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Introspection requires you to define a vision for yourself (where do I want to be?) and identify key milestones to be achieved (how do I get there?)

Conversion requires you to evaluate your skills and capabilities and then use them in the best interest of your personal brand development.

Communication requires you to clearly and consistently market your brand to your relevant audience, both effectively and efficiently.

As time goes on, more information will be revealed and you will have the opportunity to participate in daily self marketing and branding activities.

How do your customers view your brand? What do people you interact with in your personal or professional circles see and think of you? The images they have of you and your actions plays a crutial role in your brand equity. In other words, it determines how they measure your abilities and strengths. You always want to ensure that they are clearly seen in your work ethic and performance. You should never have to say what you’re great at,  just show it.

These 12 tips will help guide you in creating and communicating a brand that will help employers choose you:

1. Job search is marketing. You are the product, and the employer is the consumer. A clear and compelling career brand helps employers perceive the benefits of your product, giving you an advantage in the job market.

2. Successful career brands weave together three A’s: Authentic image, Advantages, and Awareness. Project an image of your authentic self, focus on the advantages you offer in getting the job done, and make employers aware of those advantages.

• Authentic Image: Your brand should be founded on authenticity. It should be about who you are, what your work-life purpose is, and what you are committed to causing. As a starting point to develop your brand, brainstorm a list of all the things you are good at. As examples, some ideas for brands include conflict management, sales training, best-practice systems, marketing for service professionals, and customer service. Next, identify your passion. Using your brainstormed list of what you’re good at, circle those items you are most passionate about. For starters, identify the No. 1 item. If you’re having difficulty narrowing the list down, pretend you are packing your suitcase for an important business trip. If you had room to take just one item (brand) with you in that suitcase, what would it be?

• Advantages: Once you’ve identified your top pick, determine the advantages to that item. For instance, if you are great at conflict management, the advantages to recipients (employers) of your brand might be greater cooperation among team members, which leads to enhanced productivity, new ideas, less employee turnover, etc. List at least three distinct advantages for your brand.

• Awareness: Internationally known consultant and author Alan Weiss, states that a brand is “an awareness factor.” Above all, look for opportunities to make the right people aware of your brand. Get on the radar screen. The best brand in the world is useless unless people are aware of it. Initiate an orchestrated campaign to “brandish” your brand. You can get your name out there by writing articles, speaking at association meetings, requesting to work on high-profile projects, serving on projects where you’ll be seen by a number of people (i.e., handing out name-tags at a trade show meeting), cc-ing your boss’s boss on significant emails/memos, and suggesting time-saving/money-saving ideas to your immediate employer.

3. Conduct some some analysis to determine what the market conditions are for your emerging brand. Is there a need for what you offer? Are companies hiring in that area? Are there a zillion competitors for what you want to do? If the answers to these questions are negative, consider fine-tuning your brand.

4. Once you’ve determined your passionate competency and the market demand, begin to determine the best approach for positioning your brand. Think unique positioning. Be a St. (pronounced “Saint”), as in the beST, firST, or moST. Are you the best at creating product marketing strategies, are you the first one to have mastered how to conduct electronic meetings for your work team, are you the most accomplished, award-winning sales professional in your company/industry?

5. Branding can be accomplished through verbal and visual means. Verbal branding includes your sound bites and success stories, while visual branding is accomplished through your actions, attitude, and attire.

6. Hone your product benefits into a 3-Point Marketing Message that conveys your unique strengths. This message should be a critical sound bite in your branding campaign. Here’s a short and succinct example: “I excel at the 3 R’s of sales: research, relationships, and revenue — I exhaustively research client needs, build relationships based on serving those needs, and have a track recording of driving record revenue as a result.”

7. Create a Benefit-Driven Target Statement to keep you focused in your search, help networking contacts know how to help you, and explain your value to interviewers. Align your statement with employer buying motivators, such as generating revenue, saving money, or solving a problem.

8. Be prepared for the networking opportunities that abound, both internally and externally. Be ready with a sound bite that describes your unique brand. Mix and match your success stories and sound bites to create a comfortable yet compelling 2-Minute Introduction. Consider using a tagline that helps people remember you in a unique and favorable light. Perhaps you can dub yourself “Mr. FedEx” because you always deliver projects on time! Or maybe you are “the career cartographer” who helps others chart the right course that will make smooth sailing in their work lives. Or “the change commando” who draws from a decorated military career to drive change that delivers off-the-chart results.

