To be honest, this is an excuse to post a comic of xkcd but it does highlight the importance of branding. In the xkcd comic below, I thought of it as a “How to judge if your brand is successful!”

This got me thinking about the importance of creating a strong brand name. A brand, an image, something which stands out and makes consumers want it! There are some very good examples of how companies brand themselves well such as: Coca-Cola, MacDonalds, Google, Facebook, Twitter, etc. Apple are another great example, but not only do they manage their company brand well they create a very strong product brand for each of the product lines they sell. One way they do that is by engage an emotional response. They associate a great experience, easy to use and a product that makes your life more enjoyable with it. So how quickly did it take for you to look at the picture of a person’s silhouette, bright background, with white head phones before you realised it was for Apple, and then related to iPod / iTunes? I bet that you would of picked up on it before I asked the question (maybe I should of removed the iPod wording).

So besides creating a company brand or a product brand, how can you create your own personal brand?

• Get yourself a business card (paper, electronic, etc) – People need to establish who you are and how to get back in contact with you
• Network yourself, before you need to network
• Create yourself a resume! Nearly every job requires one, so give this some attention
• Get yourself a domain (www.mydomain.com) and ditch (subdomain.com). If you don’t want to blog, create a static page at least
• Produce your own content, don’t just consume what you read. Add value to yourself by sharing
• Integrate your social profiles / online profiles (eg: Twitter, Facebook, LinkkedIn)
• You don’t always have to agree
• Remember your brand isn’t just your web presence
• Become an assets for your co-workers, business and clients

I would love to hear your thoughts on how you have created your own brand. Any stories in how branding work in your favour when you least expected it?