A Guide to Personal Branding
Personal Branding Tips
The rise of social media has resulted in employers being able to find out more about you before an interview, than they ever could before. Whilst you may not have intended for your social data to be used in this way, employers can access it once it’s on the public domain.
So, whether you’re aware of it or not, your digital presence is your personal brand. Here’s how you can find out, and then manage, what exists about you online.
Negative Branding
Search your own name and any associated key words, such as your location or profession.
- Did you show up?
- What sites link to you?
- Are they current?
- Are there any potentially negative links?
We don’t recommend restricting public access to your Facebook profile, instead, ensure you’re aware of the content that is publicly visible. You should also prevent people being able to post to your page without your permission.
- Visit your Activity Log via your Profile Page, next to Update Info.
- Review the information that is publicly visible.
- Then click on Posts You’re Tagged In and Posts by Others to see all content you’re tagged in.
- Decide if there is any content that could be detrimental to your professional brand.
GitHub
We speak to employers who are interested in previewing a candidate’s code on a regular basis, and GitHub is one of the most logical places to do this. However, if you have old or experimental code lurking on this platform, it could negatively affect your ability to progress your career.
To avoid this, simply login to your account and remove anything that you’re not one hundred percent happy with.
Positive Branding
As a professional networking platform, LinkedIn is well-established and therefore is the first logical step to work on your positive personal brand. For your profile to be located it’s crucial to have an All-Star status. However, we also recommend you go beyond that and do the following:
- Get at least two relevant recommendations.
- Belong to five industry groups that are relevant to your professions.
- Grow your network to include at least 500 connections.
- Use your profile to provide readers with an insight into your life outside of work, such as hobbies and volunteering.
Blogging
Blogging websites provide an excellent platform for you to develop your personal brand, and build a reputation for thought leadership and credibility within your industry. Although you can publish a blog on LinkedIn, we recommend using a stand-alone blog such as WordPress or Blogger to enhance the visibility of your blog.
As part of your personal brand, Twitter is great for when you’re attending conferences and industry events. This is because most of the networking is happening on here and is usually centred around one hashtag.
Engagement
To get the best results from social media, you need to actively engage with your community. This includes:
- Posting regular content.
- Re-sort your LinkedIn content from Top Updates to Recent Updates.
- Actively engage with others within your industry on LinkedIn and Twitter.
- Trail interaction with existing content in LinkedIn Groups to find good ones.
- Eventually, start posting your own content to these groups.
- Start with liking and re-tweeting posts from your Twitter Followers.
- Join in with active debates and conversations within your industry.
To find out more on managing your personal brand, such as how to get LinkedIn recommendations, check out our full blog: Personal Branding for IT Professionals. And if you need more advice get in touch with one of our specialist Recruiters today.
If you’d like more useful job searching tips, then head on over to our blog and don’t forget to follow us on LinkedIn for industry news and more.