I was back on Talbot Campus this week for another outing of my Personal Brand talk that I first gave back in 2012. The talk has evolved a bit over the years, we didn’t really use the term ‘personal brand’ back then, it was just your ‘online profile’ and much more about what you didn’t want people to see rather than making the stuff you do want people to see go further.
I’m by no means an authority on the subject matter. I think I was originally asked to give the talk on the basis of being a young(er) person with some visibility online, mostly linked to the creative projects I was involved in at the time. 11 years later I speak based on personal experience of navigating an ever-changing digital world, while building my career and reputation.
I touted a new title for the talk during this session:
‘Good news! You already have a personal brand (here’s how to claim it).’
We all agreed it could probably do with being a little catchier.
As part of the session I invited the students attending to ask any questions they had about personal branding, or the talk I gave. We didn’t have chance to get through all of them, so this month’s newsletter is dedicated to providing some considered responses to their great questions, and a few fun ones.
Q. What aspect of a personal brand is most important?
A. I’ll start with a big question straight out the gate. This may sound like a cop out answer but the most important aspect of a personal brand is you. Perhaps this is stating the obvious, but all of this hinges on authenticity. People are well practiced at spotting someone pretending to be something they aren’t. I spoke a bit about ‘imposter syndrome’ in the talk – it’s hard enough being ourselves most days, why add to that by trying to be someone else? It’s not the solution. You have to find some confidence to have conviction in being you.
Q. How did you decide on the image you wanted to portray?
A. On second thoughts, perhaps these are all big questions! I would love to follow on neatly from the last question and pretend there isn’t a decision involved in this because I just am who I am, right? Not quite. This has been a decade plus journey of realisation what that image needs to be, and can be. Remember there is only so much we can do to ‘control’ the image, the verdict is made in the minds of the people we interact with. I think perhaps the best advice I can give as you’re starting out in considering your personal brand is to work backwards with a process of elimination of the image you don’twant to portray.
Q. At what point does a personal brand become too personal?
A. I think the more personal the personal brand the better, personally. I outlined a few definitions of what a personal brand is in the talk, one of those, based on a quote from Mark Masters was that a personal brand is ‘how we differentiate’. Mark told of how his company brand became “obsolete” as it “stood for nothing” by trying to fit in. See the question below on how much of your social life you should share for more on this.
Q. What type of posts work on a personal brand social media pages?
A. Unfortunately there’s no prescription for what will work for you, in your space. I’ve found that a range of different types of posts help to keep things fresh and reach different people within my audience. The key is to not fall for the trap of being all things for all people. Can you communicate the same message in a variety of ways?
I like this breakdown of different types of posts from Sonja Nisson:
- Helpful content – Answers to questions, how to guides tutorials, tips, tricks
- Human content – Your story, your hopes, fears, experience, empathy
- Curious content – What are you learning? Research results, expert interviews, book reviews
- Celebratory content – Showing and celebrating, what’s working, giving your community a voice
Produce each of these in the format that suits you best. Great with video? Shoot and edit some clips. Prefer to write? Put the time into an article.
Q. How often should you post on LinkedIn?
A. In the talk I referred to John Espirian‘s 5:1 rule of thumb. For every post of your own, aim for around 5 comments on other people’s posts. I can’t determine what the correct frequency of posts is for you (although if you’re only posting once in a blue moon, you’re probably not posting enough), but perhaps set a pace for yourself using John’s rule by monitoring the time it takes you to reach 5 comments. As I suggested this rule isn’t perfect maths and in time its value is probably in keeping it at the back of your mind should the balance slip.
Q. How much of your social life should you share on LinkedIn?
A. You will need to decide where to draw the line and what you do, or don’t feel comfortable sharing. It might pay to decide on this sooner rather than later, but don’t assume that will never change over time. You can always roll back or go further. I don’t see any problem in taking a look back through your content down the line and removing anything that you don’t feel reflects who you are in the current day, even if the historic content is date stamped.
You’ll notice that corporate brands are doing this across their channels and some social media platforms now give you the function to ‘archive’ content.
In this newsletter I close on a couple of paragraphs that relate more to my social life. I choose what I want to include here and I’m not prioritising it over the content, but it’s there for those who want to connect with me on that level.
Q. What’s your best tip for LinkedIn?
A. Don’t give up on it. I joked during the talk that in the very earliest version of my presentation from 2012 I referred to LinkedIn as “the boring Facebook you can get away with using at work”. It really was boring at that time, people didn’t use it as a social media platform (emphasis on social there) in the same way they do today. It’s a lot livelier now that people have gotten comfortable being more ‘human’ on the platform and acting more as they would elsewhere online, rather than maintaining a false pretence.
