We talk a lot about the value of online networking and building your brand presence using outlets like LinkedIn, Twitter, and Facebook. These are great online branding tools that can help you promote yourself and your unique value proposition, but they also are getting to be crowded outlets. You need to get your name and brand out there online, but everyone is using the same outlets so how do you differentiate yourself?
Consider video. I recently received an interesting e-mail directing me to a blog post by personal brandmeister Paul Copcutt of Square Peg on how to use video to promote your personal brand. What he has to say makes a lot of sense:
“One of the concerns about personal branding, especially if someone has built a significant online presence is that how much of it is controlled or even manufactured? People are starting to ask - who can we trust or believe?
“Enter - VIDEO - it's helping to level the playing field a little.”
Video can be a great branding tool to help you stand out from the crowd. Check out the video that Paul posted on his blog to see how he uses it to promote himself. And you can post the video in multiple locations, like Vimeo and YouTube, and then embed it in Facebook and other places to give you more visibility. It also gives you a chance to project your personality and connect in a more realistic way with others. Video also gives you an opportunity to differentiate your brand and communicate something about yourself with a more personal passion.
And just as there are online locations to post your portfolio, like VisualCV, there are online video production resources as well. Paul recommends videoBio, which can produce a professional video bio for you for $299. With a little skill you can do it yourself with a Flip camera or a video camera, but production quality matters so getting some professional assistance may not be a bad idea.
As with posting photos online, some are concerned about how videos might promote ageism and weed you out of the running from the start because people can actually see you. You can think of seeing your image online as a barrier to entry, but if you think about it another way, you can’t hide your age. Hiring managers will determine your age from your marketing documents or other means before they commit to an interview. If you harness social media and video, it demonstrates that you are savvier than the next candidate and it may give you an edge.
The real trick is what you do with your video calling card once you have produced it. You need to use it to create a trail of breadcrumbs that leads back to your primary online location, whether that’s your blog, your web site, or your LinkedIn profile. Video can be a great brand differentiator, but you have to use it with a plan in mind so you are strategically promoting your personal brand, not just throwing a video out on the web and hoping it gets seen.
