Building a personal brand is a personal creation. Personal brand: a guide to creating

The editors of the CPU learned from representatives of the Russian Internet business who business maybe a personal brand is needed, how to build it, and who they consider the most prominent examples of such “personal promotion”.

Founder and CEO marketing group of companies Marketing Zen Group, Shama Haider identified several basic, in her opinion, rules for building a strong personal brand for Forbes. According to Haider, in fact, during the universal “internetization”, almost everyone has a personal brand - 90% of children under the age of two already have their “footprint” on the network - and the question, in fact, is not how create a personal brand, but how to cultivate it.

1. First, Hyder says, anyone who wants to develop a personal brand needs to start thinking of themselves as a brand. Determine what associations the name of the owner of a personal brand should evoke among others. Understand in which areas he would like to be considered an expert. At the same time, it is important to realize that a person still remains a person, and not to try to turn into a product.
2. Secondly, according to Shama Haider, it is important for anyone involved in building a personal brand to follow what is written about him online and respond to such publications.
3. You also need to start your own website - this will help display information about its owner in search engines.
4. In addition, Hyder recommends creating content that is valuable to the audience - something that would make readers subscribe to the author's blog or personal page. Such content should also resonate with the theme of the brand being created. Any message on Twitter or Facebook should correspond to the image that a person plans to fix in the minds of others.
5. You can strengthen your personal brand by creating associations with other brands. You can start, for example, with a place of work, colleagues who already have a strong brand, or a completed university.
6. The last point that Haider points to is creating a story around a personal brand. People, in her opinion, are always fascinated by things that are associated with personal experiences - and this can play into the hands of building a personal brand.

Russian entrepreneurs and representatives of IT companies told the CPU how and who, in their opinion, should be involved in the formation of a personal brand, and who in the Russian industry is a vivid example of a strong personal brand.

Andrey DavidovichManaging partner of the Internet access protection project Traffic Inspector

First of all, a personal brand is a way to make money from an image. Brand image is a kind of brand, a system of images, symbols and associations that can attract a contact audience, which can be different people (consumers, customers, media, officials, investors and other business partners). In other words, the brand itself is nothing more than a tangible asset of a company or person, which is the main means of promotion.

When we talk about personal branding, we mean the main driver of a person who wants to benefit from it. For example, Ksenia Sobchak is an outstanding person in terms of promoting a personal brand. You can treat her as a person in different ways, her statements and deeds, but there is no doubt that she skillfully manages the image of her brand and this is clearly visible. For her, this is a way of self-realization and earning money. It was beneficial for her to have a brand of "blonde in chocolate" - she had it. It is beneficial for her now to have the brand of a "liberal journalist" - she is actively promoting it. Ksenia earns the way she wants and knows how to this moment time. The question of the game in this case is important. If a person does not get pleasure from his brand, the formation of his style and promotion, this activity immediately becomes meaningless.

The second way to use a personal brand, more common in business practice, is the creation of a personal brand in order to promote and increase the competitiveness of one's business projects. For most entrepreneurs, this aspect is very relevant. In this case, the image of the entrepreneur, his personal brand becomes an element of the image of the company.

The most common example is Steve Jobs, his influence on the image and, as a result, on the value of the Apple corporate brand and its entire product line. The next example of a personal brand as an element for attracting money is already from domestic practice. Oleg Tinkov, who lives by the principles: he created a project, promoted it, sold it, invested in another. And in all endeavors, we see the maximum influence of his personality, whether it be a brewery or credit systems. As a result, the projects are extremely positive and dynamic.

Who shouldn't do this?

In my opinion, you should not engage in promotion if your business is not entirely socially ethical, which may raise some questions from the state, consumers and competitors. When a project promises too much, but there is no return. A loud example is the Israeli cosmetics Desheli, a project that was created on the basis of consumer deception. There is a very bad reputation about him, there were many lawsuits and negative in the press. No wonder we don’t hear anything about the creator of the business.

If you are not sure about good quality product, or it has high risks, then you should not engage in a personal brand. Let's take a situation: a high-profile startup, actively shines in the media, and suddenly failed. The person who developed the project and tried to build co-branding, what will he be left with in case of failure? People will always remember failure, so if you are not sure what will work, then I would not advise you to engage in personal promotion.

Also, the promotion of a personal brand should not be dealt with by people who have some unpleasant biography facts (slope from the army, bought a diploma, in the case of the prime minister of Moldova, and so on).

The business must be sufficiently reliable, built on proven technologies and tools, where the brand is one of the main factors in consumer choice. Then it will really work.

Grigory KhrabrovBranding Strategy Director Brandson Branding Agency

The situation with a personal brand is good because it reflects the general algorithm of work on the creation and development of a brand as such. A brand is a kind of special software that is loaded into the brain about a particular phenomenon, and in this case, a particular person. This means that it can be “updated”, “reflashed” and “upgraded”, although this, of course, requires the efforts of a highly qualified specialist or a whole team of specialists.

Although it's not always easy. Don Juan, in conversations with the hero of Castaneda, said: “The bad thing is that those who know you well perceive your personality as a completely definite phenomenon. And as soon as such an attitude towards you is formed on their part, you are no longer able to break the fetters of their ideas about you. He proposed to solve this problem by "erasing personal history." In the case of a brand, it is a little easier - it can be quite consciously managed, but the main thing is to realize that a brand is not communications, not external attributes, it is your essence and fundamental principle, your personal identity. In a strict sense, it is inseparable from you, as in the case of corporate branding - the brand is inseparable from the business that created it.

In an effort to develop your own brand, you must be very clear about your own “I-concept”, as well as programming the expected result of interaction with you. What are your goals for communicating online or offline? What image do you want to create? What information in this light about you is undesirable? What communication tools will most effectively highlight your strengths?

