Pleasure to be here - thanks Alex - how many designers / developers / students - red bull
could work equally well as
So what are we talking about when it comes to personal branding?
How many of you know ALL these people / most / at least one. What do they have in common?
Dirty word which has become main stream - convoluted culture surrounding them - we go through 5 stages with web celebs:
Stage 3 is important, great things are born here - how many have heard of ExplicitWeb?
key moment, put them on a pedestal, knocked them off, and finally come back to earth
But before we go any further, let’s talk about what personal branding is NOT
While researching good slide design, came across another presentation on personal branding, this was the opening slide:
FAIL. Supposedly credible, cited the following words as key to personal branding
None of this matters, no one cares how many followers, 2 words come to mind:
Too many misconceptions about what matters when it comes to online branding in general, Gary Vaynerchuk said it best:
Left shit company, started company brand because that’s how branding works, right? But didn’t just want yet another unknown web design agency, knew other people in same position.
Not just to help, but to leave something behind for the people who come after you. Chuk Palahniuk said:
Started out as almost a diary, very personal, quickly grew with competitions and interviews
Started getting more followers, more RSS, more comments, started getting a lot of good feedback and referrals for work.
Personal website getting more traffic than company website, so redesigned it and built it up. Suddenly looking at thousands of followers, not hundreds.
Realised that people appreciated what I was doing, wanted to expose that to a greater audience, approached web design blogs.
Pattern emerging, so killed company site
After this, I started getting asked one question in particular:
lolwut? I’ve only just started, I have no idea what I’m doing - but it got me thinking:
Let’s come back to our original list of celebs:
How many of you know ALL these people / most / at least one. What do they have in common?
3 key elements which all people with successful personal brands have
But there’s one important thing to remember:
Without a network you are just an artist.
Without a personality you are just a business.
Without a skill you are just a douchebag.
If you have all 3, you have a personal brand. But, one more thing:
The secret ingredient outside of the 3 main elements is:
Nobody is interested in getting to know someone false, everyone has quirks and flaws which make them interesting. Imperfections in personal branding are key. Everyone GETS IT WRONG sometimes:
So where’s my fame wealth and success?
There’s some bad news here:
But there’s also some good news:
and some even better news:
Do not give up in what you believe in, do not stop trying, do not let anyone tell you what you can and can’t do.