Brands today attempt to be more human so that they can resonate with their audience on a human level but when it comes to personal branding, all of the elements that we develop in a business brand to be more human and to resonate with their customers on a human level already exist within a personal brand. Everything from your expertise to your personality, to your tone of voice, and the language that you use all of this exists within your brand. It’s just a matter of nurturing that personal brand to develop it into an asset that you can use. In this article, I’m going to give you five examples of normal people who have done exactly that so that you can take some inspiration to develop your brand.
Gary Vaynerchuk
Gary Vaynerchuk is an absolute beast of a personal brand and it’s not just because of what he does and how he does it, it’s because he is so intentional about the way he does it. He is a massive preacher of a brand and the value of brand both personal brand and business brands. He knows exactly what he’s doing. Of course, everything that he brings to the table is raw and he gives a lot of value, he brings a lot of personality and authenticity to the table. He is just being himself for the most part but he is also very intentional about doing. He is very aware of what’s going on around him in terms of what’s going on in the social world, in terms of what people are talking about, what is trending, what’s not trending and he brings all of that to the table but he brings it to the table in a very unique way. There is no shortage of entrepreneurs or marketers out there giving their opinion but the way Gary Vaynerchuk brings his knowledge and his expertise and his personality to the table are what endears him to his fan. Another thing that I like about Gary is where he’s come from. He comes from the wine industry and he created 1000 videos on YouTube long before I ever knew who he was and he turned his father’s three million dollar wine business into a 60million dollar business. He’s coming from a place of real experience and he’s bringing all of that to the table. It just also goes to show the value of a personal brand that you can pivot from the wine industry into branding entrepreneurship and marketing and still build successful businesses doing that. I love this example of personal branding and Gary is an absolute beast to look towards.
Elon Musk
Elon Musk is a real modern man of mystery and he has been likened to Tony Stark (Iron Man) as a real-life version of him because you know he’s just got this mystic about him. He is such a smart individual and he has these huge visions. If you think about what his vision is with Spacex, he wants to bring the human civilization to mars so that we’re a multi-planet species. I mean is there any vision in the world that’s bigger than that throughout any personal brand in the world and if that’s not impressive enough for you then he’s also the founder of Paypal and he’s the CEO of Tesla, one of the most modern brands in the world. He’s got a very active Twitter account. He’s got over a 40million followers on Twitter and he’s always on Twitter sharing his thoughts, his ideas, interacting with other celebrities or political leaders. He is this real man of mystery and he has everybody intrigued about what he’s going to do next or say next and he’s very intentional about keeping his brand alive and keeping in front of the audience that is so intrigued by him.
Tony Robbins
Tony Robbins has been in the public eye since the 80s. He wrote a book called unlimited power back in 1987 that catapulted him into the limelight and since then he’s been traveling around the world doing self-help webinars and self-help coaching and helping people be the best version of themselves. At this stage now he’s helped hundreds of thousands of people to overcome adversity and to achieve success within their lives. He doesn’t just do this on a mass scale with big seminars he does this on a one-on-one version as well. He’s coached people like Bill Clinton and Oprah Winfrey to Kim Kardashian and Conor Mcgregor. Still to this day at the age of 60, he’s still traveling around the world helping people and he’s still very much in the limelight and building his brand.
Chris Doe
The first three examples were more household names. They were names that you would expect most people to know but Chris is an example of a personal brand that has been developed within a specific niche that is designed. Chris is pretty famous within the Graphic Design Community and he originally achieved success with his agency. They won many awards. He’s lectured all over the world and he achieved all of this before he turned his attention towards the future. The future went in there and plugged the gap that was much needed to give designers a bit of direction in terms of their business ideas, business processes when it comes to design. There was a real gap in the market for somebody to go in there and do that and that is what the future has done and that is what Chris Doe had done. He’s built out his brand as much as they’ve built out the future brand as well. He continues to give value every single day on YouTube channel, Instagram channel, and Linkedin channel. What I like about Chris is that he is very accessible. He’s on social media interacting with people. That is a great way to build your brand to be accessible, to be on the platform where your audience is engaging with them and offering valuable content. Chris is a great example of a personal brand that has been built within a very specific niche.
Charlie Marie
Sticking with the design space, Charlie Marie is another personal brand that has been built out within the graphic design space. She’s half Kiwi, half British. She’s living out of Valencia and she’s just doing her thing. She’s a designer. She’s bringing that value, that experience to the table and she’s showing up time and again for her audience. She’s built an absolute solid following on YouTube to nearly 200,000 followers at this stage but what I love about Charlie Marie and her brand is just how refreshingly normal she is. She brings her unique personality to the table. She’s not trying to be anything that she’s not and she’s just there being consistent time and again. It just goes to show that you can build a personal brand without having designs or ideas about relocating the human race to another planet you can just bring the expertise to the table and your unique self to the table and just be consistent.
There are some household names there and you’re not about to go and compete with Elon Must in terms of relocating the human race to Mars. However, there are some very niche examples in there as well and I wanted to give some contrast there to show you that personal branding is not about becoming a celebrity. You’re not trying to necessarily become a celebrity if you’re building your brand. You’re trying to take the time to invest in a reputation that already exists. Your brand is already there. It’s just a case of whether or not you take the time to develop that out and although there might be a lot of people out there talking about what you’re talking about, there is only one version of you. You have your unique personality, you have your tone of voice, you have your unique idea about what your industry is about, and your unique philosophy. If you bring that to the table and you take the time to develop out what your ideas are and start creating content and giving value to your audience then over time that reputation will grow and your brand will grow.
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