9. Practice. You must be able to deliver your sound bites naturally, without appearing as though you’re reading a telemarketing script.

10. Visual branding means you must look the part. Ask for wardrobe advice from someone who is successful and has a good sense of style. If uncertain about how to dress for a networking event or interview, err on the side of formality.

11. Visual branding also means you must act the part. Candidly evaluate your mindset, beliefs, behaviors, and attitudes. Are these consistent with others in your field who have attained notable success?

12. Find a person or two who will respectfully and selflessly support you in your commitment to shaping and enhancing your ideal image. A coach can be an ideal support person.

Self Marketing & Branding 101′s BlogTV.com channel for video feeds and blog posts of our content. For readers who rather watch it than read it.

This term refers to what information you relay to on-line/offline media channels about yourself and the consistency among them. The choice of words and your use of them is key to brand messaging. For example, If you would like to position yourself as a Pastry Chef guru, then you must be able to present yourself in theory and in practice as a master pastry chef. Failure to do so is not being consistent with your chosen brand messages. Messages should be short in words but strong in impact and meaning. KISS (Keep It Short and Simple). When considering brand messages, keep in mind the following:

• What information do you want people to know about you?
• What do you want them to remember?
• How can you demonstrate your expertise?
• Is your message clear?

American Marketing Association defines brand and branding as:

A brand is a customer experience represented by a collection of images and ideas; often, it refers to a symbol such as a name, logo, slogan, and design scheme. Brand recognition and other reactions are created by the accumulation of experiences with the specific product or service, both directly relating to its use, and through the influence of advertising, design, and media commentary.” (Added definition) “A brand often includes an explicit logo, fonts, color schemes, symbols, sound which may be developed to represent implicit values, ideas, and even personality.” Source: SEMPO and Wikipedia

To sum up both definitions marketing would be you communicating your offering or services to others and branding is creating uniqueness around yourself. Having a basic knowledge of both gives you a greater chance to increase your visibility to others. It allows your strengthening your position in the job market or to potential employees. When you think of Nike what comes to mind? The “swoosh” logo, their slogan, “Just Do It”, or just comfortable running and athletic shoes or apparel. All these items or insignia of Nike are what makes it’s brand. It creates and drives the companies culture such as you do the same with your life and how you present yourself. Using simple, unique ways to make yourself stand out of the crowd makes you more noticable and weeded out from the rest. This is critical especially at this given financial time and crisis. You’re ability to be recognized and your efforts for doing so must be carefully evaluated and considered.

Lines at job fairs seem to get longer during economic downturns. But landing a dream job could be just a click away.

Job experts said branding yourself online could help you catch the eye of potential employers.

Eric Wallen, an IT recruiter, said he’s never seen job market lines so long.

“If you had someone with very outstanding technical skills in high demand, you wouldn’t let that person sit out there for other employers to gobble up,” Wallen, president of Primary Search Management, said. “Now employers don’t have a problem doing that because they know that there are other people out there in the market.”

Competition is fierce, and employers are very selective. William Arruda owns a personal branding company and said you must market yourself as a hot commodity.

“One critical factor is how you show up in Google,” he said. “In the new world of work, what hiring managers and recruiters are using is your Google identity to determine if they want to bring you in or not. So you want to make sure you Google yourself and see what’s there.”

And if you don’t show up on Google, Arruda said you virtually don’t exist. So the key is to first understand your brand – what it takes to make you exceptional.

“There’s a great exercise you can do called ‘same/different.’ Think about everyone else who’s applying for the same jobs you are. Take a sheet of paper, write same on the left, different on the right. Draw a line down the center and just start writing the same things about you and everyone else who’s applying for that job, and the things that make you stand out,” Arruda said.

Arruda said personal branding can be expensive. Prices at his company range from $12,000 to $40,000. But he also said there are some relatively inexpensive ways to market yourself.

“Just commenting on other people’s blog and including your name is a way to build your online identity,” he said. “A quick review of a book at Amazon.com [is] another way to build your brand.”

This article clearly describes, just as I have mentioned, the importance of branding in your potential career or job searches. In the upcoming posts, I will go into detail on some of the more practical and least cost effective methods to use. All targeted at strengthening your brand and identity.

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