Some people think that developing a compelling image and personal brand is either not important or vain. But nothing could be further from the truth.
We live in such a fast-paced world, we are taking hundreds of thousands of pieces of information into our brains every day. If you are not creating a memorable experience with the people you communicate with, you will be forgotten.
Creating lasting impressions happens when you have aligned what you have to say with your body language and your image. So let me ask you a question, are you communicating with passion and confidence? Are you leaving people on a higher note after your interaction with them? Or are you hiding and letting others take the front stage?
Being visible is not about being pretentious or egocentric. The type of visibility and confidence I talk about is the one that allows you to express yourself fully and to be noticed for your gifts and point of view. I was talking to a client yesterday and she shared with me how she used to hide at networking events and hide in a corner pretending she wasn’t even there, feeling insecure and nervous. After working with her on her body language and confidence, she put to the test her new skill set at an event she had coming up.
She entered the event with her head held high, feeling fantastic with her image and using open body language. She even went on to initiate conversation and was so excited to report back to me how easy and how much more fun it was to be open to communicate with others. She felt amazing.
Last week out of nowhere, she got a message on Linked in from a gentleman she met at the networking event inviting her to a job interview. And not just that, she was invited to another interview with another company, for a role that hardly ever comes available in her industry. All of this was made possible because she opened up and decided to be visible to opportunities!
These are 5 important aspects to consider when wanting to develop your Stand out personal brand:
Your brand essence: What makes you, you, and unique? In 3 words how would you describe the essence of your brand? That is who you are in your most authentic but empowered version. The first step to creating your personal brand is to reconnect with who you are and actually get to know and accept yourself completely.
Your presence: Your presence and your body language do most of the ‘talking’ when you first meet someone. Is your body language aligned with your message? If not, your message can get lost. How you dress, how you use your body language and how you communicate must be consistent and congruent. That is how you create a presence that stands out and gets you noticed
Your style personality: We all have a very unique style personality and I encourage you to re-connect with it. There are certain industry-standards that you might want to consider. However, it is crucial that your image is a true and authentic representation of who you are. You don’t need to wear black suits and white shirts or blouses to look credible and professional. The science of impression management shows how balancing different elements of your image can portray you as a leader while staying true to yourself and your style personality
Looking good: Looking good is important. Not only because people will make assumptions about your capabilities and attention to detail based on what they see but because there is a huge link between how you present yourself and how you see yourself. You want to be able to show on the ‘outside’ how capable and intelligent you are. Your look says a thousand words about you. Be careful with the style of clothes you wear and the fit. The fit of your clothes is super important. An expensive suit in the wrong fit won’t do anything to increase your presence.
Colour and impression management: The colours you wear can have a massive impact on how you are perceived. They are a huge element when it comes to impression management. By adjusting not only the colours you wear but the contrast you create with the clothes close to your face, you can appear to be more approachable or credible. You can appear to be healthier and even be seen as more professional. Low contrast level (wearing 2 colours close to each other in depth) can make you go unseen, medium contrast (wearing a dark with a light/bright colour) is always appropriate as well as the most people friendly contrast level to use, and wearing a high contrast level (2 colours completely opposite to each other) can make you seen as very creative.
