So what is personal branding? It can be interpreted in a variety of different ways, but for today, it is... creating a consistent presence of yourself and your work and using this brand when communicating and networking with peers, colleagues, and others for professional growth YOU ARE ALREADY DOING IT! Things that are already in your personal branding toolkit include: - resume - business card - portfolio - blog or website - email address - even personal style! Communication through social media adds another layer to these things: - LinkedIn profile - Facebook - Twitter
Blog viewed 17,000 times in 2010 @libscenester = Klout score of 46 229 RSS subscribers in google reader Awesome? No, but it's a start. www.libraryscenester.wordpress.com
Personal branding has become more and more important in the digital age, as our interactions online leave almost indelible footprints-- often archived and instantly searchable. We've all heard the stories about someone talking about their boss on Facebook, posting inappropriate photos on Facebook, letting it leak on Twitter that their "sick day" was really just an excuse to sleep in.
EVERYONE DO THAT NOW, FOR REAL! - Ask them the kinds of things they found. Anything positive, negative, surprising? Why? To see what other people see, how you are perceived online. It is important because OTHER PEOPLE are googling you: - Students looking for research help! - Faculty members - Colleagues - Vendors - Future employers - Prospective employees Working strategically, you can control (somewhat) the information that shows up - or at least push GOOD information to the top. Personal branding can help you do that.
By building both personal and professional into your brand, you are sharing your passions in a genuine way. Some people choose to keep their personal and professional lives separate. Even having personal Facebook profiles for friends and family and another for networking. My personal belief is that the awesome comes in when the two overlap. But do whatever you are comfortable with. (image re-created by Erin Dorney, inspired by Ji Lee via SWISS MISS: http://www.swiss-miss.com/2011/04/that-sweet-spot.html)
Don’t be an island! Leverage social networks. Blog, Tumblr, Facebook or Twitter accounts are easy to set up. You can be on your way in less than 10 minutes. But it will take a lot more time than that, and personal branding requires a time commitment. Personal branding does not happen in a void - the whole nature of social media is collaborative and multifaceted. Some tangible steps you can take to integrate yourself into this network include: Visit and comment on other blogs, retweet content, and connect with others to avoid shameless self-promotion. Every time you do this, your exposure rate grows - more people click on your links and your brand becomes stronger. - Use consistent voice, image and persona across different platforms so that people can find you and you can grow your brand. It also helps you look genuine if you’re not completely different on Twitter or Facebook or on your blog.
Be genuine and professional at ALL times. Do not focus on the negative - what is the point? There is a difference between critiquing something with evidence and strategy and ranting about something that annoys you. Remember that online comments last forever and you never know how far networks expand.
If they are saying good things, you want to know about it and continue that conversation, who knows where it will lead? If they are saying bad things, you want to remedy the situation, do a little damage control or spin. Monitoring is easy and there are a lot of programs out there that can help you: Create Google Alerts for your name/brand: http://www.google.com/alerts RSS feeds of advanced Twitter search: Visit http://search.twitter.com/advanced, create searches for your name and other keywords, click on the RSS icon to create and send a feed for each search to your Google Reader. Icerocket Blog Search: http://www.icerocket.com/ Socialmention: http://www.socialmention.com/ Pretty cool - mentions your top keywords, top users (people who reply or mention you), sentiment (positive, negative, and neutral posts), top hashtags, average minutes per mention across the web, time of last mention, etc. Can create RSS feeds/alerts. Topsy Social Analytics: http://analytics.topsy.com/ Klout: http://klout.com/ measurement of your overall online influence identifies influencers on topics across the social web” by assigning a Klout score which is calculated using dozens of variables culled from your social media profiles and interactions it gives you a matrix of your reach, amplification, etc. Measuring these things gives you a benchmark to see if your personal branding efforts are improving. It’s also good to know what people are saying about you so that you can manage your presence and make it work for your purposes, whatever they may be (finding a job, securing a speaking gig, etc). Follow. Engage. Share. Those are KEY.
Try not to focus your entire personal brand around your current job. How will you maintain your brand once your job changes? If you focus your brand on your professional interests and passions instead of your job title or workplace, you will be able to take it with you from institution to institution. Transferability of your personal brand is very important because basically what you’re doing is building relationships - that takes time and you don’t want to have to start over from scratch just because you narrowed your scope too much from the get-go.
Some people are turned off from the whole idea of identity management because “branding” brings to mind selling and PR spinning. Do what you are comfortable with - choose a platform that works for your needs. This also goes for posting frequency, regardless of what platform you select: Find your personal comfort zone on frequency of updating. Posting too often may cause your supervisor or future employer to wonder when you find the time to do your work. If you are posting links every few minutes, others may wonder if you ever read what you repost. It goes back to being genuine. You need to find a balance that works for you. If it’s not comfortable and authentic, people will know, it will feel forced and it won’t work.
Have everyone take a notecard. SECRETLY write down three words that define you. DONT SHOW ANYONE! TRY TO DISGUISE YOUR HANDWRITING! Erin collect them all and shuffle, then redistribute. NOW, you need to talk to other people in the room and try to find out WHOSE NOTECARD YOU HAVE. BUT!!!! You cannot use any of the words that are written on the card. You need to gain other clues to figure this out. GO! Talk about this activity. different ways to describe what defines you, that is the voice of your personal brand.
Open discussion or groups remind them about the URL for resources and suggested readings Open the floor for questions
![[object Object],[object Object],[object Object],[object Object],[object Object],[object Object],[object Object],[object Object],[object Object],[object Object]](data:image/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAIAAAAAAAP///yH5BAEAAAAALAAAAAABAAEAAAIBRAA7)