All of that said, LinkedIn’s frustrating non-linear algorithm and the “need to succeed” motive that many come to the platform with has given rise to a desperation in some people’s content to attract engagement (more so than any other platform in my opinion) that is frankly tiresome. For the past couple of week’s I’ve had to take a back seat on LinkedIn to find my enthusiasm for it again. I’ve spoken to others who feel the same and don’t doubt you’ll experience it too. Take a break, maintain the core connections you have, come back when you’re ready.
Oh, and my best practical tip is connect with everyone you have a professional engagement with, whether that’s meeting them in person, via email, over the phone, built a network of connections that is based on prior interactions.
Q. How do you identify something you’re interested in to write about that would be relevant to an employer?
A. If you’re looking for a job in a particular field or discipline, it would make sense for that to inform your subject matter. Of course, others may look to do the same, so how do you avoid writing near identical articles? This is where the personal comes in to play. Take what interests you (for me it’s music and collecting, amongst other things) and write through that lens. Apply your hobby to your work. This can run the risk of feeling shoehorned in, so you’ll need to think carefully about the genuine connections between the two.
Q. Should you put more time into your CV or LinkedIn?
A. 100% LinkedIn. The platform lives and breathes with potential opportunities for you in your career. The CV should write itself and shouldn’t require too much, if any, of your time between the occasional update. In my personal opinion, if done well, your LinkedIn profile should be more interesting to an employer or potential client than a static document.
Q. How can you incorporate your personal brand into a CV?
A. As you can probably tell from the previous question, I’m a bit cynical about CV’s. This may be because I’ve not had to use mine for many years, whereas LinkedIn I’m using multiple times a day. I’ve seen examples of CVs where people go over the top on the design and others that look like they’ve been cobbled together in about 5 minutes. I wouldn’t worry too much about the formatting to make it look personal (unless perhaps you’re applying for a graphic design role?), let your experience do the talking and use it as a signpost to the other spaces where an employer can see your track record for themselves (a regular blog, a portfolio site, a podcast or YouTube channel for example).
Q. Should you adapt your personal brand for job applications?
A. I would say adjust rather than adapt. To be able to radically change overnight would suggest that what you had in the first place wasn’t authentic. The personal brand is multifaceted, you can dial up or down on what feels most appropriate for the application. If you feel like you’re having to be someone else entirely in a job application, it might be a red flag that the role isn’t for you.
Q. What if I want to change my brand I have so far as I’m still early in my career?
A. Following on from the last question, see this as a constant evolution. Almost anything you put online can be edited or removed. What you can’t control is the impression you’ve already made on someone (we don’t have access to their memory bank unfortunately!). Generally speaking people will understand and accept the changes you make over time, you may alienate any audience you’ve built up though if you regularly put out contrasting messages or content at short intervals.
Q. What do you need to look out for to maintain your brand (once it’s already been developed)?
A. A personal brand is a bit more ethereal than a tangible item like a car or even our health and wellbeing. The maintenance comes through your continued presence in the spaces you identify as being appropriate to building your reputation. I spoke a bit in the presentation about the emergence of the ‘burnout’ trend. I think this is something key to look out for as it can begin to undermine your good efforts. We need to regularly re-evaluate the activities we choose to dedicate our time to, this isn’t an unlimited resource and can be as valuable to us as money.
Q. What examples of content should be added on your website?
A. Your website is your uncontested space to control the first impression you want to make. A biography, details of your achievements.. this is your highlights reel, or a ‘Greatest Hits’ as previous generations may have termed it.
If you decide to go the written route in your content production, a website is a good place to house this, even if you replicate it for use elsewhere online. For video or audio content you’ll more likely host in one of the spaces people go to for this type of media (YouTube or a podcast platform). Wherever you place your content other than your website, remember you’re on someone else’s land, you could be removed. Always make sure to try and capture your audience in a way that allows you direct contact with them should the third party channels be taken from you. The best way to do this is to set up a mailing list.
Q. Who’s online profiles do you follow that you think are a good example of a good personal brand?
A. In the talk I gave the answer of Fearne Cotton. If you’re not familiar with her I do recommend you check out her “digital footprint”, she’s involved in various projects in her role as a presenter, but everything she puts out feels very concise, consistent and authentic, despite us knowing that there will be a level of decision making behind what Fearne chooses to share.
