A personal brand statement is a quick blurb that describes your unique focus, experience and expertise. They are hugely popular today. But I must be honest – due to a few common flaws, I’m tempted to suggest not using them altogether. Here are three reasons I dislike most personal brand statements, and why in the end I still encourage you to write one.
1. Rigidity versus Fluidity
A strong personal brand needs to be flexible and reactive. As technologies and trends update, so should your personal brand. I worry that folks with a structured, well-defined personal brand statement will allow outdated features within their personal brand statement to linger for too long.
For an exaggerated example, take “Bob the Beeper Guy”, and his personal brand statement: “Dedicated to delivering premium pagers and beepers to the Southern California business community, with a focus on unparalleled customer service”. At some point in time this statement went from awesome…to awesomely out of date. I realize this example is a bit extreme. I also realize we all can change our personal brand statements at any time. Even still, my worry remains that some folks will blindly become tied to obsolete features of their brand.
"Hi...1993? I'd like my personal brand back, please."
2. Don’t Tell Me, Show Me
If someone is truly interested to learn what your personal brand is all about, I can promise you this: your personal brand statement isn’t going to fully do the trick. They need to see and feel your brand through your blog postings, portfolios of work, recommendations by clients, etc. Too often I’ve seen individuals put all their time and effort into crafting the perfect personal brand statement – and they forget that it is the action behind those words that truly matters.
Keep in mind that a personal brand statement should be a quick, inviting prologue – the rest of the story better be damn interesting too!
3. One Size Doesn’t Fit All
In today’s working world, most of us wear many hats. Maybe you’re like me and have both a day job and an outside passion (that are related, but not identical). Or maybe you have two roles that are completely different – accountant by day, jewelry designer by night, for example. How do you address this situation within your personal brand statement? Will someone looking for custom jewelry care about your accounting expertise? Doubtful.
With all these negatives, why do I still recommend personal branding statements? Because sometime, somewhere, you’re going to wish you had one prepared and memorized. Maybe you will coincidentally meet a venture capitalist or hiring manager in an elevator. You have 20 seconds until to you reach your floor, and they’ve asked “What do you do?”. Quick – what is your response?
My unprepared response might be “Um…I, um…I work in the advertising department for a big company.” (Nice, right?) Now what if I answered instead, “I help businesses and individuals build and promote lasting brands, using the social web as a tool to spark conversation and encourage engagement.” Much better!
So, I suggest that you do write and remember a personal brand statement (or two). If you decide to do so, here are a few recommended guidelines:
- Constantly review your personal brand statement to ensure all qualities and features described within still apply.
- Make certain that you “walk the walk”, don’t just “talk the talk”. Substantiate the claims within your statement, and continually build and improve upon them.
- If you own a wide variety of skills and experiences, consider multiple personal brand statements that vary by audience.
For other views on personal brand statements, check out these articles by Dan Schawbel and Brand-Yourself. What do you think? Am I being overly critical here? Care to share your version, or an example of a time your personal brand statement helped you?
Thumbs down by striatic. Bob’s beeper by ePublicist.
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