To understand how a brand manifests itself, one can recall the concept of contact branding by Davis and Dan. By highlighting certain points of contact with the brand, we can understand how effective the brand management process is. In the case of personal branding, we can also highlight such points: experience before meeting (social networks, media activity of a person), experience during meeting (clothes, style, demeanor) and experience after meeting (results of communication and interaction). It is after the third stage that people around form a concept of you as a person, which is very difficult to change in the future.

There are many positive examples, they are all well known. David Beckham, Richard Branson, Steven Spielberg have all gone beyond the limits of their profession and become brands in their own right. However, there are also ersatz brands - that is, those for which there is no content, but nevertheless, in the strict sense, they are brands. And they are all well-known - Vitaly Milonov, Vladimir Zhirinovsky and other persons whose brand capital is their only asset.

Anna FrishmanPR-manager of the international developer of free-to-play games Plamee

A personal brand gives a person great opportunities in terms of the freedom to form their own career. In fact, there is practically no difference between promoting a product and promoting a person. The lion's share of personal branding is ordinary marketing through an approach to oneself as a product and the definition of one's personal utility for the consumer.

It is worth promoting and building a brand of yourself when you adequately assess yourself as a specialist and your capabilities. If you are a cool specialist in your field, then your colleagues will promote you. For example, if the question is: “Who would you recommend to solve this difficult issue? Who do you think is the best? - recommend you, then you are going in the right direction.

A person who has achieved obvious success simply automatically moves to a higher category in terms of branding, which means that he is already surrounded by a different community of colleagues and professional relationships on a completely different level. The brand of yourself, in addition to standard tools (image, communications, personalization, and so on), is built by building special professional relationships with partners and colleagues, which in turn are the catalyst for your growth.

If your goal is to build a career, position yourself as a professional and an excellent specialist, if you want your opinion to be considered and meaningful, then you just need to build a personal brand. Plus constant self-education and personal growth They will help you reach your goal.

In my opinion, best example personal brand in IT is Steve Jobs. A good professional with a developed unified style, both external and communication. Plus, of course, a professional in his field.

Pavel Trubetskovdevelopment director of the developer company Simtech Development

A company is always an abstract concept. Ideally, when there is a real person behind it. If this person is public, he, in fact, is a guarantee that everything stated in advertising communications is true. Trust is the only competitive advantage in our time, when absolutely all goods and services are becoming more and more similar to each other, and quality is no longer an advantage, but a condition for survival.

Just look to the West. For a long time, email marketing has become one of the main promotion channels. Not what is meant by it in Russia (delivery of promotions and coupons, store news). I'm talking specifically about "adult" email marketing, the goal of which is to establish a trusting relationship with the consumer and establish stable repeat sales through constant "touches" with really useful tips from the company. So, one of the key rules of any email newsletter is that it must come from a specific person. Not from an abstract company, but from a person. The personal stories of the author are embedded in it (after all, it is stories that sell).

And here it is important to look at what inspires confidence. And only expertise inspires confidence. Accordingly, when building your personal brand, your task is to collect as much social evidence as possible of your expertise in certain area: publishing in the industry media, speaking at conferences, maintaining your own learning channel, in which you review various products and services, share recommendations on how your potential consumer can increase its effectiveness in a particular area.

Ekaterina KononovaHead of specialized agency BAKE Pro

It is important to remember that in today's world, personal branding is seen more as part of marketing than branding itself. It is more important for domestic startups to find additional investments or directly advertise the project than to try to take a place in history. And this is largely due to the level of development of this market in Russia.

There is such a technique of a multi-level star, where, conditionally, first they clean the basements (audit), then they lay the foundation (strategy), and then they start using the main tools (packaging, marketing, expert development, public and media communication).

Unfortunately, more and more often we have to deal with the fact that the money received from investors and business angels “newly-minted Jobs” begin to invest in self-PR, realizing that the project may go bankrupt, but with some name they are all heard they will be able to quickly recover in the style of business phoenixes. Some characters just want to amuse their ego, because most often the age of activists in the movement for personal advancement does not exceed 30 years, which is confirmed by conferences where you can see the whole color of the nation, but there are still practically no well-known names in the Russian IT market. It's starting to look like another bright soap bubble, where everything is great, from social media avatars to TED-style speeches, but it's completely pointless.

The only thing I would like to wish such people is to look more and more often at Durov's personalities, who use newsbreaks as a way to maintain interest in a person, and who always keep their mission in mind. Only by doing something for a higher purpose can you achieve something outstanding, including in personal branding.

Vladimir Kovalevtechnical director of the international payment system Paymentwall

A personal brand is a concept that is intuitive, but difficult to explain in words. It consists, first of all, of your personality - of how it interacts with other people. The more people your personality can influence and inspire, the faster and more effectively your personal brand will grow.

The external manifestation of a personal brand is yours appearance and the way you act every day, your professionalism. Internal - what picture and sensations appear in a person's head when he remembers a specific person.

You can build a brand consciously and subconsciously all your life. In fact, this thing - a personal brand - everyone has, but not everyone uses it, interacting with a small number of people. To build the desired image, it is necessary to effectively establish contacts with old and new acquaintances, use social networks, events, parties and professional companies.

It is also necessary to work on yourself, because a strong personal brand is what allows you to feel confident in any circumstances and be a fulcrum in an ever-changing world. Ultimately, the main action is to influence people, their decisions and destinies, and inspire them to act and change.

Who can benefit from a personal brand? Anyone who wants to change the world, to make themselves and others better. If you are the owner of a company, you have a triple responsibility: your personal brand, professionalism and ability to take responsibility depend on your understanding of the direction of the company, as well as the team spirit in the team and the image of the company in the eyes of customers. But a personal brand is definitely not in demand by those who want to stay where it is.

