Personal brand – what it is, types, examples

How do you stand out in a dynamic and competitive marketplace? One way is through personal branding. After all, it is not just the privilege of well-known personalities who come from the front pages of the newspapers, but is also an excellent tool to present yourself and your services to a wider audience.

From this article you will learn:

What is a personal brand?
What are types and examples of personal brands?
How to improve your personal brand using social media?
How to create an effective content strategy for a personal brand?

Personal brand – definition

A personal brand is the range of unique qualities, values, beliefs and skills that define an individual. It consists of both image and identity.

A personal brand is a set of an individual’s unique personality traits, skills and experiences, the communication and promotion of which are intended to differentiate the individual from competitors and build a positive image of the individual among members of a specific target group.
What is a personal brand?

The purpose of a personal brand, on the other hand, is to give the target audience and potential customers an idea of who the individual is, what he or she stands for (personally and professionally), what competencies he or she possesses and what makes him or her stand out from his or her competitors.

Types and examples of personal brands

Personal brands are created for different purposes, depending on our needs. Accordingly, we distinguish the following types of personal brands:

Careerists – personal brands that are leaders in their fields, focus mainly on their own achievements and share information about them. Their main goal is success and a constant desire to improve themselves (e.g. Elon Musk).
Altruists – people who want to support those in need with their charitable actions and their main goal is a higher good than just looking after their own interests (e.g. Angelina Jolie).
Hipsters – are mainly looking for innovative and trendy solutions, and although they are often compared to a combination of altruists and careerists, they tend to lean more towards the latter, especially in terms of information shared and actions taken. They don’t like to follow the crowd, preferring to take new directions (e.g. freelancers).
Boomerangs – personal brands that aim to stir up controversy through the content they share and then return to their comfort zone. They like to provoke (even if what they share isn’t entirely true or they themselves disagree with a particular piece of information) – examples include journalists.
Connectors – they are creative and put a lot of work into making sure the content they create fits in with the expectations of their audience, they can read their audience’s needs well and advise accordingly. Their main goal is to create strong relationships with other professionals and their observers (infnuencers).
Selective – brands that only share selected information with specific audiences, to which they devote a lot of their time and attention. They only engage when they want to or when they see a benefit in doing so (e.g. fashion influencers who only work with top brands).

In the age of the internet, social media is an extremely important way for potential customers to ‘check you out’ and decide whether it is worth doing business with your brand. A well-established social media presence is therefore a foundation that can determine whether you gain new customers or lose your current audience. Social media can also help you to strengthen your personal brand. Here are the key aspects to look out for:

Ensure that the information on your social media accounts is up to date – verify and update contact details and important information, especially about you and your business.
Publish posts on a regular basis – you can use publication scheduling tools, among others, which will allow you to create a suitable schedule for publishing posts.
Create quality content that your audience is interested in – write in clear language that matches the style and narrative of your entire profile across all channels – so your messages are consistent, recognisable and fully readable.
Keep in regular contact with your audience – reply to comments and messages – this will give you the chance to build a quality and long-lasting relationship with your audience.
Find and join industry-specific social media groups – by joining such groups, you will increase your visibility and ultimately reach new customers.
Keep the content you create positive.

Remember that the personal brand you are building allows you to stand out from others in your industry who have not already done so. Ensure that your audience can get to know, like and trust you. Bear in mind that the methods discussed are just some of the ways you can build and enhance your personal brand. You can read more about the whole process in the article on personal branding.

Creating an effective content strategy for your personal brand

The basis when creating a personal brand is to build its authenticity. Audiences are constantly monitoring and evaluating the individual movements of people they follow online. To avoid the proverbial stumbling blocks, you need to build a consistent image of yourself online. All content shared on your social media profiles and websites must reflect your true self, i.e. based on your personality, your values and your passions. A trustworthy image inspires trust and likability, which in turn also influences consumers’ purchasing decisions. This is because consumers often make a purchase based on the similar values held by a brand or the affection and respect they have for the person behind it. When creating a personal brand, it is therefore worth documenting your actions and showing your journey – from its beginnings to what it is now.

The next step is to define your brand objectives. Ask yourself how your personal brand can help you. Think about whether setting it up will help you find your dream job, whether you need your own personal brand to empower you and become an expert in your field, or whether you want to promote your products or services in this way. Write down your goals in a file and then review your progress. Once you have your goals developed, break them down by their value. Evaluate which ones are most important to you and which ones you should focus on next.

With your goals clearly defined, you can start to take action. One proven way to build your personal brand is to create and successively implement a suitable content marketing strategy. During this process, it is worth paying special attention to aspects such as:

The profile of your potential customer – the profile of your brand’s potential consumer is an extremely important issue so that you know who to target with your content, services and products. Think carefully about who you want to attract and specify who you want your customer to be. Determine his or her age, motivations, social status, occupation, likes and dislikes and other relevant issues related to him or her. If you’re going to target different types of people, you’ll need to create a separate profile for each – this way you’ll know how best to reach your target customer. Think about what each of them can expect from you and your profile, what information they are looking for and how it can help them. Define the customer problems they may come to you with (pain point/pain point) and create simple solutions for them so that you can help them and, as a result, gain their trust.
Create content for the blog – once the profiles of the individual personas are ready, ensure that you have relevant content that explains to your audience how your product or service will solve their problems or teach them something new. To do this, it is a good idea to go all out and start a blog that will be a collection of all the necessary information. It is important to focus on creating authenticity for your personal brand at the beginning of building it, rather than monetising it. Write comprehensive content, enriched with valuable information – this approach will undoubtedly bring you profits in the future.
Guest post on leading industry portals – guest posting content on sites other than your own may seem illogical on the surface. In reality, however, it is not at all. This is because guest blogging is designed to create authority among your audience. This will ensure that they perceive you as a specialist in your field, which will have a positive impact on the credibility of your personal brand. Publishing on recognised industry sites will also increase traffic to your site – as users will check out information about you. By going to your site, they will also be able to take additional interactions, such as signing up for an industry newsletter or observing your social media profile, which will support the personal brand development process.
SEO optimisation – visibility is at the heart of all online activities, including those undertaken as part of personal branding. If you want to gain sufficient visibility, you need to optimise your website for SEO. This will ensure that it appears higher in search results in response to specific user queries. The basis for this is the relevant keywords that must be included in the published content on your site. Create a list in your file of the necessary keywords that your audience will search for and write articles based on these.
Visual issues – most of us are visual, which means that our attention is attracted to clear, eye-pleasing elements. For this reason, it is also worth ensuring that your personal brand aesthetics are appropriate. A consistent image (in the form of a photo or logo) to represent you on your various profiles is key. It allows recipients to associate the brand with the specific person behind it. The colour scheme and layout of the website and accompanying profiles is also important. This is because colours influence people’s emotions and increase brand recognition, while a visually refined website, together with audiovisual materials, inspires trust in the audience and demonstrates the brand’s professionalism.
Analytics – building a personal brand, like any other online activity, requires proper analysis of the chosen strategy. Use various tools (such as Google Analytics) to check the effectiveness of your actions. On the basis of individual analyses, optimise your activities regularly. In this way, you will improve your results and build a strong, recognisable personal brand.

A content marketing strategy is an extremely important issue in the context of building a strong personal brand. Creating and implementing said strategy is not the easiest of tasks, but it can bring real benefits, The most important of which include: