Your resume is irrelevant; it’s time to brand yourself
It is said that no one cares about your resume anymore. They care about your personal brand. Personal branding is essential in the new economy. It is the best way to differentiate yourself from your competition. If you do not start building your own personal brand, chances are, someone else will.
Whether you use your personal brand to distinguish yourself from the competition, or to reinvent yourself, make sure it is consistent. Having a personal brand that is consistent across all social media and networking platforms helps people identify you, unequivocally.
However, forging a brand across platforms can be time consuming. New platform, Designed You, offers an aggregated website where you can pool your social media accounts, resume, biography, contacts, etc., into your own custom homepage that people can easily find online.
Instead of distributing cards with all your social media information, it would contain a single URL. Currently the site is by invitation only, so it is difficult to know what the setup process will entail, or what the final product will look like, but it does show promise.
Your personal brand is your reputation
To benefit fully from your personal brand it needs to come from a place of authenticity; knowing your passions, values, and goals, as well as, your strengths and weaknesses helps to demonstrate who you are, not just what you do. By rooting your brand in authenticity and understanding, it will come across as less of a promotional package, and more of a genuine interest in being known and understood.
But remember: no matter how good your content is, keep adding new things to your brand. If you do not, you will risk going stale. No one goes through an entire career, without changing a little. Just make sure you update your brand to reflect the current trends, as well as, your current goals.
Your personal brand is your most valuable asset; are you using yours to its full potential?
Jennifer Walpole is a Senior Staff Writer at The American Genius and holds a Master's degree in English from the University of Oklahoma. She is a science fiction fanatic and enjoys writing way more than she should. She dreams of being a screenwriter and seeing her work on the big screen in Hollywood one day.