Let's look at those who inspire us. Modern people-brands come to mind first: Steve Jobs or Richard Branson. I like to learn not only from my contemporaries, but also from the classics. Take Lillian Stanford, small trader, owner railway, senator and founder of one of the best universities in the world. A brand person who made his name known through professional skills, contacts, vision and values.

Alexander Levitasbusiness trainer

A personal brand is defined by two parameters - reach and reputation. Reach is the answer to the question "Who knows you?" Reputation - "What do they think of you?" For example, the Chikatilo brand has a reach of almost 100% of the adult population of Russia - but the reputation is below the baseboard. And the brand "Aleksey Abrikosov" has a small coverage (ten to one, that you hear this name for the first time), but among those who know him, the reputation of academician and Nobel laureate A. A. Abrikosov is very high.

Where is a personal brand needed? Where at least one of the two conditions is met: 1) high competition or 2) “expansion” by tens or even hundreds of times in the payment of a well-known and unknown specialist. First of all, these are two areas - art and professional services.

The "Black Square" painted by Malevich is worth millions of dollars - and if you draw something like that, you can hardly sell a picture even for 20 dollars. Consulting a well-known doctor or lawyer can cost a hundred to two hundred times more than consulting an ordinary specialist. And when one of the best violinists in the world, Josh Bell, played the Stradivarius violin in an underground passage, where no one recognized him by sight, he did not earn his usual 10 thousand dollars for the performance, but only 32 dollars and 17 cents.

It is also absolutely necessary to have your own personal brand policy, it is desirable to have a personal brand for a person making a career in a corporate environment, and it is quite good for an entrepreneur to have one.

In order to promote your personal brand, you must first build the foundation of the brand - understand who and for whom you want to be. It is not very easy, because there are many details to consider. Muhammad Ali and Mike Tyson are two American black boxers, two world champions, but think about how different their brands are.

When you have managed to formulate what impression you want to form about yourself, you need to simultaneously work on both brand parameters - reach and reputation. In order to increase coverage, it is necessary to cooperate with the media, be active in in social networks, write books, perform on stage at events.

And in order to build a reputation, it is necessary, on the one hand, to accumulate “brand evidence” (for example, completed projects, received awards, reviews and recommendations, and so on) - and on the other hand, to stand out from the crowd, being something something extravagant and unusual. Think about how many grandmasters of the TV show "Own Game" can you remember - besides Anatoly Wasserman? And there were 20 of them.

Alexander Trifonovchief expert of the legal online service 48Prav.ru

I moved to the online legal sector with a “big scratch” from the offline business, but the personal brand works both there and here. According to our observation, lawyers, lawyers and various professional consultants should be engaged in the creation and promotion of a personal brand from the student bench. AT legal business it is customary to separate the personal brand of a law firm and the brand of a lawyer, lawyers move from firm to firm or create new ones law firms and customers go hand in hand with them all their lives.

Often, many are ironic and wonder why law firms are called by the names of named partners. Yes, because the personal brand of a specialist works for the company more than favorably.

From a formal point of view, a built-up personal brand is always higher fees, a clear understanding by clients of a lawyer's specialization in resolving certain problems, and an impeccable trail of recommendations and reviews. At what, one may get the impression that no one will remember the competitive successful cases of a specialist, but somehow they heard somewhere that his work is the highest class and fire. That is, the subjective and emotional assessment prevails, and the recommendation or the so-called word of mouth works very well.

Plus, the owner of a personal brand not only works all the time, he is also the champion of a charity golf tournament, collects Soviet propaganda posters, grows squirrels in his own forest area, is fond of yachting, or plays the cello and so on.

If a specialist is not a brand in professional community, then his destiny is to be a generalist and take on all cases, work with cold clients from the street, consult for free, work with objections on prices for services and give discounts. It should be understood that all personal brands have different personal characteristics.

Dmitry Tsivilevco-founder of the online platform for the sale of electronic gift certificates Giftery

Tools for promoting a personal brand are quite diverse depending on the goals of the person. These can be expert presentations at professional conferences, joint events and presentations with partners at thematic round tables, as well as writing your own book in which an expert reveals an interesting problem related to the development of the industry and offers his own solution to this problem.

Promotion of a personal brand is useful for the leaders of various companies in order to increase their recognition, market value and increase demand for the company's services. For example, if we are talking about management efficiency, then the American manager (manager) Lee Iacocca, the author of several autobiographical bestsellers, immediately comes to mind. He was President of Ford and Chairman of the Board of Chrysler Corporation. In other words, an effective personal brand creates a direct connection between the tool for solving a business problem and the author of this tool, who effectively owns it.

You should not engage in a personal brand for a leader who does not have a clear strategy for the development of his company and his own development. There is nothing worse than trying to initiate communications that do not have a clear purpose and content. Such a development of a personal brand will lead its owner nowhere and create only negative in the information field. You should not place high hopes on a personal brand if there is no core in the form of a development strategy and communication content. Without these components, a personal brand itself cannot exist.

The most important concept in marketing is the concept of a brand. If you are not a brand, you do not exist. Who are you then? You are a commodity.

Philip Kotler, Professor of International Marketing

From the moment you wrote your first resume, you have become a commodity in the job market. And to find Good work With decent salary and to be in demand, you not only have to develop as a professional, but also work on a personal brand.

What is a personal brand

A brand is what people say about you when you are not in the room.

Telegram became popular because it was made by Pavel Durov, not Petya Ivanov. They paid attention to Tesla because it is engaged in the project, and not some John Smith.

Didn't anyone create instant messengers before Durov? Probably some talented student technical university There was a graduation project and more abruptly. Only no one knows about him, but everyone knows Durov. The same can be said about Musk. He didn't invent electric cars, and Jobs didn't invent the buttonless phone. All these things have become popular thanks to brand personalities.

We can say that a personal brand is a certain image that is created more than one day. And when people hear your name, this is the image they represent. Igor Mann is the No. 1 marketer in Russia, Artemy Lebedev is the designer of all Russia, Maxim Ilyakhov is the creator of the info style, and so on.

Cool professionals need to develop their personal brand so that clients or employers hear about them. A personal brand is your reputation.

A personal brand should answer only two questions: who knows you and what they think of you.

When you need a personal brand

There are two main cases:

1. When your industry is highly competitive.
2. When the payment for the services of a popular specialist is much higher than yours.

People are willing to overpay for expertise and experience. And pay a lot. They want to buy peace and confidence. And in order for people to want to pay, there is a lot of work to be done to create a certain image of an expert in their heads.

There are a lot of professions where a personal brand is needed: from a hairdresser and stylist to a doctor and builder, from a lawyer and sales manager to a copywriter, designer and SMM specialist. It is especially worth mentioning the sphere of art - an artist, a musician cannot do without a personal brand.

What is a personal brand for?

It's time for the millennials. Generation Y has entered an active consumer phase. And it seems that this generation does not believe in anything: neither in justice, nor in laws, nor in advertising. He needs personalities. Therefore, in order to stay at the top of the business chain, you need to develop not a company brand, but a personal one.

A personal brand builds trust. People are more actively buying from other people than from abstract brands. Sales and new partners follow from trust.

A personal brand is like a school record book: first you work for it, then it works for you. Everything is simple.

Types of personal brand

Expert

This person talks only about work and profession. You will not find information about his personal life and hobbies in social networks. Only professional regalia and mentions.

This image is ideal for those who are going to train their own colleagues. Therefore, it is important for an expert to build the image of a guru so that the whole sphere moves behind him.

Insider

This person combines his expertise with personality. He talks about himself, shows that he is alive, but everything is within the limits of what is permitted and does not undermine his expertise.

His audience wants to look the same, relax the same, live the same. But at the same time it remains a secret. For people, he is an expert and a tough guy at the same time, but no more.

shocking man

Scandals, intrigues, divorces, betrayals - all this is about him. The image of the majority of public figures is built on this approach. People love to poke around in someone else's dirty laundry, and they are given a reason to do so.

The difficulty lies in maintaining a constant interest in your person. Since there is no expertise here, the audience easily switches from one outrageous personality to another - who will surprise you more.

What is a personal brand

Expertise

This is your experience, skills, portfolio. What customers and employers want to get in the end.

Without this item, a personal brand cannot be created. First you become the coolest electrician in your area, then in the city. Word of mouth brings you new customers. People like your approach to work and its results. You show that you are a real expert, not a fake one.

Reputation

When your audience trusts you implicitly. You always back up your words with actions.

Reputation is the second most important item after expertise. It can be spoiled by one minor oversight, and it is difficult to win it again. Therefore, it is important to watch what you do, what you say, how you look.

Popularity

What is a personal brand without popularity? When you've proven that you're the hottest electrician in the area, a perfect reputation goes ahead of you and brings you new customers, it's time to think - how popular are you?

Creating popularity is also work and an integral part of the development of a personal brand. Everyone should know about you potential clients and colleagues.

What happens if you neglect your personal brand

Remember the recent scandal with the teacher who posted a photo in a swimsuit? After that, a flash mob began on Instagram, where other teachers also began to upload their vacation photos.

The fact is that a teacher is also a personal brand. It has its own audience: students, parents, colleagues, management. And he needs to confirm his expertise in the media space in order to be an authority.

Recently, a friend spoke about her failure at an advertising agency for a marketer position. HR checked her social media and upon meeting said that she does not come across as a professional. On her page there were publications of drawings of fabrics for embroidery.

Simply put, if you don't take care of your personal brand and reputation, you can face a lot of unpleasant things: from scandal and refusal to hire to low salary and lack of clients.

7 steps to build a personal brand

As it was written above, a personal brand is an image. It needs to be matched, it needs to be supported. No contradictions, only constancy, so that the image does not collapse in the minds of different people.

1. Choose the area in which you are the best. Define your specialization.
2. Tell your friends and acquaintances about yourself as an expert in your social networks.
3. Determine who your target audience is, your potential customers. Build a detailed portrait of your ideal customers who bring you the most profit. You need to understand where they spend time, what they read, what channels they watch.
4. Read books on your and related fields, increase your erudition, learn foreign languages ​​- become a person with whom it is interesting to talk.
5. Consider the outer image. Like a product, you as a brand person should have certain features that will recognize you: a mustache, bright ties, pink hair, a braid, glasses, and so on.
6. Flicker wherever your colleagues and potential clients are: participate in exhibitions, conferences, competitions.
7. Promote through different channels: start developing your own pages on social networks, create a website and blog. Then go to industry sites and online publications, give your comments, write articles. Create an image of an expert for a wide audience.

The editors of the CPU learned from the representatives of the Russian Internet business who in the business field may need a personal brand, how to build it, and who they consider the most striking examples of such “personal promotion”.

The founder and CEO of Marketing Zen Group, Shama Haider, outlined several basic, in her opinion, rules for building a strong personal brand for Forbes. According to Haider, in fact, during the universal “internetization”, almost everyone has a personal brand - 90% of children under the age of two already have their “footprint” on the network - and the question, in fact, is not how create a personal brand, but how to cultivate it.

