What is Personal Branding — and do you even need it?
From Opera to GaryVee, and our personal favourite Samdish Bhatia, people have continuously inspired us with their original and authentic self. However, the space of personal branding can be daunting at first. Personal branding has grown immensely in the past few years — thanks to the influencer culture. People are naturally more likely to connect with fellow human beings. If you’re wondering what personal branding can do for you, here are some things you cannot choose to miss:
You already have a brand.
Everyone who remembers you has an opinion on who you are and what you do. People’s perception of you forms your brand. So unless you’re invisible, you’re already a brand.
The way people remember you forms your brand.
What’s that? People don’t remember you? Well, that’s also a brand… one with a poor brand strategy but still a brand. What this means is that the process of branding gives you some degree of control over what people think of you (or your company).
Start building a story around your work and lifestyle
A personal brand is formed by a near authentic representation of your work and lifestyle. The core motivation of your audience is a sense of shared aspirations. This is commonly seen in politics. Remember how Trump supporters stormed the capitol? The impact of shared aspirations can be massive.
Personal Branding keeps your work flexible
Once you have positioned yourself as someone who works hard or someone who cares a lot about turtles, it is easier for you to switch your offerings since your audience values your mindset over your work. Elon Musk does it really well. His visionary tech-head image makes us receptive to his unthinkable business propositions!
Business brands are about capability
Imagine your company makes pens with its own plastic producing units. It can be difficult to sell swimming tubes made out of plastic under the same brand name since the two products require different emotional appeals. A stationary brand would have appealed through utility (long-lasting, doesn’t leak, buttery-smooth). On the other hand, selling Swimming tubes would require appealing to the emotion of safety — yours, your kids’ — you get the idea, right?
Business brands need a lot of thought
So you’ve seen how the brand identity of a stationery brand would be very different from that of a water safety equipment brand. This means that you will need to figure out your long-term vision before you commit to a brand. This requires choosing an appropriate name, tagline, imagery, colours and much more stuff that definitely takes more time.
The liability is all yours
Remember Harvey Weinstein, the convicted sex-offender and Co-founder of The Weinstein Company? Well, chaining his name with the company led to bankruptcy when several of his co-stars spoke up about his sexual offences. While this was still a Business Brand, tying his second-name gave it an inseparable personal touch.
Take a lesson from BTS
Excellent wardrobes, incredible music videos, and stellar choreography — their soft masculine presentation is unique. Add to that their sensitive approach towards various global movements. Donating $1 million toward the BLM movement was one of the many moves that allowed them to penetrate deeper in a global audience that doesn’t speak Korean. This audience — also called ARMY (their fan-base) — was so responsive to this generous act that they quickly matched the donation amount themselves!
In Conclusion
Personal branding has recently seen a lot of growth. People love people but turning yourself into a public figure means you are accountable for everything you do. Business brands are usually able to separate the personality of their leaders from the business itself. Either way, we treat all brands equally at Clay Pot Studio if you’re a Designer, Developer or Copywriter, help us improve our Beta Website by tweeting your reviews to @claypotstudio.