I’m also going to plug my friend Tom Clarke here. He works in the electric vehicle industry. Last year he started writing a weekly newsletter called ‘This Week in EV’, hosted here on LinkedIn. With the exception of a couple of weeks off for holidays, etc, he’s posted every Friday morning for 32 editions, giving his professional opinion on some of the latest news stories relating to electric vehicles. In addition to this he’s started creating bite size ‘This Week in EV’ content for the LinkedIn newsfeed, such as nicely formatted carousel posts. His recent one broke down the ‘Top 5 reasons you can’t buy an EV’. So far it’s had 130 ‘likes’, 43 comments and 20 reposts.
Q. Do you think the personal branding method is suitable for a finance / insurance marketing position, is the corporate world different?
A. I think there will be different considerations regardless of which industry you go into, but the personal branding method isn’t really a matter of choice. As my longwinded title for the talk suggests, you’ll have a personal brand whether you intend to or not. What we’re considering here is how we can nurture it in ways that best contribute to achieving our intended goals. The uber serious corporate world is different, but the people involved are still human at the end of the day (I think.. ). Remember this example I spoke about in the talk. ‘Professional’ people were delighted at the opportunity to let their hair down and put a hoody on!
Q. Did you foresee your career path going in the direction it has when you were our age?
A. Not at all! I hadn’t given a lot of thought to where I might end up in full time employment. I was so focused on what I was doing at that time with my band, and then the record label that I was only ever really thinking about the next thing coming up with each of those, and then the thing after that, until the moments came when it was time to call it a day.
My career I have now sort of happened in the background. I went to BU to get a degree as a failsafe for if my involvement in music didn’t manage to pay the bills and I’d need to get a ‘proper’ job someday. I took the job at BU after I graduated because it sounded interesting and made use of the extra-curricular skills I had. I said yes to becoming a part time lecturer because I thought it be fun and a good experience (it was, marking assignments not so much). I said yes to the opportunity of joining the company I work with now (Grapevine) in-house because I liked the people and their ethos.
Some of the things I set out to do didn’t work out, at least not financially, but I’ve been incredibly fortunate with the opportunities that have presented themselves and I feel confident that I made the correct choices at the right time.
Q. What’s your top tip for new graduates?
A. Keep an open mind (and eyes) to the opportunities that present themselves to you. A lot of it comes down to timing, and luck. This doesn’t mean stand still though, I appreciate that I may have made it sound as if it worked that way in my own experience, if I did then that’s really not the full story. You have to create the conditions for the opportunities through the things you do, and one of the best ways you can achieve that is by putting yourself out there in the ways presented in the talk and, hopefully, in these responses to your fantastic questions.
I hate to make this about the depressing reality of money, but I feel like people shy away from the basics of this with career advice, particularly when you’re starting out. “Tighten your belt” as my Dad would say, don’t overly commit yourself to financial commitments for the next few years, give yourself some flexibility to take opportunities that might not pay the best in the short term, yet open doors for you. Don’t put yourself in a position where you have to give up on how far you’ve come so far for a high paid job in finance – no offence meant to people who work in finance, most of them are human too.
Q. Which is your favourite Pez dispenser?
A. This is the toughest question of the lot, hands down. I have a Bratz one from the mid 2000’s that I didn’t find out until years later is actually quite rare because there was an error in the production (it has yellow eyes instead of brown). Mine is one of the first batch that got through before anyone at the company noticed. I would be genuinely heartbroken if anything were to happen to my very first one, which is a pretty common Goofy from 2002. I could buy it again for a couple of quid but it wouldn’t be the same.
Q. Do you eat all the Pez?
A. Haha, as I said in the talk, I probably stopped eating them less than a year into collecting. Since saying that I did actually buy a packet of ‘exotic’ refills with flavours I’ve not had before including mango, nashi and lychee. When I get around to trying them I’ll report back in a future newsletter edition.
Q. What genre was your record label?
A. Proudly non-genre specific! My music taste is fairly diverse, which gave a wide pool of artists to work with. This included Less Than Jake (ska punk), Imogen Heap (electronic) and Kids In Glass Houses (rock). We also put out some stuff that was more acoustic based, but the most unique of all was ‘math pop’ – ever heard of it?
Q. Can you talk more about your vinyl records please?
A. I can’t remember how much detail I went into during the talk, essentially we worked with artists to licence their music. This meant we had permission to press a certain number of copies of their album, EP or single on vinyl. We would manage the whole process from placing the order with the vinyl pressing plants (at this point there were only a couple servicing the whole world!), marketing and selling the release online, then shipping out the order once the stock arrived.
We would have a catalogue with different options of what colour the vinyl would be, whether it was transparent, if we wanted to add multiple colours into the mix. We’d always run these past the artist for their approval before we went ahead. Sadly, in some cases, they opted for a plain black pressing haha. Supposedly some collectors only want that classic look! You can see some photos of the records on our Instagram which is still live @saintnovemberrecords.
Liam Toms 