TECHNOLOGY REPORT:
“Personal branding is not something that happens overnight, it can take lots of planning and months of hard work to start seeing the results; but as the English say; opportunities always come to the prepared,”
Using ICT as a tool to Personal Branding with specifications on social media.
Social media is changing the way humans interact and behave drastically across the globe. Back in the day families would meet around a fire place to converse, friends would travel distances to visit each other. All that has been replaced by facebook messenger, whatsapp, IMO, LinkedIn, Skype, instagram, twitter, Club House, Zoom name it.
Due to the attention people are giving to social networks,many businesses and brands can now be accessed via social media. This in the end is making using social media to create and promote brands so competitive that those who use with creativity and consistency are reaping highly.
We are a world where people dance upload videos on Tik Tok, write a 150 word tweet, Share whatsapp statuses while several others own YouTube channels, blogs to mention but a few, its high time we learned on growing our accounts with qualitative contents i.e.written, images, graphic and other Audivisuals contents.
In Uganda, influencers earn a minimum of $28 (about UShs 100,000) to promote a show, programme, product or service and content development. These digital fortuities are gradually becoming solutions to unemployment and are open to persons with influencing powers.
This creates demand to equip the youth who are most internet users with necessary skills on digital influencing, personal and business branding in stead of spending too much time and data consuming harmful contents. Parrots UG organize the expert talk session in this article with youth experties who have great experiences on personal Branding.
Do you want to further your career, grow social following, sell more products in your business, and increase better opportunities your career? We will discuss this later in this article.
Personal branding is not something that happens overnight, it can take lots of planning and months of hard work to start seeing the results; but as the English say; opportunities always come to the prepared.
Branding yourself is not sn easy feat. It is time-consuming, slow and sometimes hard to stomach. Receiving negative feedback online can knock you even if you have a great communication plan, and sometimes you don’t feel like being the brand you have built. We highlight a few things to consider when branding yourself so that you can improve your self-brand quickly.
Research & Create your Personal Branding Statement: Personal branding statement defines you,who your audience will be and why they should follow you.
Sovereign Hasahya, the Butaleja district Female youth leader also the National Youth Council member advise that defining your personal brand will enable you audit your competitors if at all they exist.
She suggests for the use your full name, avoid nickname and shortened names as well as keeping the same identifty across all social networks.
“Have a good Bio-data for example your occupation, education background, work experience, competent skills and your physical address.”
“Clearly define what sets you apart from others because this helps you to create your personal brand strategy,” Hasahya said.
Not far from Hasahya’s thoughts, Bathsheba B Akantorana, a trained journalist is emphatic that defining a personal brand with a consistent image/LOGO, updating your account and focusing on your profile statement allows you to express information about yourself and product.
Building a personal Branding strategy; check how to engage your audience and define what success will look like for you. Hold open discussions on specific topics such as Gender, Climate change allows you engage your audience who may share their opinions in a leave a reply / comment section for example holding a Q& A session, Live Facebook or YouTube chat.
Uniqueness and Consistency; Online Journalist and events moderator Isaac Akuguziibwe, gives fascinating insights into uniqueness and consistency of branding. He says one need to be unique, consistent (on using Brand LOGO, name, slogan and choice of colours) and creative enough for their brand to stand out. He says this calls for a sustainable brand management and development strategy.
Monitor your Personal Branding engagement; Not everyone knows about your existence online no matter how more or less popular you are. Today, there are still people who search for the parents, age and cause of death of Jesus. Isn’t he popular? Many people will search for your name upon hearing it being mentioned in media, public or reading it in Newspapers and on social media when something strange or great happens to you.
Hasahya calls for monitoring of who mentions or sites your name online, respond to messages and comments on social networks on time.
Mary Blessing Ahairirwe, a first year student at Makerere University who believes in acquiring useable life skills adds that monitoring your personal brand engagements online allows you to fetch responses from your audience which you May use to better your brand.
In addition to the above, Leonard Kamugisha Akida, the founder of Parrots UG Online Newspaper says while monitoring a Personal Branding engagement, one should create room to action for negative remarks.
“For any person or company to develop, they should accommodate both positive and negative criticisms. Not that everyone will embrace your brand. You need to give place for action on negative remarks to redefine your brand,” “Negative remarks allow you to correct your brand for instance acquiring a unique name, relevant LOGO, brief and precise personal brandingstatement,” he said.
Develop your Personal Branding; Aim to sharing your personal brand through social media, outreaches, speaking opportunities. Consider blogging, vblogging, podcasts improves consumption of your brand.
Gilbert Akampa, a laboratory technician at Holy Innocents Children Hospital Mbarara suggests for the use of banners, flyers, short video/audio clips, use of brand corporate identities like T-shirts, Caps, Hoods, Umbrellas, wall clocks to create awareness about your brand to your targeted potential audience.
Have a communication plan; Controlling your presence online can be time-consuming so this plan will help you with negative backlash and help you to easily provide information to partners that you will work with down the line.
Measure your success regularly; Set some KPIs for personal brand success so that you know you are heading in the right direction. Celebrate even small wins to remain motivated to achieve more.
So after doing all this how do you know if you have been successful in building a personal brand? A few valuable KPIs include:
●When a sale converts through your blog
When you are asked to speak at an event or on a podcast
●When someone refers you to a potential client.
●When a publication reaches out to invite you to guest blog.
●When people start mentioning you online, on social media, their blog or other important media.
Precious Ankunda, an Online journalist at Parrots UG says the internet provides more opportunities for people to do transcribing, freelance writing, sales and marketing, brand ambassador roles but stresses that they are only available to people with a strong personal brand. She urges the youth to explore and exploit their potential talents online.
We have all seen digital influences such as bloggers, vloggers, social media users with a large following being hired by corporate companies as to manage and promote ther product’s brand. This is due to the impact of digitisation through innovation on job creation.
You could Uganda’s next Akshay Kumar, Virat Kohli, Kareen Kapoor, Amitabh Bachchan or Kiara Advani. You don’t need to be a celebrity or an icon to become a brand ambassador. All you need is producing nice content (photos, videos, graphic posters, audios)
Personal Branding is not just about selling products or services but trust and assurance to the potential customer that whatever you are promoting is safe to use.
In the post pandemic era, we must to dedicate our focus on tapping into activities that provide solutions to societal aspirations. ICT is a necessity in this. Use it with due diligent.
