Building a Personal Brand

During my education as an English major, keeping a blog was required of some classes. The idea behind the task was meant to initiate a habit, an appreciation, and a kick-start towards a personal brand. 

What the heck is a personal brand? 

More so, Why is it important to brand yourself? 

There is a sea of 7,107,256,437 people hanging out on this planet. (http://www.census.gov/population/popclockworld.html) (there, proof.)

A giant chunk of that sea is either working people, or people searching to get their work on. 

If you want to stand out in that sea-

stand out as a metaphorical "rainbow fish" amongst the other working fishes, you have to jazz it up a bit. 

And while it's currently socially unacceptable to buy a billboard space to display your resume and most attractive Facebook profile picture; you're gonna have to try some other options. 

blog.

-It portrays a peek into your personality &

displays a dimension of your intelligence

-A blog can be a supplement to your resume.

Sure, you can list "professional-grade basket-weaving skills" on your resume, 

but writing about it,

posting photos, 

and really laying out proof of these professional-grade basket-weaving skills will distinguish you from other basket-weavers. 

& "Don’t be fooled by the myth that if you build it, they will come. Unless you’re the luckiest person on earth, you’ll have to actually communicate everything you’ve created to others." (http://mashable.com/2009/02/05/personal-branding-101/) 

-I'm not gonna lie to you- lots of people have blogs. Simply writing posts ain't gonna produce the magical results of massive waves of recognition. You're going to have to work at it. Throw your page's url out like candy at a parade -in places where it holds chance of being gobbled up.

Announce new posts on your social media sites. Stand on your roof & yell it to the neighborhood. 

Think about one of your favorite brands.

Why do you like it?

Brands establish authenticity, dimension, and emotion-tailored to the audience that they want to appeal towards. 

For example- take the recent Chevy truck ads.

The ad embodies the hard-working consumer--and this appeals to their demographic. 

Who is your demographic? 

Are you a technologist? Blog about technology. Blog about what you love. Blog with the passion that made you study this technology for the years that you did. 

Get on Stackoverflow, Github, & discussion boards; & then link that activity into your blog. 

If you want to be seen & known-if you want to be a rainbow fish amongst the sea of technologist fishes (but how do they type? :P ) Start placing your colorful scales all over the sea to be noticed.