Building Your Brand

Are you one of THOSE people? You know the kind I mean… the kind of person who only goes on LinkedIn when they’re in between jobs and looking for their next opportunity. It’s actually how I stay informed on who’s out of work; suddenly their name pops up in my newsfeed as they feverishly share content among their contacts so they can become more visible.

You’re doing it wrong.

Working your LinkedIn profile only when you’re looking for a job is like calling up a contact out of the blue after several years and asking for a reference. Who are you? Yes, I vaguely remember you. Why should I give you a reference?

Relationships don’t grow by themselves. They need nurturing and require time to be set aside to connect to people, and to build trust.

It’s almost amusing how many people log onto Facebook daily and share articles and status updates, yet they let their LinkedIn profiles languish, treating it almost as an afterthought. Oh look, Mary Lou is having a work anniversary. I think I’ll log in and send her a “Congrats!”

You have it backwards.

Facebook isn’t going to help you find a new job. Facebook is where you keep in touch with family and friends, sharing jokes and recipes and the occasional funny cat video. (By the way, don’t share those on LinkedIn – it’s really unprofessional and that’s not going to make you look good.)

Have you read an interesting article lately that pertains to your line of work? Maybe it was something about a style of business you admire or a new innovation in your field. Why not share it with other professionals? Over time, your contacts will get a fairly good idea of the type of person you are, what you’re interested in, your concerns for your profession, the type of self-development you’re pursuing, and the direction in which you’re heading, just by the articles you’re reading and sharing. This is an important part of building a relationship with your contacts.

We are constantly selling ourselves, to our customers, to our current employers, to our next potential opportunity. You need to market yourself and build your own personal brand so your contacts will know who you are.

Contacts that will be so important when you’re looking for that next opportunity.

Building Your Brand by Suzette Seveny is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.