1. First, Hyder says, anyone who wants to develop a personal brand needs to start thinking of themselves as a brand. Determine what associations the name of the owner of a personal brand should evoke among others. Understand in which areas he would like to be considered an expert. At the same time, it is important to realize that a person still remains a person, and not to try to turn into a product.
2. Secondly, according to Shama Haider, it is important for anyone involved in building a personal brand to follow what is written about him online and respond to such publications.
3. You also need to start your own website - this will help display information about its owner in search engines.
4. In addition, Hyder recommends creating content that is valuable to the audience - something that would make readers subscribe to the author's blog or personal page. Such content should also resonate with the theme of the brand being created. Any message on Twitter or Facebook should correspond to the image that a person plans to fix in the minds of others.
5. You can strengthen your personal brand by creating associations with other brands. You can start, for example, with a place of work, colleagues who already have a strong brand, or a completed university.
6. The last point that Haider points to is creating a story around a personal brand. People, in her opinion, are always fascinated by things that are associated with personal experiences - and this can play into the hands of building a personal brand.

Russian entrepreneurs and representatives of IT companies told the CPU how and who, in their opinion, should be involved in the formation of a personal brand, and who in the Russian industry is a vivid example of a strong personal brand.

Andrey DavidovichManaging partner of the Internet access protection project Traffic Inspector

First of all, a personal brand is a way to make money from an image. Brand image is a kind of brand, a system of images, symbols and associations that can attract a contact audience, which can be different people (consumers, customers, media, officials, investors and other business partners). In other words, the brand itself is nothing more than a tangible asset of a company or person, which is the main means of promotion.

When we talk about personal branding, we mean the main driver of a person who wants to benefit from it. For example, Ksenia Sobchak is an outstanding person in terms of promoting a personal brand. You can treat her as a person in different ways, her statements and deeds, but there is no doubt that she skillfully manages the image of her brand and this is clearly visible. For her, this is a way of self-realization and earning money. It was beneficial for her to have a brand of "blonde in chocolate" - she had it. It is beneficial for her now to have the brand of a "liberal journalist" - she is actively promoting it. Ksenia earns as she wants and knows how at the moment. The question of the game in this case is important. If a person does not get pleasure from his brand, the formation of his style and promotion, this activity immediately becomes meaningless.

The second way to use a personal brand, more common in business practice, is the creation of a personal brand in order to promote and increase the competitiveness of one's business projects. For most entrepreneurs, this aspect is very relevant. In this case, the image of the entrepreneur, his personal brand becomes an element of the image of the company.

The most common example is Steve Jobs, his influence on the image and, as a result, on the value of the Apple corporate brand and its entire product line. The next example of a personal brand as an element for attracting money is already from domestic practice. Oleg Tinkov, who lives by the principles: he created a project, promoted it, sold it, invested in another. And in all endeavors, we see the maximum influence of his personality, whether it be a brewery or credit systems. As a result, the projects are extremely positive and dynamic.

Who shouldn't do this?

In my opinion, you should not engage in promotion if your business is not entirely socially ethical, which may raise some questions from the state, consumers and competitors. When a project promises too much, but there is no return. A loud example is the Israeli cosmetics Desheli, a project that was created on the basis of consumer deception. There is a very bad reputation about him, there were many lawsuits and negative in the press. No wonder we don’t hear anything about the creator of the business.

If you are not sure about the good quality of the product, or it has high risks, then you should not engage in a personal brand. Let's take a situation: a high-profile startup, actively shines in the media, and suddenly failed. The person who developed the project and tried to build co-branding, what will he be left with in case of failure? People will always remember failure, so if you are not sure what will work, then I would not advise you to engage in personal promotion.

Also, the promotion of a personal brand should not be dealt with by people who have some unpleasant biography facts (slope from the army, bought a diploma, in the case of the prime minister of Moldova, and so on).

The business must be sufficiently reliable, built on proven technologies and tools, where the brand is one of the main factors in consumer choice. Then it will really work.

Grigory KhrabrovBranding Strategy Director Brandson Branding Agency

The situation with a personal brand is good because it reflects the general algorithm of work on the creation and development of a brand as such. A brand is a kind of special software that is loaded into the brain about a particular phenomenon, and in this case, a particular person. This means that it can be “updated”, “reflashed” and “upgraded”, although this, of course, requires the efforts of a highly qualified specialist or a whole team of specialists.

Although it's not always easy. Don Juan, in conversations with the hero of Castaneda, said: “The bad thing is that those who know you well perceive your personality as a completely definite phenomenon. And as soon as such an attitude towards you is formed on their part, you are no longer able to break the fetters of their ideas about you. He proposed to solve this problem by "erasing personal history." In the case of a brand, it is a little easier - it can be quite consciously managed, but the main thing is to realize that a brand is not communications, not external attributes, it is your essence and fundamental principle, your personal identity. In a strict sense, it is inseparable from you, as in the case of corporate branding - the brand is inseparable from the business that created it.

In an effort to develop your own brand, you must be very clear about your own “I-concept”, as well as programming the expected result of interaction with you. What are your goals for communicating online or offline? What image do you want to create? What information in this light about you is undesirable? What communication tools will most effectively highlight your strengths?

To understand how a brand manifests itself, one can recall the concept of contact branding by Davis and Dan. By highlighting certain points of contact with the brand, we can understand how effective the brand management process is. In the case of personal branding, we can also highlight such points: experience before meeting (social networks, media activity of a person), experience during meeting (clothes, style, demeanor) and experience after meeting (results of communication and interaction). It is after the third stage that people around form a concept of you as a person, which is very difficult to change in the future.

There are many positive examples, they are all well known. David Beckham, Richard Branson, Steven Spielberg have all gone beyond the limits of their profession and become brands in their own right. However, there are also ersatz brands - that is, those for which there is no content, but nevertheless, in the strict sense, they are brands. And they are all well-known - Vitaly Milonov, Vladimir Zhirinovsky and other persons whose brand capital is their only asset.

Anna FrishmanPR-manager of the international developer of free-to-play games Plamee

A personal brand gives a person great opportunities in terms of the freedom to form their own career. In fact, there is practically no difference between promoting a product and promoting a person. The lion's share of personal branding is ordinary marketing through an approach to oneself as a product and the definition of one's personal utility for the consumer.

