Personal Brand: How to Implement One

Now that we've developed a personal brand by identifying those five to seven values or elements that we would like to be associated with ("branded with", if you will), how do we about implementing them?

Why the thought? Why not just immediately start executing on what we've written down? Because action without thought seldom accomplishes the end which we think. It's not only what we think our revised personal brand will look like - it's what others will perceive the new personal branding as being?

An example? New Coke. The Coca-Cola company thought "Great new flavor, great new logo". Consumers received it as "nothing wrong with the old flavor, no-one asked me, why did you do this?" The result? One of the shortest product launches in history.

How to go about it? Simple. Start with each characteristic we have identified. We've already written down how we want that characteristic to be perceived. Now write out what it would look like - not in our ideal circumstances, but in the circumstances that we are in. Personal Branding will eventually enable us to change our environment - it will not happen right away.

An example: one of the items on my list is "Thoroughness", something I have not always been terribly good at. I want to be perceived as someone who thinks things out and executes them thoroughly, leaving no hanging threads. In practical terms? That means taking some time at the beginning of something to lay out the entire framework of impact and assess any changes. It means listing precisely what "complete" would look like - and then executing to ensure everything is accounted for.

The perception of others? Initially it may not go well. I will not immediately respond to others, but take time to map out everything that is involved. Solving things may take longer as well and completing 10 things often takes longer than completing one. But the result? A problem or situation will be thoroughly resolved instead of coming up in a few months.

Remember as well that in executing any branding strategy (product or personal), everything counts. How things look, how things sound, how things feel - all of these have impact on the idea that you are presenting of yourself. To quote Brian Tracy, "Everything Counts".

Once we've written out what it looks like, we need to start executing it. For myself, I have starting writing it down in multiple places - in my planner, on a card in my office, in my car. I need to constantly start thinking "This is my brand. This is what I am now." Those reminders are necessary for me, because this is a new behaviour on my part. New behaviors take time (up to six weeks by some account).

Do we roll them all out at once or one at a time? That's really dependent on the individual. I myself would have problems completely becoming different all at once. I need to move one block into place at a time, possibly two. For others, all at once is the way to got. Whatever one decides, it should always be in the context of "Can I really do and maintain this if I do this, or will I overwhelm myself and fail?"

How do we ensure our branding is going well? That's for tomorrow. For today, let's think of what that perfect brand of us would look like in the imperfect circumstances of where we are - and how that brand will change those circumstances.