Personal branding takes attention, love of self and compromise, similar to a relationship. This Valentine's Day, The Branding Muse would like to share a little love with all our followers.

One of the biggest and most extravagant sports events of the year is the Super Bowl. No one can argue that the NFL has positioned the Super Bowl brand as the premier branding and advertising opportunity. With millions of viewers each year, and numbers climbing annually, spectators can gather a few lessons on personal branding and reaching a new age of consumers. Super Bowl Sunday is not just a night to argue over which team will win, but an evening to soak up the creative marketing content and apply those strategies to our own personal brands. 

 Many young professionals, college students and even high school seniors, have expressed confusion and uncertainty in how to use LinkedIn. LinkedIn can seem like a daunting social network and many say that they don't know where to start. Think of LinkedIn as the professional Facebook. You want to use it to make connections and nurture relationships with professional contacts such as classmates, professors, coworkers and supervisors. Below are tips for getting started with LinkedIn and harnessing its power.

There are two things that are keeping you from creating your brand and those are FEAR and EXCUSES.  Creating and maintaining a personal brand takes time and energy that many students and young people don’t want to invest. What is a personal brand? A personal brand is the way that you communicate your unique value, which influences the perception that others have of you. A brand is not a website or logo or other tangible items. A brand is a message. What are you saying?

When developing your personal brand, one thing that is also important to take into consideration is the promotion and marketing of that brand. Market your personal brand by growing your following on your digital channels and building your network of contacts.

How to Get Going When You Don’t Know Where to Start
Launching a personal website, launching a brand, launching a business. These were some of the key search terms on Google when people wanted to begin building a brand. Many of the articles share ambiguous advice without real actionable steps to act upon. Launching your brand does not need to take months and months of preparation. What it does require is countless hours sitting in front of a computer and a determined mind to get things done. Here is the secret formula to launching your brand in a nutshell: Vision + Plan + Action= Brand. Decide what you want to do. Decide how you are going to do it. Do it. That’s basically it, but don’t worry. I’ll elaborate.

When you are developing a brand, your target audience helps to shape your communication channels, tone and aesthetic. Be the best version of yourself, because the original is better than the copy. How many times have we heard some version of this saying? We hear it so much as we come of age and work through our personal battles to become the woman that we want to be, but what about our businesses and brands? The same rules apply. We hear all of the online marketing and branding gurus say it, “Be yourself,” “Find your unique voice,” etc. but I have found that few fail to listen. As I watched another fabulous episode of Marie TV, the topic of authenticity was discussed. It is an important factor when developing your personal brand.