselves in favorable conditions.

In addition to creating and enhancing the personal brand, the individual should always monitor their brand activity. For instance, the individual can google their name and see what content shows. If the content is something unfavorable, they should contact the content poster or website and ask for it to be removed. Or remove it themselves if they have access.