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Establishing your personal brand is a great way to drum up interest in yourself,

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your expertise, and perhaps a business you run or work for.

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This is a very powerful strategy that businesses use to attract customers

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and new business,

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and individuals online have used the same strategy

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to turn themselves into influencers with thousands, sometimes millions,

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of followers.

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Personal branding must be authentic though

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and be consistent with your values and beliefs.

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So let's hear more now from author C.C. Chapman

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to learn how to develop your own personal brand in the tech industry.

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So C.C., how does personal branding differ

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from the branding that a company has online?

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So personal branding is how people in the world are going to perceive you

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and what you stand for.

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It's really important for anybody—

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it doesn't matter if you're a designer, a developer, or what you do—

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to develop a personal brand.

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That goes beyond just the work you do because let's face it

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your work has to be stellar, your work has to be as great as possible,

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but at the end of the day everybody you're competing with—

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their work is great.

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Your personal brand is also about your work ethic, your responsibilities.

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It's about the things that happen when you step out from behind the computer.

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You get out there to a networking event, or you're at a conference.

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How you act, how you speak, what you do. >>Your personality.

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Everything about you. Your personality, what you believe in.

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All of that builds your personal brand.

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It's everything from a simple Tweet to a Facebook status update

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to the way you handle yourself at an event.

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All of that goes back to building your personal brand.

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So what are some examples of ways that our designers and developers out there

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can develop that personal brand? You mentioned social media, blog posts.

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I mean what are some of the examples that come to mind?

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Sure. So everything you create, every action you take adds to your personal brand.

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Everything from when you start up a blog, every blog post you write.

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If you're writing blog posts that are helpful and informative

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that's going to shape your personal brand in one direction.

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If you start becoming more of the review guy or girl,

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you could go in that direction,

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but everything you do does build up that.

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Some people will just—whether it's an angry Tweet or a negative Facebook status,

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that all builds up because you don't know who's watching and listening.

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It's not just the people who are commenting on your blog.

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It's not just the people who send you an email. Trust me.

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The web's a big place. You know that, but people are paying attention.

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At the end of the day when it comes down to you against somebody else,

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and you've got equally great work, your prices are competitive,

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it's going to come down to who they personally connect with. >>Right.

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It's not always about what you've said or what you've done necessarily.

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It's like this is a guy or girl I want to hire, I want to do some business with.

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Yeah. That's kind of the important point that I think we want to make here

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is that personal branding can make such a huge difference when it comes to

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making business connections and making business deals. Right?

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Personal branding is going to give the public, perspective clients and customers

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this really—it can be an intimate look into really who you are

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in terms of personality, of values, of what you believe in,

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and maybe if those values don't align with a company

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or a client that you want to do business with,

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maybe it's not going to be a good fit. >>True. Very, very true.

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Just like you're going to be investigating clients when you're going for a new job,

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they're going to be investigating you.

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There's not a company on this planet when they're going to hire you,

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whether it's to build a website or to hire you to be a full-time employee,

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they're going to Google you. They're going to look you up.

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They're going to find out what you're doing online,

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and all of that—every photo, every post you do, every action you take

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both from behind your computer and out in public

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plays into that role, and it's your brand.

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It may sound very weird, and it does feel weird to say that you have a brand.

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It's a very, very strange feeling, but you do.

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It's who you are, and it's important. You've got to protect it.

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I've seen a lot of professionals in the industry go as far as developing multiple

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online presences for themselves.

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We're talking about well, this is my personal account,

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this is my professional account.

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I have a band. Here's my band's account. Here's one website I run.

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Here's a pod—all kinds of things. Right? >>Yeah.

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Now in addition to the potential for it being confusing,

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is that something that people need to consider to have that division

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between the personal and professional, or are you not giving the whole picture

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if you do that?

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I always say to people—I used to get asked this a lot.

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The band separation, that makes sense. >>Sure.

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That's good marketing for your band,

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but the whole concept of having the personal versus the professional profile

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or the Twitter account or the Facebook status is ridiculous.

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You are who you are, and let's face it,

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if there's some aspect of you whether it's the way you act, whatever it is

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if you're pretending not to have that as part of your life

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it's going to come out in the office.

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You're going to get to know these people, and it's eventually not going to work out.

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I am not a proponent for having separate professional and personal profiles.

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What a lot of people do like LinkedIn.

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LinkedIn is the biggest social network focused on your careers.

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What you share there could be completely different than what you Tweet and Facebook

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and put on your blog. That makes sense. I'm not saying don't do that.

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What I'm saying is don't have this fake personal persona

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and your professional persona and separate the two.

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You are who you are. Be who you are.

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If they don't like you they're not going to hire you either way,

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so don't put up a facade and try to be somebody you're not.

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It eventually crumbles down, and it's not going to work for you.

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It's a waste of time and energy.