It is worth promoting and building a brand of yourself when you adequately assess yourself as a specialist and your capabilities. If you are a cool specialist in your field, then your colleagues will promote you. For example, if the question is: “Who would you recommend to solve this difficult issue? Who do you think is the best? - recommend you, then you are going in the right direction.

A person who has achieved obvious success simply automatically moves to a higher category in terms of branding, which means that he is already surrounded by a different community of colleagues and professional relationships on a completely different level. The brand of yourself, in addition to standard tools (image, communications, personalization, and so on), is built by building special professional relationships with partners and colleagues, which in turn are the catalyst for your growth.

If your goal is to build a career, position yourself as a professional and an excellent specialist, if you want your opinion to be considered and meaningful, then you just need to build a personal brand. Plus, constant self-education and personal growth - they will help you achieve your goal.

In my opinion, the best example of a personal brand in IT is Steve Jobs. A good professional with a developed unified style, both external and communication. Plus, of course, a professional in his field.

Pavel Trubetskovdevelopment director of the developer company Simtech Development

A company is always an abstract concept. Ideally, when there is a real person behind it. If this person is public, he, in fact, is a guarantee that everything stated in advertising communications is true. Trust is the only competitive advantage in our time, when absolutely all goods and services are becoming more and more similar to each other, and quality is no longer an advantage, but a condition for survival.

Just look to the West. For a long time, email marketing has become one of the main promotion channels. Not what is meant by it in Russia (delivery of promotions and coupons, store news). I'm talking specifically about "adult" email marketing, the goal of which is to establish a trusting relationship with the consumer and establish stable repeat sales through constant "touches" with really useful tips from the company. So, one of the key rules of any email newsletter is that it must come from a specific person. Not from an abstract company, but from a person. The personal stories of the author are embedded in it (after all, it is stories that sell).

And here it is important to look at what inspires confidence. And only expertise inspires confidence. Accordingly, when building your personal brand, your task is to collect as much social evidence as possible of your expertise in a particular area: publications in industry media, speeches at conferences, maintaining your own educational channel, within which you review various products and services, share recommendations how your potential consumer can increase their effectiveness in a particular area.

Ekaterina KononovaHead of specialized agency BAKE Pro

It is important to remember that in today's world, personal branding is seen more as part of marketing than branding itself. It is more important for domestic startups to find additional investments or directly advertise the project than to try to take a place in history. And this is largely due to the level of development of this market in Russia.

There is such a technique of a multi-level star, where, conditionally, first they clean the basements (audit), then they lay the foundation (strategy), and then they start using the main tools (packaging, marketing, expert development, public and media communication).

Unfortunately, more and more often we have to deal with the fact that the money received from investors and business angels “newly-minted Jobs” begin to invest in self-PR, realizing that the project may go bankrupt, but with some name they are all heard they will be able to quickly recover in the style of business phoenixes. Some characters just want to amuse their ego, because most often the age of activists in the movement for personal advancement does not exceed 30 years, which is confirmed by conferences where you can see the whole color of the nation, but there are still practically no well-known names in the Russian IT market. It's starting to look like another bright soap bubble where everything is great, from social media avatars to TED-style speeches, but it's completely pointless.

The only thing I would like to wish such people is to look more and more often at Durov's personalities, who use newsbreaks as a way to maintain interest in a person, and who always keep their mission in mind. Only by doing something for a higher purpose can you achieve something outstanding, including in personal branding.

Vladimir KovalevCTO of the international payment system Paymentwall

A personal brand is a concept that is intuitive, but difficult to explain in words. It consists, first of all, of your personality - of how it interacts with other people. The more people your personality can influence and inspire, the faster and more effectively your personal brand will grow.

The external manifestation of a personal brand is your appearance and the way you act every day, your professionalism. Internal - what picture and sensations appear in a person's head when he remembers a specific person.

You can build a brand consciously and subconsciously all your life. In fact, this thing - a personal brand - everyone has, but not everyone uses it, interacting with a small number of people. To build the desired image, it is necessary to effectively establish contacts with old and new acquaintances, use social networks, events, parties and professional companies.

It is also necessary to work on yourself, because a strong personal brand is what allows you to feel confident in any circumstances and be a fulcrum in an ever-changing world. Ultimately, the main action is to influence people, their decisions and destinies, and inspire them to act and change.

Who can benefit from a personal brand? Anyone who wants to change the world, to make themselves and others better. If you are the owner of a company, you have a triple responsibility: your personal brand, professionalism and ability to take responsibility depend on your understanding of the direction of the company, as well as the team spirit in the team and the image of the company in the eyes of customers. But a personal brand is definitely not in demand by those who want to stay where it is.

Let's look at those who inspire us. Modern people-brands come to mind first: Steve Jobs or Richard Branson. I like to learn not only from my contemporaries, but also from the classics. Take Lillian Stanford, small merchant, railroad owner, senator, and founder of one of the best universities in the world. A brand person who made his name known through professional skills, contacts, vision and values.

Alexander Levitasbusiness trainer

A personal brand is defined by two parameters - reach and reputation. Reach is the answer to the question "Who knows you?" Reputation - "What do they think of you?" For example, the Chikatilo brand has a reach of almost 100% of the adult population of Russia - but the reputation is below the baseboard. And the brand "Aleksey Abrikosov" has a small coverage (ten to one, that you hear this name for the first time), but among those who know him, the reputation of academician and Nobel laureate A. A. Abrikosov is very high.

Where is a personal brand needed? Where at least one of the two conditions is met: 1) high competition or 2) “expansion” by tens or even hundreds of times in the payment of a well-known and unknown specialist. First of all, these are two areas - art and professional services.

