Personal Branding and the Job Market
If you don’t think personal branding is important, you’re flat out nuts.
Nowadays it’s so much easier to brand yourself online - through blogging, social media, networking - and then leverage that effectively offline as well. Bringing your online branding efforts offline is key; because you can’t live exclusively online. And this is especially true in the job market.
There are plenty of places online to look for jobs, and we know that Gen Y and Gen X do almost all of their job searching online. It makes completely sense. And now we’re seeing tools to help companies and candidates brand themselves more effectively online. But ultimately, hiring people is about one-on-one connections and meeting people face-to-face to see if there’s a fit. The online job market helps bring people together, and it’s getting better at it, but you still need to bring your online brand with you when you meet potential employers for interviews, etc.
Dan Schawbel gets personal branding.
The man is building himself a mighty fine soapbox, and he’s happily and constantly standing on it to espouse the importance of personal branding. In many cases he’s speaking directly to Gen X and Gen Y about personal branding in the job hunt.
One of Dan’s initiatives is the Personal Branding Magazine, which is a subscription service you can buy. Here’s a link to a free sample from the latest issue of Personal Branding Magazine.
This issue is particularly interesting to me because … well, I’m in it! And, it’s all about the job market.
Dan interviewed a host of people in the job market, including yours truly, asking us each one very important question, “If you could change one thing about recruitment, what would it be?”
Here’s my answer:
The one thing I’m most interested in changing and seeing changed, is that a strong influence be put on the relationships between employers and candidates versus anything else. Ultimately, people hire people. We don’t hire machines. We don’t hire a resume. We hire people.
Here are a couple other answers worth highlighting:
From Chris Russell at Jobs in Pods:
To get employers to open up more and show more transparency when it comes to their work environments and company culture. This means engaging the next gneeration workforce on their own turf, using new media like blogs, podcasts and social networks. Recruitment’s future is all about establishing relationships, not just advertising jobs.
From Joel Cheesman at Cheezhead:
I would eliminate the barriers that restrict recruiters from being innovative and experimentative, such as legal, marketing and IT departments.
From Alex Rudloff at Emurse:
Job seeker empowerement. Candidates are intimidated, overwhelmed and often don’t know where to even begin. Better tools and easier access to helpful information go a long way towards helping someone build the confidence to tackle a modern job hunt.
The feature article in the magazine is entitled, Job Hunting in a Brand YOU World — which is an interview with Rob McGovern, Founder of JobFox. It’s a great interview, and the rest of the content in the magazine is well worth it too.
The Importance of Personal Branding
Personal branding matters now more than ever because of the proliferation of ways in which people connect online. It makes it easier and easier for people to stand out and really build up their own profile. If you’re competing with them for a job, and you’re not as actively developing your personal brand, you’re in trouble. Of course the same holds true for employers - if you’re out there looking for top talent (and you should be!) then you’ll need to build up a brand that gets recognized and resonates with job seekers. Otherwise they’ll skip past you without batting an eyelash and move on to the next company that gets it.
Check out Personal Branding Magazine — it’s definitely worth reading.
Hi Ben,
I’m glad that you finally got the recognition you so obviously deserve:-o but I have to say that it does take a bit of a mind shift in not only the job market but also in the mind of clients.
Sadly from my experience, organisations tend to leave it a bit late when they have problems with their IT strategy or Software Product development, and then the fire engine is pulled out with a flashing light and siren a running!
I do agree that some clients are good when it comes to building a relationship, but in the main they have slipped into their own comfort zone, where ‘just-in-time-software’ really means ‘just-in-time-panic’.
I hope that on reading this and the journal you refer to, that there is a mind shift in my industry.
cheers
Hi Ben,
I agree with you. The linked site is my personal brand. I find that LinkedIn does the job superbly.
I do personal branding work for a few clients and the requests are increasing as people become more aware and anxious to transition their offline reputations into the online world.
Leonid
Can’t disagree with you. Personal Branding is one of the main keys to success in the Job Market and plain social internet life. You’ll see the results faster, if you put yourself a higher goal. “If you want to shoot the bird, aim to the Sun and you will shoot the bird..”
One of the best parts about personal branding to these groups online is that if you are willing to put in some work, you can certainly go a long way towards personal branding without spending tons of money that you otherwise would through other media.
Ben, in my experience, everyone has a personal brand whether or not they’ve actively worked on building it in the same way every company has a brand, be it good or bad, regardless of whether the business is aware of what that is. Since you’re going to have a personal brand anyway, you may as well take an active role in how what it is.
Branding is huge in my business..i am a metal artists…not so much personal branding but product branding for sure…awesome article…i will bee back to read more..i just foud your blog today!!!
I agree with much of what you’ve stated, especially when applying it towards job candidates. However, I’m not so big on personal branding… company branding yes… but personal branding doesn’t necessarily benefit me and my daily activities. On that note, there are many professionals in job positions that do require personal branding (and a lot of it) - for example: real estate agents, miscellaneous salespeople, politicians, Donald Trump, etc.
I recently made a post about building brand identity on my blog, and I really think that your post has one crucial element that many people will miss: You can’t live exclusively online. You have to build your brand in the real business community. Trade shows are great for this if you can find a good one, but what other suggestions would you offer?
In today’s fast changing online world personal branding is vital. But it is about more than simply getting your image everywhere. Imagine what leverage your online company will have when your reputation for honesty, integrity and sound innovation precede you! Strive to provide solutions for online marketers. Choose quality content. Forget being keyword driven: focus rather on supplying valid information and clear strategies for success.
re: Keelaras, I completely agree. Trade Shows are a great way to introduce or push your brand.
I have found a lot of great groups on Meet Up, most recently one out of NYC that specializes in personal branding. It’s an obvious concept, but one most people don’t realize the potential of.
Personal branding is just as important as company branding in my opinion. I am a Realtor, do clients hire my company? NO! They hire me. I love social media, blogging platforms etc.
Thanks for the great article! It’s difficult to think of doing offline branding with the wayy our society is today.
Great article. I am a freelance makeup artist so personal branding is something I take seriously. I’m just starting to use social media to expand my brand and am excited about the possibilities.
Personal branding is essential during recession. Earthlings should do anything and everything to get a job and hang onto it with all of your might.
Personal branding is essential regardless the economic situation. In my job, freelance writing, it is especially important. I think a blog is the easiest way to “brand yourself” so to speak. Any other thoughts on the best way to brand yourself?
Thanks for all the comments!
@Zac: Blogging is a great start. Networking in-person is probably the best thing you can do. It builds confidence and ensures that you don’t get stuck behind a computer permanently focusing on the big world. Sometimes focusing on the “small, local” world is key.