1. Don’t Be Afraid to Share Who You Are
“The temptation is always to speak about your company when marketing your personal brand, either in a presentation, written piece or face-to-face interaction. Avoid this pitfall and speak to the market you’re operating in and your predictions for the future. People and press are interested in knowing who you are personally, not just hearing one more fluff piece about your company.”
Nav Athwal, RealtyShares
2. Personal Branding Is Less Formal and Communicates Your Values
“There’s always going to be some overlap between the personal and the corporate, as you can’t help but put some of yourself into your business. But personal branding should be more focused on who you are and what motivates you. This is important because you carry your personal brand with you everywhere you go. Be authentic and reveal interesting facts about your background, interests and goals.”
Shawn Porat, Scorely
3. You Should Avoid Brand Conflict
“The key when marketing your personal and corporate brand is to mitigate brand conflict. It’s likely that your personal brand may not always represent the position of your corporate brand. For instance, with the presidential election behind us, it was completely appropriate for you to publicly support a candidate, but it may have been against corporate policy to represent your company in doing so.”
Kristopher Jones, LSEO.com
4. Your Personal Brand Must Survive Your Corporate Brand
“Your personal brand needs to be able to survive your corporate brand. Founders always get too attached to their startup. Just remember: All businesses are temporary for individuals. Eventually, you will split ways with your business, and your personal brand needs to be able to survive this — even thrive.”
Gideon Kimbrell, InList Inc
5. Use Your Personal Brand to Make Bold Statements
“While my business makes bold statements about what we stand for, as the face of the company, I lead the charge in exploring my own authenticity with bold strokes. That means I am often polarizing. The result is that the wrong people run screaming from our business and the right people run screaming towards our business.”
Corey Blake, Round Table Companies
6. Talk Openly About Your Mistakes and Learnings
“Often with corporate brand marketing, mistakes are not discussed in public. Especially public companies have to regulate corporate communication as one wrong statement can move stock price downwards. However, when you are building a personal brand, it is, in fact, great to talk about mistakes and learnings. It makes you more human, authentic and relatable to your audience.”
Karan Chaudhry, Comnplus
7. Keep Your Company Content Close to Your Original Mission Statement
“We all use different tones and energy in our posts, whether it be LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook or Instagram. It’s more important than ever to have a personal brand and present that effectively, especially if you run a company. As far as the company’s online presence, keep it as close to the original mission statement as possible.”
Alexis Levine, Savvy Media
8. Set Clear Goals
“When it comes to marketing your corporate brand, the goals of exposure are clear: The larger the footprint, the larger potential growth. It’s important to define clear goals when it comes to your personal brand. Are you doing it for the fame, expert positioning, laying a foundation for a future business, etc.? Like anything, the clearer you are with your goals, the more likely they’ll happen.”
Ross Beyeler, Growth Spark
9. Avoid the Oversell and Be Authentic
“Your personal brand has the word “person” in it for a reason. If you’re just a springboard for your company’s products, it will do more harm than good in the long run. While corporate and personal interests can align, it’s vital to brand yourself as a human and be authentic instead of acting like a billboard.”
Elle Kaplan, LexION Capital
10. Balance Your Content
“People expect to read posts promoting services, packages and accomplishments from a corporate brand. While it’s appropriate to share bits of that as a part of your personal brand, your personal brand should expand beyond your role in your business.”
Leila Lewis, Be Inspired PR
11. Your Personal Brand Has a Slightly Broader Focus
“A corporate brand revolves entirely around what the company does. A personal brand is all-encompassing, as far as that individual is concerned. So, if you’re an entrepreneur, it means you have the skills and experience necessary to build companies — not just one. But you should still position yourself as someone who understands certain industries and topics if you are passionate about them.”
Ismael Wrixen, FE International
12. Look Closely at Your Connection to the Company
“If you are the single face of the company, it becomes hard to separate your identity from that of the company. Should you take a step back from the public or change direction, you put the corporation at risk because you are the company. If you are the corporate brand, your personal life may also get scrutinized and connected to the public perception of the company.”
