What is Personal Branding?

We have always been told that “First Impression is the best impression”, but what does it mean and why is it so important? Let’s imagine a scenario where you have an interview scheduled with your dream company. You are highly motivated and perhaps a bit nervous, rightfully so, this is your dream company and you don’t want to mess this opportunity up! You are sitting in the waiting room, where you see your competitors dressed sharply like yourself, enter and exit the boardroom. And finally, your turn arrives. You enter the room, greet the panel members sitting across you and finally take a seat. You share your credentials for them to go through, and they begin questioning you about the job role. You answer them to the best of your abilities. You are confident that you did well. You say your goodbyes and leave.

A few days later, you get an email. It’s from the company you applied to! Eagerly anticipating, you open the email, but to your surprise, it is a rejection letter. Now you are wondering what went wrong, after all, you did your best right? But think about it, you were competing with like-minded candidates with perhaps the same experience as yourself. From the company’s perspective, they will give a hefty salary so they might as well select “the best” or someone that stands out. Did you lack the skills required for the job? Perhaps not, it’s just that you didn’t make a strong enough impression! The person who got the job must have done an exceptional job to stand out. It could have been the way they were communicating; they must have been oozing with confidence or presented themselves uniquely.

Whether you like it or not, this is what the world has come to. For you to communicate your worth, about your skills to the people around you, you need to have a strong brand.  Personal branding is all about preparing and presenting yourself in a way that constantly communicates your value to the people around you. This could be what you stand for as an individual, your culture, your skills etc. You are unique, and depending on how you market your uniqueness the more it helps you to get opportunities you deserve. When you do personal branding right – your expertise and skills speak for you, even when you are not in the room.

How Can Personal Branding Help You as A Fresher or a Student?

Personal branding is often overlooked when we are a student. It makes sense because as a student, we often feel like we don’t have any established expertise or credibility in the marketplace yet. I believe this is to be a very common misconception. We don’t have to be considered an “expert” for people to take us seriously. We already have a “personal brand”. This revolves around the following

• What people think about us
• What people say about us
• How we make them feel
• And lastly, how they remember us

When we understand this, we need to simply be intentional about choosing what impression we want to leave on people, what we want to be known for and how we want to be remembered in a professional setting.

As we enter an increasingly competitive workforce, by building our personal brand, we can establish a reputation as motivated and talented individuals with strong desire to learn and grow in our desired field. We can make a lasting impression on our future employers, mentors or collaborators. Building connections and establishing strong professional relationships with our professors, industry professionals and peers could be our key to unlocking the doors to our dream internships, job offers or valuable recommendations.

How to Build Your Personal Brand?

Establish Your Purpose

You must have a long-term vision and mission. You need to identify and reflect on your strengths and passions. Ask yourself what skills set you apart, what topics excite you, and what difference you would like to make to the various audiences that are important to you personally and professionally while embodying your values. It would be helpful if you could define your long-term career goals as knowing where you want to go will guide your personal branding strategy. Also, think about how your personal brand can help you achieve those goals. For example, if your long-term goal is to become a marketing strategist, your brand should highlight your skills in market analysis, creative thinking, and communication. If you want to make a difference in the tech industry, showcasing your coding, problem-solving, and innovation expertise will be crucial. The key is to align your personal brand with the future you envision for yourself, ensuring that your audience—whether employers, colleagues, or clients—sees the potential and value you bring.

If you try to resonate with everyone, you will resonate with no one.

John Lee Dumas

Develop Your Online Presence

You probably don’t need me to tell you this but today most of the world is online. Many potential employers and recruiters search for potential candidates online before making hiring decisions. When you create a strong online presence, this could be by the way you polish your LinkedIn profile, build a personal website, or showcase your work in a portfolio, it would make you more visible to the right people. Not only does portray professionalism and show your seriousness about your career, but it’s also a good medium to communicate and demonstrate your skills, knowledge and projects beyond what’s written on your resume.

If you are just starting off, your LinkedIn profile is often the first-place employers will look, so make sure it’s up-to-date and polished. Choose a professional-looking photo, craft a compelling headline and write a summary that reflects your skills, education and career goals. If you are in a creative field (like design, writing or photography) or a technical field (like coding or engineering), creating a personal website or an online portfolio could be a wonderful way for you to display your work. Showcase your projects, assignments or freelance work here to give your potential employers a clear idea of what you are capable of. Even if you’re not in a creative field, a simple website with a blog or bio section can set you apart and demonstrate your commitment to your career. That’s what I did! Click here to check it out! If you feel really comfortable, you could take your online presence to the next level by also making video content.

Share Your Knowledge and Insights

Another way to build a strong online presence is to share content that reflects your interests and expertise. Social Media can be a powerful medium to leverage professional growth if used correctly. Practice writing articles on LinkedIn, discuss what’s happening worldwide, and share your opinions (respectfully). With tools like ChatGPT and Artificial Intelligence in general on the rise, you can and must use them, obviously, it’s there to make our lives easier, but please be aware that people can easily identify when you share anything if it’s original or if it was generated. And if and when they realise your thoughts are not original, it leaves a bad impression which could damage your personal brand. I see a lot of my peers posting on LinkedIn without even making any changes to their ChatGPT outputs and posting it online, which would be embarrassing if people called it out. If you are using AI because you fear making mistakes, there is nothing wrong with it!

Make mistakes, and take risks, but always be yourself! Thomas Edison failed 1000 times before he was successful with an invention that quite literally changed the world. He believes that he didn’t fail, he learned from his mistakes and that eventually led to him discovering perhaps the best invention that got the world to where it is now.

Part of what makes art special is that it’s difficult to make even with all the tools right in front of you. It takes practice, it takes skill, and every time you do it, you expand on that skill.

Drew Gooden

Take Up Relevant Courses

There is never a limit to learning things. You should always be on the lookout for the latest developments around the world. Consider broadening your knowledge. Not only does it build your personal brand, but it also expands your knowledge and better develops the skills you currently possess. People who tend to have certificates and degrees are more likely to be seen by employers when you publish it on your LinkedIn. But don’t just do these courses for the sake of it, do it so because you are genuinely serious about it, because it can backfire if people were to ask you and you fail to give a legitimate response.

Be Active

When you are active on the mediums mentioned above, you tend to amass a following. Perhaps by the information you are trying to communicate, people may relate to it. When you end up creating more connections with your followers you are increasing your reach. This could help you not just from a number’s perspective, but also to reach new audiences and share your thoughts and ideas with them. This could open doors to new opportunities.

Conclusion

Building your personal brand as a graduate or a college student may seem to be overwhelming at first, but I believe it is an essential step to better position yourself for success in today’s competitive job market. By how you present yourself, you create a strong consistent brand that communicates your strengths, skills, values and aspirations. So start now. Be authentic, stay consistent, and take advantage of every opportunity you come across.

If you have made it this far, I appreciate you taking your time! I would love to hear your thoughts on these strategies – what’s worked for you, and what challenges you may have faced while building your brand? Feel free to share your experiences in the comments below and follow me for more content like this. Thank you for reading the blog, stay tuned for the next one!