Personal Branding 101 is yet again pleased to feature an article by the excellent career and personal branding blogger Jorgen Sundberg. Enjoy!
The trouble with your personal brand is that in order to strengthen it you more or less have to blow your own trumpet. What if there was a way to boost your personal brand absolutely free by simply keeping in shape and doing some good for the world?
Answer: Easy. Just run a marathon race for charity!
What exactly is a marathon?
It’s a big old organized race with shed loads of runners. There are thousands of marathon races taking place in the world every year, all of which are at a set distance – 26 miles long. The most famous ones are probably the New York, Boston, Paris and London marathons and these races will have tens of thousands of participants.
What’s the word all about?
The word marathon comes from Greek mythology. Legend has it that a soldier with the tongue twisting name of Pheidippides was a messenger (this was before Twitter) that ran from the Battle of Marathon to Athens, a distance exactly 26 miles. He delivered his message, which was that the Greeks had beaten the Persians, and then promptly collapsed and died. This is obviously not the most encouraging story for any first time marathon runners, let’s just assume he hadn’t trained properly.
Can anyone run a marathon?
The answer is yes – all you really need is a pair of running shoes and the time to prepare properly. As a marathon typically takes about 4-6 hours to run, you’ll have to do a fair bit of training before your big day. It’s advised to start training at least six months before the race, by running 3-4 times per week. The runs you do are a combination of long distance runs, up to about 20 miles, taking about 3hrs, speed training and the dreaded hill training which leave your legs feeling like spaghetti.
Personal branding benefits of running a marathon?
If you are struggling to see the connection, here are five personal branding benefits to running a marathon for charity:
1. You have an excuse to contact people
We will assume that you run the race for a charity of your choice. The charity will set up a fundraiser site for you that you can forward on to your network. You now have a great excuse to catch up with anyone you have ever known. Go ahead and blitz everyone including colleagues, customers, friends and family. Unleash a social media campaign, create events on Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter so people know when you are running and how they can donate money. Some folks will contribute, some won’t. The point is that everyone will take notice– and your personal brand goes up in value as a result.
2. Increased recognition and respect
People know what a commitment running a marathon is and they will respect you for it. Anyone that manages to do it demonstrates exceptional determination, and when you run for charity you’ll score even more brownie points. Just think of how you will be positioned with your customers and stakeholders in your business, I would venture to say that your credibility will skyrocket. You have now turned into a force for good in the eyes of others.
3. You’ll have a story to tell
The next dinner party or networking event you find yourself at, you’ll be the center of attention with your compelling marathon story. After almost a year of training, you’ll be bursting with tales of progress, setbacks, success and adversity – all full of emotion that people tend to lap up. Use the story of your big race freely and make it your signature dish as it were. Give a speech on it, or why not write a blog post?
4. It will boost your confidence
One of the main ingredients of a really strong personal brand is confidence. When you finish a marathon race, you’ll be oozing with confidence and you’ll feel like you can take on any challenge. Next stop the Ironman challenge?
5. Great return on investment
Your race will be almost free in monetary terms; you will however pay with sweat equity and your time. However way you look at it, the return on investment is unbeatable. The results are all beneficial: you keep very fit, you raise money for charity and your personal brand gets a boost in the process – everyone’s a winner.
Call to action
If you are ready for the challenge, look up a marathon going in your area at Runners World. Sign up for a race taking place 6-12 months time from now and this will give you plenty of time to train and mentally prepare.
Before you go, it just so happens that I will be running the Stockholm Marathon on the 5th of June, in case you would like to help me raise some money for Cancer Research http://www.justgiving.com/Jorgen-Sundberg . Your money goes straight to life saving research. Thank you in advance for your consideration.
Jorgen Sundberg is a personal branding consultant and blogger based in London. You can find him at JorgenSundberg.net, The Undercover Recruiter and at his company Personal Branding UK. Connect with him on Twitter @jorgensundberg.
Photo credit, informatique.
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