A Personal Brand example – The Fundamentals of Personal Branding


Update: We’ve just released our complete, definitive guide to personal branding. You will likely find everything you’re looking for (and more) there!

You can find our older post below.

Have you clearly defined the basics of your personal brand? It’s necessary groundwork if you want your personal branding efforts to give you any mileage. Meg Guiseppi broke down the fundamentals of personal branding in her popular post, Personal Branding Worksheet. I decided to go through Meg’s checklist to revisit the core of my personal brand. Join me as we go through her checklist. When we’re done, do the checklist yourself and use my answers as inspiration. (Write a blog post about your answers and I’ll feature it on the blog). It’s time to hone in on the Brand Called You!

My Personal Brand Checklist

My vision is:

A world where everyone does what they love, increasing happiness and productivity across the globe.

My purpose is:

To connect passionate people to each other, so they can work on meaningful projects that realize their potential.

My passion is:

Helping talented people build a web presence that helps them get what they need to succeed.

My values are:

  1. Simplicity. I spend time doing the things I’m good at and that fire me up. I delegate the rest.
  2. Tangible goals. I excel at logically breaking down abstract projects into the concrete, actionable items needed to achieve them.
  3. Relationships. Business is people talking to people. Let’s all help each other get what we want! I never see competitors, only collaborators.

My goals are:

  1. In one year, I will publish an e-book about establishing an effective web presence, bolstering my credibility and visibility in my field.
  2. In three years, I will be running the web platform that is the gold standard in personal ORM.
  3. In five years, I will be acquired by one of the key players in online career development, to offer peerless, integrated services for career success.

My top three brand attributes are:

  1. I am an extremely clear communicator
  2. I constantly envision what could be
  3. I am highly organized and logical

I excel at:

Identifying and communicating actionable next steps to achieve a grander vision.

People describe me as:

Creative, funny, musical and empathetic.

My weakness is:

Perfectionism! I spend a lot of time making sure things look, feel and sound right. Sometimes, too much time.

My target audience is:

20-35 year old young professionals with a clear vision of where they want to be – and the drive to get there.

I know I have competition. What differentiates me is:

My ability to understand what is possible, then work from the ground up to create a realistic plan to get there.

… and that’s a wrap. Now it’s your turn! Start at the top of these questions and start filling in the blanks. Often, the hardest part is getting started. So don’t worry if your “vision” doesn’t sound right the first time you write it down. Now that it’s written and out of your head, you can start revisiting it and honing it. It will evolve over time. Good luck and let me know how it goes!

5 Comments

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  1. 1
    Meg Guiseppi

    Pete, you did a beautiful job on the worksheet! Thanks for sharing it with us. I hope this gives your readers a clearer understanding of how deeply they’ll need to dig to do it well themselves.

    Maybe you’ll do a follow-up post describing how the exercises made you feel. Did you feel each step was worthwhile? Did the process help you crystallize what differentiates you and empower you to keenly understand why people should do business with you over your competition?

    -Meg

  2. 3
    Robert Dagnall

    Pete, thanks for assembling this checklist.

    A question about your vision: “A world where everyone does what they love…” So who’s going to take out the trash in this perfect world? What about unpleasant yet necessary jobs?

  3. 4
    Chris Perry

    Pete, this is an outstanding breakdown of your own personal brand development.

    I love Meg’s worksheet/checklist, but I think you actually completing it as an example for others really compliments it well.

    Thanks for your work on this!

    Sincerely,
    Chris Perry
    Career Rocketeer

  4. 5
    detrawilson

    I have been struggling with branding myself. Your post was sooooo helpful to me. You gave me specific questions to ask myself, and I love it! You are offering something very useful. Stay encouraged!

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