Why Branding Yourself is Important

Apr 28 2010 by Joel Reyes | 44 Comments

Branding yourself keeps you current in your chosen field, opens doors for you, and creates a lasting impression on clients. By developing your own brand, you’ll have control over people’s initial perception. If you don’t brand yourself, someone else will, and the outcome might not be in your favor.

Relatively speaking, a strong brand influences its target audience and works overtime to engage those who may not have been targeted at all. A successful brand self-promotes, stimulates a unique experience, breathes loyalty, and offers consistency in the quality of the service it offers.

Brands are also used as a way to connect on a universal level. Here are a few reasons on why branding yourself is important.

You’ll be an Expert in Your Field

Not everyone knows who you are, and since that means they probably have no idea what you do and how good you do it, it’s vital for you to give your skills a bit of recognition.

Branding yourself isn’t entirely about who you are as an individual, but mostly about what kind of services and goods you can offer.

A client will usually choose someone they’ve previously heard of to work on their latest project and if you didn’t leave an impression that shows you’re quite the guru in your field, you’re straight out of luck.

It would be much of an inconvenience if a client knew who you were, but had no idea about the quality of services you offered. They’d have nothing in order to set you apart from the rest, and mediocrity will follow you.

Breaking free from this mold means that you have to brand your services.

Become an Asset

Having an asset that’s unique and commands respect is a good investment, especially if you’re a freelance designer. By branding yourself, you become the asset and the product you market is your set of skills or services. You’re your own unique product and no one can take that away from you.

Structuring yourself to become the asset will add value to not only your business, but also your skills and experience. When you’re the asset, your business revolves around you and therefore you’re irreplaceable.

You will be recognized for who you are and most importantly, what you do.

Be a Memorable Force

When companies annoyingly repeat TV and radio commercials, they aren’t trying to sell you the product at that instant, they do it so that the first thing you remember when you go to a department store is their brand. It doesn’t matter what line of product you choose, as long as you go with their brand.

Same concept when it comes to branding yourself. If your brand can successfully reach out and influence potential clients when they start up their browser or need a specific project to be worked on, your brand is the first thing that pops into their minds. Having a catchy name for your freelance business that’s easy to remember is a plus. For example, when you think about quality browsers with customizable elements, who do you think of? For me, it’s Firefox. The name and image behind the brand is simply compelling.

Stand Above the Rest

What defines a brand is the services or products behind it. For example, who would WordPress be without its content management services? Just a catchy name and nothing more.

Creating a brand that stands out requires you to develop an image that is consistent with what your brand has to offer. The image you choose to represent your brand should be simple, straightforward, and convey what you or your business does. The colors you choose should provoke interest, and you should use color theory to make your logo creative and unique.

Build Trust and Recognition

Branding yourself allows you to easily engage with your clients and build trust. Once your clients begin to trust you, they’ll never forget what you have to offer. Out of building trust comes recognition. Odds are if a client trusts you, then they won’t hesitate to refer their contacts to you. Over time, this evolves into a strong relationship, which in return turns your clients into loyal customers.

Easier to Find You

A brand that’s easy to remember is easier to find. If your brand has unique properties and succeeds in attracting attention, then you’ll have a much better chance of having potential clients hear about you and easily find you as well.

For example, Apple is a strong brand that has attracted new customers by breaking standards and reaching higher levels of innovation. If you type the word "Apple" in Google, the first thing that comes up is Apple.com, not the definition or content on the actual fruit. That’s a remarkable accomplishment. The Apple brand has become a staple in its own niche, and it will always be easy to find. You should apply these same principles, offer good services, break a few standards, create a unique representation, and your brand will flourish.

How Are You Branding Yourself?

What are ways to establish a self-brand? Who are good examples of self-branding? Share your thoughts and opinion on this subject in the comments.

