We’re constantly hearing about the need for a personal brand, and personal branding experts are popping up as numerous as fleas. LinkedIn is rife with people creating, nurturing, and maintaining their personal brands. But it can really get away from you.
Have you ever taken a look at a profile you wrote 6 months ago, and it just doesn’t represent who you are anymore? But now, what? All that effort to portray ourselves a certain way, and yet a fixed image just can’t keep up with how we actually evolve as persons. Now we have to MAINTAIN that brand but, over time, it starts to feel just like we fibbed.
Some people actually do fib. A major fast food chain recently gave their spokesperson the boot for exaggerating a role in a major event. Managing one’s brand can become so much a thing in itself that we forget to ask whether it’s really in touch with reality.
Add to this that some of us have TWO brands to manage. We do all that work to keep up our personal image, and then rush out to start an LLC, corporation, other brand entity, and we’ve got double the workload. I’ve always found that strange. If building up your own name is working, just operate under that. That’s your flag!
So what do we do about this incongruity? Spend more time building a conversation than a brand. Focus more on authenticity & transparency than managing our reputation. We think THAT can BE a brand. That’s how we do it at MadPipe. If you’re interested, visit madpipe.com because (at MadPipe)…..
