Thing 3 - consider your personal brand

Thing 3 is all about building your personal brand, a hot topic in library circles at the moment.

Like a number of people who took part in CPD23 last year, I was initially quite reluctant to engage with the idea of creating a personal brand. I had the perception that it was a bit cynical, and wasn’t too keen on the idea of ‘selling’ myself. I wonder if it is the terminology that is off putting, it’s difficult to get past the impression the word ‘brand’ tends to conjure up. Perhaps referring to it more as building or directing your reputation would be easier to engage with?

I think the most important thing I’ve learnt since then is that there are many different ways to develop a brand, many approaches will seem not appropriate or relevant, but it’s actually quite easy to find one that sits more comfortably with you. At the recent CILIP New Professionals Day Ned Potter discussed the 5 ways you could influence your brand. The thing that stood out for me most from his talk was that creating a brand should not be your end goal; it should be more a happy result of pursuing the interests that are important to you.

I think this method allows you to create a brand in a more organic, natural way, rather than as something you’ve ‘constructed’. It also allows for flexibility, as you pursue your interests and ambitions it’s likely that they will change and develop. Hopefully that means that your ‘brand’ will also develop, rather than feeling like a rigid thing you have to stick to.

So with this in mind I had a look at some of the ways in which I manage my ‘brand’, and to be honest I don't do much and it hardly takes up any time.

• I use the same profile picture for all my online accounts, it's a photo of me, which helps when meeting people face-to-face.
• I try and keep the design of my blog and Twitter account relatively consistent, I use the same background image for example. Although I regret not using matching names for them when I first set them up.
• My full name does appear somewhere on my online accounts, and a small bio. While I don't want all my personal details 'out there', I'm also not comfortable with the idea of being totally anonymous either, I think people will connect with you better if they know something about you.
• I'm not keen on the idea of merging my professional and private lives, so Twitter, LinkedIn and my blog are for work-related stuff, Facebook is for social.

Out of interest I also decided to Google myself, I did this last year, and was not particularly surprised to discover I didn’t rank very highly in the search results. Well, what a difference a year makes!

My Twitter account (@KrisWJ) is second in the listings, and I suspect I am one of those 15 professionals listed in LinkedIn. I haven’t done much with my LinkedIn account, perhaps if I did I could get it working a little harder for me!

CILIP New Professionals Day 2012 part 1

There is simply too much information to share in just one post (or it would be so freakishly long no-one would want to read it) so I'm going to break it up into parts.

I headed down to the CILIP New Professionals Day on the 11th May, the first time I'd ever been to one, and coincidentally the first time I'd ever been to CILIP HQ! My train was at a horribly early time (I am not a morning person) so I was very thankful to the lovely cabbie who took me to the station, and was very helpful even though my brain clearly wasn't switched on, and apologies to the staff of Upper Crust whose crisp display I destroyed (I have nothing against crisps, I'm just clumsy).

Arriving in London, I negotiated my way to Ridgemont Street just in time for Annie Mauger's welcome.

The first speaker of the day was Ned Potter, who discussed influencing your brand. In the past I lacked real understanding of the usefulness of creating a brand (see Thing 3, from CPD23 last year) but the more I learn about it, the more I think it is 'a very good idea'.

Ned kicked off his talk with four points;

1. Don't panic, it will be fine
2. You already have a brand
3. You can never fully control it
4. Don't panic

He then got us to submit our definitions of brand via Twitter, using the #npdbrand hashtag, and we could see them pop up up on the screen in front of us.

The purpose was to distinguish the difference between 'brand' and 'branding'. He gave us the definition that a brand is 'the sum total of everyone's perceptions about what a service is or does' that it is 'in the eye of the beholder' and quoted Jeff Bezos 'your brand is what people say about you when you're not in the room'.

Once we'd establish what a brand is, Ned shared his advice on how to influence it (in 5 ways!).

1. Get online - he recommended Twitter as a good starting point for those who are not already online
2. Publish something - try something like In the Library with the Lead Pipe or check out the Library Writer's blog for writing opportunities
3. Organise something - join a committee & help out with events, or if the kind of events you like aren't happening in your area, organise one yourself (eek!)
4. Share something - some of the most popular blogs seem to be the ones that share advice & resources that can be helpful to others in the information profession
5. Present something - apparently after the first time it becomes less scary (hmm)

He pointed out that it is not realistic to promote yourself as a 'super librarian' 24/7, or to worry too much about what other people are doing, it's not a competition. You only really need to compete with those that are pursuing exactly the same career path as you, and as there are so many different ones to choose from, the chances of you having exactly the same as anyone else are relatively slim.

I think the most important point I took from his talk was to 'focus your brand on what your goals are', that basically your brand needs to be relevant to your chosen profession. And that ultimately 'the brand is not the end goal it is just a by-product of pursuing your own issues and passions'.

Ned ended his talk with the following messages;
"Just do something, anything! If you have an idea, try and make it happen"

You can see the full Prezi for Ned's talk here, and better write ups than mine are available from Annie Johnson, Siobhan B, The Neon Librarian and Lady Pen (Penelope Dunn).

Thing 3

Personal Branding
First things first, I Googled myself (as suggested in the cpd23 Thing 3 post, not because I am weird).  I didn't appear on the first page, contrary to my long held belief that my name is spelt unusually (I've met loads of Christines but never another Kristine) it actually seems there are loads of us out there.  Got slightly side-tracked looking at the other Kristines, particularly http://kristinechapman.com/ and http://kristinechapmanonline.blogspot.com/.  Knew I should have registered my name as a domain ages ago, even if I was never going to use it.

Finally found myself (ha-ha) on the third page of results, on my employers website.  Of course that makes total sense; I'm not really 'out there' in terms of publishing or activity online so it would be unusual if I did appear at the top of the list.  Other than that, the only other result was my Facebook page.

I'm a little wary of the idea of 'branding', it seems very corporate, but if I join more social networking sites then it would be wise to have some sort of cohesion.  I'm keen to make my blog look a little more personal, but I feel I want to take a little more time to decide what to go with.  I've already changed my blog title a few times since first setting it up due to indecision over what to call it, so I'm not sure I want to commit myself just yet.