Brand Yourself So The Doors Open Themselves

I get asked all of the time how I chose to brand myself and what I did in order to make that brand come to life.

Personal branding is absolutely crucial to your professional success. It’s a combination of your image, perception by others, reputation, the words you use, and the feelings you evoke in your community.

Good brands take years to create, build, and maintain. Here are a few practical tips for you to improve your personal brand so that professional success comes swiftly, greatly, and profitably.

Take Good Pictures

Half of branding is how you look and what people think of when they see you. This isn’t always a popular topic, but it’s the truth and reality.

The picture on your LinkedIn profile, Instagram profile, and Facebook profile (does anybody use Facebook anymore?) should reflect who you are and how you want others to see you.

Notice the conjunction, “and”. Your picture should accurately reflect you, but it should also communicate how you want others to think of you.

For example, I have four wonderful children and I love them dearly. Although a big part of my life is being a father, I do not have a LinkedIn picture of me wrestling on the floor with them during a pillow fight. Is it me? Yes, absolutely. Is it how I want CEOs of companies to think of me? No.

So, get a good professional photo and be sure to smile. Have a nice background, nothing fancy, too casual, or sloppy. No selfies. If you are bad at taking photos, here’s a trick: right before the photo make yourself giggle and your “real” smile will come thru. Not kidding, your brain has two different neural pathways for smiling, one is the real smile when you actually laugh, and the other is that terrible frozen smile that we all have.

Also, dress the part of what you want others to think of you as.

No Fake Job Titles

Please, please, please do not call yourself a guru, ninja, master, sensei, wizard, or any other silly title. Also, quit using sentences. I know it’s really popular right now to have lines on LinkedIn such as, “I help others solve problems by connecting solutions”.

Um, OK. But, what in the world do you actually do? The whole purpose of a job title is to let others quickly know and understand what you do. It’s not your identity so don’t get hung up on it.

No more, “customer sales success consultant”, instead, call yourself “customer service”. There is absolutely nothing wrong with the traditional titles of “sales rep”, “customer service”, “insurance salesman”, or any other titles.

And while we’re at it, be sure to avoid the “CEO/Co-founder” like the plague. If you’re a one-man show, you’re not a CEO, you’re an owner or entrepreneur.

Be realistic with your titles and be clear to communicate what you do, don’t make people guess.

Don’t Stretch Your Job Description

We have all heard the, “dress for the job you want” line, which is kind of true. But the reality is that we all have job titles that describe what we do. The real task is to execute flawlessly our current job description, decide what we want next, and then go above and beyond in what we currently do.

This shows growth, commitment, and a sense of reality. If you put, “VP of Business Development” and you’re 22, fresh out of college, and it’s a small operation, this grandiose title and description will actually hurt you instead of help you.

Rather, put the job duties that you actually perform, “cold call 50+ clients every day”, and then add everything else that you do and want to do. This shows whoever is looking at your brand that you are eager to learn and want to expand your role.

Be Strategic With Your Time

This is key and perhaps the most important thing you can do to increase and improve your personal brand. You need to seriously think, map out, and identify what you want to be known for.

Once you do this, create a list of everything that you have to do to make this a reality. For instance, when I was 20 years old, I decided that I wanted to make the most of my twenties so that when I reached my thirties, I wouldn’t look back with regret.

One of the things on my list was that I wanted to be known as a writer and have my articles published. So, at the age of 20 I sent out work samples, which were snippets from my personal blog, to thirty different publishers. Only one responded and gave me the chance to prove myself, which was terrific. This was the start of my articles getting published but it took me thinking about what I wanted to be known for.

if you want to work in the finance world, it might be worth attending Stanford or Harvard, not only for the education but also because of the network and what those brands mean in the eyes of others.

Are you wanting to be known as an expert? Get certifications and write your own articles on LinkedIn or Medium.

Everything you do should reflect your brand, how you want to be thought of, and what others perceive of you.

Start Branding Now

After you finish this article, take a piece of paper and immediately write down three things that you want your brand to stand for. Then, decide what you have to do to make that a reality.

You’re not going to get it perfectly at first, that’s OK. You’ll hit speed bumps, that’s OK. You’ll also make wrong turns that will hurt your brand, that’s OK.

Pursue your brand, improve over time, and look to others with established brands for encouragement and inspiration.

You have what it takes to be great and to have a wonderful brand that sets you up for so much professional success that the doors will begin to open themselves.