Over the past decade I have been working on a brand as speaker and author. That has brought lessons I have packaged into what I love to call the 13 laws of branding. There could be more branding laws, but these have stuck and have helped me to stand out.
By JONAH NYONI
Your personal brand plays a crucial role to your success. This is how you present yourself to people, your reputation and what you are known for. This is how you are perceived in the mind of others. Your personal brand is a combination of your strengths, talents, purpose, character, and actions. Everyone is a brand. Some people consciously build their brands and others are not aware of their brand, but they are still a brand.
A brand answers to crucial questions such as: How are you perceived?
How do you stand out of the crowd? What is your band equity (value)? What is your a differentiator? What’s your Unique Value Proposition?
Always remember that you are always selling your yourself! Rob Brown once said “Your reputation is your personal share price in stock market of life”.
13 Cs that will make you stand out:
1. Clarity — Be clear about who you want you be? Where you want to go?
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What you want to achieve. I have since realised if you don’t know what you want in life, other people with clear dreams will use you to accomplish their dreams. What are your passions? Your purpose?
2. Create — Create content which is compelling, informative, engaging, appealing and entertaining. Everyone has potential. Learn to tap from your inner deep self. You have resources and reservoirs of greatness inside you. Great people always create something. Write content for a blog. Sing that song! Write that book! Start that business! Carve that niche. Never die without something with your name on it!
3. Communication — Tell people about your brand. Unless people know it, how will never experience it. Use all available channels of communication, to make people aware. Be visible. You might have a great product, but is you hide it no one will see it. Attract attention. Grab attention!
4. Competence — This calls for your expertise, skills, abilities. This is what makes you contribute in the market.
5. Character — Character is seemingly a minor issue, but it the main glue that keeps your brand together. It takes time to build a formidable brand, but it takes good character to keep the band tack. Character is about your core values, principles. It’s the true you.
6. Candour — Be authentic to yourself. Be yourself. Be honest to others. Don’t try to be someone else because you want to fit in. You stand out when you are honest and original.
7. Consistence — Stick to something. Work repeatedly on your craft. Don’t give up. “Winners never quit, and quitters never will” — Oral Roberts. Most people give up too early. Most people are afraid of the pain that comes with building a brand.
8. Collaborate — Success is when you are able to engage other people to help you build your dream. This journey is lonely to walk alone. This journey is tough to cry alone! Find a shoulder to cry on.
The route can be rutted and rough and you need a friend who sticks closer than a brother. So that when you are down He reaches for your hand and says Lord I am with you till the end of the world.
9. Conscious — make a concerted or conscious effort to see your brand grow. As we currently experience the Fifa World Cup, there are brands that are constantly flashing on our TV screens. Why? It might seem meaningless, but those adverts are being pressed into our subconscious mind.
10. Competitive — This is a world of competition and you have to stay on top of the game. Not only that, strive to get out of the red ocean into the blue ocean.
Norman Vincent Pearl — “Strive to be in the top on life because the bottom is overcrowded.
Peter Drucker said we live in an era of 3 Cs. Overwhelming complexity. Accelerated change. Tremendous competition”. Raise the standard.
11. Change — Improve your brand. This life is constantly changing, revolving and progressing. The first step to change, is by challenging what you created yesterday.
Never seat on your laurels. Never bask in your past successes. Look for ways to improve your brand!
12. Confidence — People buy brands they trust. David Henry though said, “If you advance confidently in the direction of your own dreams, and endeavour to live the life that you have imagined, you will meet with success unexpected in common hours”
13. Commit — Be committed to building your brand. Grab you destiny by its horns. You have to believe your gut. Believe in your heart of hearts that something good is going to come out of your effort.
A great brand does not come easily, but you have to learn failing and try again. Where you have to fall but get up again. Where you have to be knocked down, but never throw in the towel.
Linda Ntuli — “My defeats are turned into delights! Breakdowns to break-throughs! Struggles into strengths! Stumbling blocks into stepping stones! Hurts into harvests! Odds into adds! Tragedies into strategies and rejections into directions! Rise up and do it!”lJonah Nyoni is an author, success coach and certified
leadership/business trainer. He is the author of Inspiration for Success and Success Within Reach. Contact details: Tel: 0772 581 918. Email: [email protected]. Twitter@jonahnyoni.
