Personal Branding For Dummies
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William Arruda, founder of Reach Personal Branding, launched his own personal branding video resource at PersonalBranding.TV. Arruda says video is the new frontier in personal branding; video may be the most powerful tool you can use to build an emotional connection with the people you connect with virtually. Video allows you to deliver a complete communication — something that is often missing in a world where most communication is electronic.

In building your personal brand, Catharine Fennel, founder of videoBIO, offers sage advice to show how video is an important media tool to help visualize and personalize your message. She says that when thinking of generating video, you need to look at it as a toolkit of videos that best represent your brand.

Video is not a singular event; it is replacing the way people are communicating online. Therefore, you need to identify what parts of your message you want to translate into video on an ongoing basis.

A video bio should be the cornerstone video for your personal brand toolkit. The bio is the video that represents your overall story and profiles you and/or your business in general. Consider your video bio an opportunity to connect with your audience, establish trust and a connection, and build your credibility and expertise in your particular subject matter.

Your personal brand and persona simply cannot be expressed only in the written word. Video fills in the blanks between the lines by giving your message the high-impact human touch that connects you with your audience.

Typically, a video bio includes a mix of the following:

  • Introducing yourself, your role, and/or your company

  • Storytelling or sharing a point of view on your area of business

  • Identifying achievements

  • Educating or sharing information about your industry

  • Calling viewers to action — what do you want viewers to take away and do? How can they contact you?

In addition to a video bio, you may want to consider creating promotional videos, educational videos, how-to videos, or editorial-type blog videos that can become part of a regular communication schedule and be included on your website, blog, or social media channels.

You want to gain the widest exposure possible for your video communications. Videos should live on your website; be pushed to social media channels like Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, and Google Plus; and be hosted on a YouTube channel. Video can also supplement your e-mail communications; video can live passively as a link in your e-mail signature, or you can generate video messages and send them out embedded in an e-mail.

In the next few years, video will likely take over how society communicates, whether it be a recorded video, a live video chat via Skype or FaceTime, or a new technology not yet invented. You’ll no longer be able to hide behind a phone call, so your appearance will begin to take on a larger role. Video can help connect you with your brand audience in ways never before possible.

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Susan Chritton is a Master Personal Brand Strategist, Executive Career Coach, and Master Career Counselor. She guides professionals looking to engage their authentic self in the world through personal branding. Visit her website at www.susanchritton.com.

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