The "Black Square" painted by Malevich is worth millions of dollars - and if you draw something like that, you can hardly sell a picture even for 20 dollars. Consulting a well-known doctor or lawyer can cost a hundred to two hundred times more than consulting an ordinary specialist. And when one of the best violinists in the world, Josh Bell, played the Stradivarius violin in an underground passage, where no one recognized him by sight, he did not earn his usual 10 thousand dollars for the performance, but only 32 dollars and 17 cents.

It is also absolutely necessary to have your own personal brand policy, it is desirable to have a personal brand for a person making a career in a corporate environment, and it is quite good for an entrepreneur to have one.

In order to promote your personal brand, you must first build the foundation of the brand - understand who and for whom you want to be. It is not very easy, because there are many details to consider. Muhammad Ali and Mike Tyson are two American black boxers, two world champions, but think about how different their brands are.

When you have managed to formulate what impression you want to form about yourself, you need to simultaneously work on both brand parameters - reach and reputation. In order to increase your reach, you need to cooperate with the media, be active on social networks, write books, speak from the stage at events.

And in order to build a reputation, it is necessary, on the one hand, to accumulate “brand evidence” (for example, completed projects, received awards, reviews and recommendations, and so on) - and on the other hand, to stand out from the crowd, being something something extravagant and unusual. Think about how many grandmasters of the TV show "Own Game" can you remember - besides Anatoly Wasserman? And there were 20 of them.

Alexander Trifonovchief expert of the legal online service 48Prav.ru

I moved to the online legal sector with a “big scratch” from the offline business, but the personal brand works both there and here. According to our observation, lawyers, lawyers and various professional consultants should be engaged in the creation and promotion of a personal brand from the student bench. In the legal business, it is customary to separate the personal brand of a law firm and the brand of a lawyer, lawyers move from firm to firm or create new law firms, and clients go hand in hand with them all their lives.

Often, many are ironic and wonder why law firms are called by the names of named partners. Yes, because the personal brand of a specialist works for the company more than favorably.

From a formal point of view, a built-up personal brand is always higher fees, a clear understanding by clients of a lawyer's specialization in resolving certain problems, and an impeccable trail of recommendations and reviews. At what, one may get the impression that no one will remember the competitive successful cases of a specialist, but somehow they heard somewhere that his work is the highest class and fire. That is, the subjective and emotional assessment prevails, and the recommendation or the so-called word of mouth works very well.

Plus, the owner of a personal brand not only works all the time, he is also the champion of a charity golf tournament, collects Soviet propaganda posters, grows squirrels in his own forest area, is fond of yachting, or plays the cello and so on.

If a specialist is not a brand in the professional community, then his destiny is to be a generalist and take on all cases, work with cold clients from the street, consult for free, work with objections on prices for services and give discounts. It should be understood that all personal brands have different personal characteristics.

Dmitry Tsivilevco-founder of the online platform for the sale of electronic gift certificates Giftery

Tools for promoting a personal brand are quite diverse depending on the goals of the person. These can be expert presentations at professional conferences, joint events and presentations with partners at thematic round tables, as well as writing your own book in which an expert reveals an interesting problem related to the development of the industry and offers his own solution to this problem.

Promotion of a personal brand is useful for the leaders of various companies in order to increase their recognition, market value and increase demand for the company's services. For example, if we are talking about management efficiency, then the American manager (manager) Lee Iacocca, the author of several autobiographical bestsellers, immediately comes to mind. He was President of Ford and Chairman of the Board of Chrysler Corporation. In other words, an effective personal brand creates a direct connection between the tool for solving a business problem and the author of this tool, who effectively owns it.

A leader who does not have a clear strategy for the development of his company and his own development should not be engaged in a personal brand. There is nothing worse than trying to initiate communications that do not have a clear purpose and content. Such a development of a personal brand will lead its owner nowhere and create only negative in the information field. You should not place high hopes on a personal brand if there is no core in the form of a development strategy and communication content. Without these components, a personal brand itself cannot exist.

Everyone has a personal brand - a well-known marketer, a housewife, a child. This is the image of you that forms in the minds of other people: the associations associated with you, your products or services. In a way brand equals reputation: It can evoke negativity, respect, hate, love, or other emotions.

A personal brand is needed to:

• increase loyalty target audience to your products, services, offers;
• increase awareness among a wide or narrow target audience;
• position yourself as an expert in any field and thereby increase the cost of services or goods - an expert product always costs more.

Examples

There are many examples of successful personal branding. For example, world famous personalities:

• Elon Musk- Entrepreneur and inventor. He is the CEO of two large companies Tesla Motors and SpaceX. Both companies work with new technologies, so Elon positions himself as a supporter of new solutions. In fact, he is. Elon drives a Tesla car and plans to carry out a manned mission to Mars in 2020-2025. His secret of success is constant development.
• Vladimir Putin- politician, president Russian Federation. It is known to everyone in our country. Positions itself as a candidate from the general population and actually works with them - takes into account the interests of different social groups, religions, ages.
• Quentin Tarantino- producer. His films are known all over the world without exaggeration. He positions himself as a person who brought special humor to the cinema. The key to Quentin's success is precisely in him: the audience laughs at what is not so funny in reality.
• Queen Elizabeth II. Her personal brand began to build immediately after the coronation, and she still successfully maintains it. Every day, Elizabeth responds to letters from ordinary residents, and throughout her reign, she shows really worthy royal manners and restraint.

Other examples are lesser known. These people are known in narrow circles:

• Artemy Lebedev, designer, owner of a design studio. His popularity is largely due to his active anti-religious position and expressive statements. Many of his entries become catchphrases among designers, editors, and authors.
• Ilya Balakhnin- marketer, CEO of Paper Planes Consulting Agency. He achieved success through hard work: he worked for large companies, including Coca-Cola, Beeline, Russian Standard and others.
• Dmitry Kot- copywriter, author He is widely known in the circles of copywriters, authors, editors. Dmitry conducts webinars, shares useful information with colleagues, writes texts. At the heart of his success is the competent promotion of his name.

