Using Personal Branding To Find A Job
No I have not blog faded! Yes, I am still here. No, you can not get rid of me. I spent the last week up in the Trinity Alps area of Weaverville, California. The middle of nowhere. Yet, the town is a total Mayberry place. The movie theater guy sells the tickets, sells the popcorn, takes the tickets, etc. One Gas station. One Grocery Store.
We stayed at the Trinity Alps Resort. This is a place where there is no:
-cell phone coverage
-Internet access
-TV
-A/C
..well you get the idea. My family loves it. I, on the other hand am a team player and go with the flow.
So, this gives me a lot of time to bond with my family and think.
What do I think about when cut off from the outside world? Web Pages…homepages, branding.
(Yes, I need to see a shrink.)
So here is my thoughts on this. If you are a job seeker in this market, you need to have your own website about yourself. Call it a website, homepage, web page or whatever. You need to have a place where people can learn about you.-You are a brand! Yes, it is true. Personal branding is where I am going with this. Say you are an accountant named ” John Hoeser”. (hey I like that name.) You apply for a job. On your resume you put a link to www.johnhoeser.com.
The future employer can go and learn more about you on your site. Also it well help you get the word out about who you are, what you do, what you know and why your the accounting guru! There are many things you can do to this page to increase your brand awareness. . Let me share some of this in list form. People like lists:
-Create an About Page. Share that you are John the Accountant. What your background is in the field. Your achievements, notable accomplishments and why your an accounting guru. (Not an Expert! That term makes my hair stand up.)
-Have a blog. Write articles about accounting and other subjects. Give your insight about the field. Have this new content come out at least once a week.
-Comment back to people who leave comments on your page. It shows your active, social and well people like knowing someone is reading their comments.
- Have a linkedin.com badge on your site. Just another way people can learn about your background and knowledgeable in the field. As well as who you are connected to and any recommendations you have gotten.
- Drop your new content (blog posts) on sites like Digg, Stumbleupon, Facebook, and Twitter.
-Have a RSS.
-Leave comments on other accounting sites. People like comments, right? As well as it gives you a web presence.
-Use linkedin’s Q & A section
-Network offline. Yep, there is more to life then being online. Go to meetups, tweetups, social breakfasts and such. That is where I get most of my prospects and leads!
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Intersting points. Personal Branding seems to become more important in the future. even in germany
Hey Germany is hip!
[...] of their blogs, RSS feeds, Flickr, social bookmarks and many other social networking sites. Using Personal Branding To Find A Job – newmediachatter.com 07/29/2009 No I have not blog faded! Yes, I am still here. No, you can not [...]
Great article!
thanks
I have done everything you have listed. I find blogger relations a valuable tool in your arsenal. I have learned a lot from the people who I have commented on there blogs and I find this a great way to network. I am sure if I get a PR position this strategy will work well with media relations.
Agreed!
Dave, good personal branding premier. Personal branding is still important even in a good economy because the competition is still there and the technology is always changing. Maintaining relevancy, with consistency and high level of visibility is the key.
Thanks Dan!
Aloha Dave – Great piece…thanks for the thoughts! Two comments for you and your readers…
1.) I just love Weaverville…you should see the way they deck the town out for Christmas time…really beautiful! Also love the Trinity Alps Resort…been there many times on steelhead fishing trips. Enjoy the solitude!
2.) At http://chi.mp we're working on a platform that we believe will appeal to people interested in Personal Branding. The current beta platform includes a free domain that you select for yourself ("mypersonalbrand.mp") and the chi.mp service that aggregates content and contacts from your social web services. It is still early days for chi.mp so I hope you'll give us some feedback on what features you'd like to see in the ideal Personal Branding platform as they come to mind!
Mike
Glad to know someone knows where Weaverville is!
What can I say? I think this method works out well! Especially if you are in the visual communications field as you need to be able to show your work to anyone interested. For other professions I can certainly see the value in posting your thoughts and ideas.
I think it would work for many professions, heck all of them!
I'm 100% with you — personal branding is THE way forward. The key is to be consistent with what you stand for — so e.g. if you're all about creativity, then display creativity in your online presence, in your resume, in your CV, in the job interview etc etc etc.
The reason a webpresence (even if not a standalone site, but on social networks like linkedin or on outsourcing sites like odesk, scriptlance etc) is so important is that employers are starting to look for 'social proof' (just like everybody else is when they are 'buying' something on the Internet)
have a look at my blog where I write on this stuff regularly
http://www.veitschenk.com
Cheers
Veit
Quite interesting. I would see were having a personal website could become as needed for a job search as a resume.
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Hi Dave,
Great post! I struggle with the mix of personal vs. professional in my blog posts. I just recently set my blog up to automatically post to LinkedIn, FaceBook, and Twitter, but… LinkedIn is where I like to demonstrate my professional side and FaceBook is my more personal, playful side. Trying to mix the two into one "brand" can sometimes be a challenge! On the other hand, doing this helps me define my most prevalent values — whether in a professional environment or personal environment — and stay consistent with those messages. Who says we can't have a sense of humor in a professional environment, right?
Thanks, again, for the post!
Have a blog. Have a blog. Have a blog. yadda yadda
How many people have the time and inclination to maintain a blog
Dave, you've got great info and I enjoy your writeups. Thank you.
Can you – or anyone tell me how social media would help a small grocery store chain in its marketing efforts?
Using Personal Branding To Find A Job…
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