About the Author

Joel Reyes is a web designer and web developer with years of experience in the industry. He runs a development studio called Looney Designer. He works with standards-compliant HTML/CSS, PHP, JavaScript and WordPress development and design. Connect with the author via Twitter.

44 Comments

Aaron Kato

April 28th, 2010

Haha! It’s so funny that I can read about the importance of branding myself right here :) Even though I really enjoyed all the phrases of the article and I agree with it at all.

Design Earth

April 28th, 2010

Good points. Nice to read.

Harsh Agrawal

April 28th, 2010

Love this article and one should always brand themselves.. Imagine Steve jobs tomm join a new company… The company will instantly get branded by his name.. After all its one man name..and brand will move with his name… Great article

Babar Asif

April 28th, 2010

very informative article…thanks

James

April 28th, 2010

cool post..loved it

Amy

April 28th, 2010

a very well written article.

Jonathan B

April 28th, 2010

Ty for this post. This will definitely help my business.

cooljaz124

April 28th, 2010

Sure , this is very nice tips

Scott Petrovic

April 28th, 2010

Good article on branding. Writing articles like this is a great way to show your expertise in a field. Writing blog posts on your portfolio site is another great way to show clients your knowledge and expertise outside of straight portfolio pieces. Showing that you are current and valuable in the existing and future market is really what can seperate you in the ever-changing web world.

Louay Haddad

April 28th, 2010

that’s a great article.

It really needs time and a lot of research and i think after that phases we can become consultants and no more designers.

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Jordan Walker

April 28th, 2010

Great article with important information. Thanks.

NickDesign

April 28th, 2010

Good article!! Thanks. In these times “hyper-competition” is necessary to create your personal branding to build trust in your business relationships.

Matthew Heidenreich

April 28th, 2010

great read, very useful. Thanks!

venkat

April 29th, 2010

good article

Sean McGary

April 29th, 2010

Great article. Very informative and helpful.

Gringo

April 29th, 2010

This looks like the writing work of cpt. Obvious.

Irina

April 29th, 2010

Interesting ideas! Thanks.

Vivek @ InfoEduTech

April 29th, 2010

Branding is necessary in this blogosphere. without any branding you will not survive in this blogosphere and not able to run your onl9 business effectively.
Without any brand no income and no business

Mikel King

April 29th, 2010

This was a good high level view of branding. Appreciate the effort you put in to writing,I found it very helpful.

Cheers,
@mikelking

Daniel Low

April 30th, 2010

I agree totally with the article sir. Being the “most popular” is slightly better than being the “most skillful”. Branding is really important to let people see and remember what we do, even if we are not the best in the market.

Zack

April 30th, 2010

Branding yourself isn’t entirely about who you are as an individual, but mostly about what kind of services and goods you can offer.

This is an important point which is always been forgotten.

Divergens

April 30th, 2010

Great article.

I can recommend “Crush it” by Gary Vaynerchuk, If you want to read more about branding yourself.

Anita McCants

May 2nd, 2010

Very helpful information.

Puneet

May 14th, 2010

Branding always works. Once you are a brand traffic comes automatically.

Bill Bassman

July 2nd, 2010

I had to use my full name to brand myself.:) Great post. I’ve probably committed the biggest no-no and gone back and forth branding my company and my name.

Lisa Thomason

August 22nd, 2010

We have found some clients over look this very important factor so have spent a lot of the initial work re-branding them and have seen some great results. LT

Debbie Russell

October 8th, 2010

I think in the next few years you will find more and more people branding their name with a website. For those with common names like me, one idea is http://www.debbierussell.me because after all, it is all about ME! That is what I did.

Alan Gross

January 7th, 2011

You need to be known and branding on one of the ways to be known. In today’s electronic age you need to expand the ways you communicate your brand.

Dennis Salvatier

February 4th, 2011

I often blog about the importance of branding and educate my clients on the need for it in their small business. They think a brand is about how you look and I correct them and let them know it’s about how you are perceived. I you don’t brand yourself, people will do it for you. Nice post.