Books: what to read about personal branding

1. Tom Peters. “Turn yourself into a brand! 50 surefire ways to stop being mediocre

In his book, Tom Peters talks about why, in his opinion, the era of “I-brands” will soon come and how to effectively promote your personal brand. 50 ways to build a brand have been published, each with step by step guide, answers to questions, examples.

2. David D'Alessandro. Career Wars. 10 Rules for Building a Successful Personal Brand

This book will be useful to anyone who wants to "stand out from the crowd" and build a successful brand on their own behalf. It really has 10 basic rules of personal branding. In addition, it tells in detail about how to remain yourself, how to work with superiors, how to learn to admit and neutralize your mistakes, and what to do with competitors.

3. Igor Mann. "Number 1"

This book is fully adapted for Russian realities, because it was written by a well-known marketer in Russia who works with local brands. It describes in detail helpful tips, which will help competent personal branding, as well as practical tasks. You could say that the whole book is a simple route leading you to become number one in your niche.

Conclusion

Personal branding is a laborious, costly, long process. But it gives excellent results: your opinion will be considered, you will be asked for advice, and the value of the goods and services you offer will increase significantly.

A personal brand (reputation) appears in a person almost from birth and develops throughout life. The point is to understand what image arises in the minds of others when they remember you, what a defining opinion about you exists. When a person is zero without a wand, this is also a personal brand.

How many audiences, so many opinions can be about the same person. For some, you are Seryozha's mother, and for some - Chief Accountant Tatyana Vasilievna and that bitch.

You can manage your reputation

Everyone can create from scratch or change public opinion about themselves in the direction they want. But the boundaries of possible changes depend on the potential of a person. A stupid gopnik can become a stupid deputy. But the prefix "stupid" cannot be removed until the level of intelligence changes. In the same way, you can’t tell that you have a pumped-up husband until he has at least some muscles. The idea of ​​wishful thinking seems tempting, but it rarely happens.

You can't have multiple professional personal brands

For example, a person wants to be a famous knitter of woolen swimsuits and an equally famous designer. He starts fooling around: he writes on the same platform both about knitting and about working out - but his career does not move either there or there. The reason is simple: you can only play one role in one information space.

Exhibition of personal brands. Shot from the series "Game of Thrones"

Of course, you can take a pseudonym, separate two projects into different venues and audiences, but this is a utopia. There will not be enough time and hands for everything - something will remain at the level of a hobby, and something will bring the main income.

I suggest not to complicate your life and immediately choose what and in what place will be. Decide what you will earn on, in what area you will increase your reputation, and what will be your sweet hobby without claims to monetization and expertise.

Personal editing is allowed

Let's agree that we are talking about a real person, and not a fictional one.

Even if you're a beginner with no merit, you can embellish your story a little. Don't say, "I'm nobody, but I'm going to be a musician." Better: "I started studying music and I'm planning a career in this field." Yes, you have to show cases - lessons, progress, mistakes. But the status of an aspiring musician is better than the promise of becoming one.

Fake it until it works.

Austin Kleon, writer, artist

Editing is possible up to the stage of development closest to you. Then it is believable for others, feasible for you, and it is also a good motivator for growth. If you introduce yourself as a soloist of the Bolshoi Theater after a couple of successful parties in a karaoke bar, there will be no sense.

The search for uniqueness leads to a dead end

If you start to study the topic of personal branding in detail, calls to find your uniqueness will fall on you from every iron. It sounds reassuring, but we are ridiculously similar and most of us are very predictable. Otherwise, social stereotypes would not work. Advertising would not work if we were as unique as we are told.

The teacher shows the students photographs of students from previous years, explaining that every young person considers himself the center of the universe. Shot from the film "Dead Poets Society"

The idea of ​​finding developed and expressed traits in oneself is more realistic. Everyone has them. Someone is more of a cynic, and it catches the eye. Someone is a control freak and, and this is a pretty significant part of the personality. Someone is lazy. Someone lazy, but with a conscience.

In general, I am for not looking for a divine spark in myself. Great if you have one, but most people aren't that unique. But everyone has something that is inherent in him to a greater extent, and this most strongly affects the character, actions, way of thinking and way of life.

For me, reasonable uniqueness from the point of view of an adult is precisely in this.

What it is desirable to understand before the start of conscious work on a personal brand

Seeing a psychotherapist is a good idea

You can’t invent a personal brand, it just so happened. In politics, you can. But in business or career for ordinary people, this does not work. If you are serious about doing this, you need to adequately understand yourself at a very deep level.

We can only build on what we have, keeping in mind who we want to become. If you make a mistake somewhere and attribute to yourself values ​​that you don’t really share, that don’t inspire or captivate you, there will be no strong brand - neither personal nor corporate. There will be an imitation that will quickly turn into nothing.

How many can say that they know themselves well enough and are honest with themselves? Personally, for more than a month I have been trying to figure out my values, goals, desires, strong and weaknesses. The first attempts were an outright lie to itself, and the "current edition", I think, is not the last.

But in addition to understanding, self-acceptance is also important.

Personal brand development has nothing to do with sales

You may be famous all over the country, but as poor as a church mouse. A personal brand is not a story about sales, but about influence.

Selling processes will have to be set up separately and on time - when there is a product, an audience ready to buy, and at least some reason to buy from you. If you are starting from scratch, then you must understand that a miracle will not happen in a week. It won't happen in a month.

See how long it takes for new stars to appear in your field, how much time passes for successful people from market entry to acceptance. And you will see what path you have to go.

A PR specialist will not be able to promote your personal brand

Don't look up to the people the top PR agencies in the country work for if you're not one of them.

In the next article, we will look at how to write down personal brand goals, your audience and competitors.