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Will businesses have to deal with personal branding?
January 5th, 2009Personal branding is going to be huge in a couple of years as everyone is at least very good at one thing and also because it is going to be even easier than today to start a blog, run your own TV show and things like that. This post is going to be more a discussion and some thoughts about whether or not businesses and companies will have to deal with personal branding and if it will be an issue for them.
The impact of social media and personal branding
With social medias and personal branding, each and everyone of us is an “expert” in a field. If not an expert, you’re talking/blogging about something you feel comfortable with. Some are extremely lucky, have a day job they really enjoy and blog and tweet just for fun. On the opposite, some have a boring day job or a job they hate and this personal branding/blog stuff is what keeps them alive during the evening and at night. It is for some, just like a double life: working as a regular receptionist during the day and running a popular show on the web at night.
This is the kind of things that leads to disasters for employers because you are not able to keep your employees focused. They are tired during the day because they blog/Vlog/tweet all night and on top of that they do personal stuff from work.
Blogging and branding from work
How many of you take time while you are at work to blog, tweet, read rss feeds, comment on blogs and forums? I bet a lot and it is extremely normal because personal branding/blogging is EXTREMELY time consuming. The amount of emails, comments, tweets and blog posts you have to deal with everyday usually would require you to be working full time on it, but you can’t. So what do you do? You work on your “personal business” from work. That’s classic. How many hours everyday do you spend at work on your online business?
Less work done
I can see problems in the future as more and more persons will get into blogging and vlogging. Right now, the bloggosphere seems huge, but it’s still a minority of the population who blog seriously and brand themselves seriously. This is going to change and I think it will be a problem for companies and businesses. As more and more people start to blog, more and more people will start to work on their personal brand from work and as we all know, it’s extremely time consuming. I think companies will have to deal with this issue.
Employers will have to adapt
Is it your fault if your online business/personal branding stuff is a lot more attractive than your day job? Well, maybe it is. Maybe you decided to have a job you didn’t like just because it gives you enough time to run your business from work, maybe you don’t want to leave because you have good working conditions you don’t want to loose even if your job comes with a bottle of scotch and gun, etc. Whether you like your job or not, employers will have to adapt to this new reality, the social medias reality. Employers will have to understand that people not only have a personal life now, they also have an “online life”.
Accepting it, not fighting
Let’s start with an example: the music industry. This industry fought for so long and is still fighting against sharing music online, but then a company called Apple understood that fighting was completely useless. Apple’s vision was simply to get into the business instead of fighting against it: if you can’t beat them, join them. iTunes is today the biggest music provider online and the music industry couldn’t be happier. So, just like the music industry, businesses will have to understand social medias and will have to deal with it instead of fighting against it. Fighting these big social beasts will only make things worst.
Not only they will have to understand the importance of social medias today, but they will also need to make their jobs a lot more attractive. It cannot be all your fault if your online life is more attractive than your day job, employers will have to make their business a business 2.0. What is a business 2.0? I think it will be an environment where whatever your job is, you’ll be able to bring ideas, interact with others, think outside the box and all that of course with the help of technology and social medias. Social medias within the company.
You share
Share with us your vision. Is social medias/personal branding going to be a treat to companies and if so, what’s the best way to deal with this?
17 Responses to “Will businesses have to deal with personal branding?”
What do you think?
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How about companies allowing employee online profiles connected to the company.
That way when the people go home they will still be working for the company as they build their online identities.
No?
I think systems will develop that make it easier to maintain our online lives, like you’re seeing with lifestreaming now. Ultimately, there’s not enough money in for everyone to pay the bills commenting and posting. What you want is technology to do stuff for you (e.g. Your phone has a GPS that knows the coordinates of your office, and then can automatically update your Facebook status with “Ben is in the office” etc).
I like your thinking but alas I think most leadership today is too short-sighted to see the value. Perhaps when this generation of Web 2.0 “kids” gets into power. Obama could provide leadership and example here.
johns last blog post..An Hour on the Treadmill
I definitely think that people do not know how to deal with social media and companies definitely don’t know how to. But if you do it is a great way for personal branding.
Franklin Bishops last blog post..6 Wordpress CSS Plugins
Personal branding is inevitable and corporations will have to deal with it in order to recruit the top talent (brands). Also, not everyone is an expert in the field because most people haven’t used their brands (and social media) in order to achieve results.
I don’t think this will be an issue for employers. At least for the employers that want to keep their employees focused on their jobs. They can always block access to these sites or make the computers in the office only access the Intranet in the business and therefore only certain sites are reachable. So stopping all of the at work personal branding/blogging is easily stopped.
On the other hand, I think this is a very important medium for everyone in the future. Yes, you will see the early adapters using social media to recruit employees, promote them, watch them, monitor them, promote them, and more.
Should be interesting!
Freddie Taylors last blog post..Goal Setting Sunday: Week 18
@Dean: I never really thought about that, but it is a nice suggestion. I guess you have to trust your employees though. That also brings the issue of what to do when some employees leave the company, but that’s certainly a step in the right direction. I know some companies like Microsoft can allow you to host a personal blog about Microsoft technologies on their servers. You can work on your personal brand and still speak in the name of the company.
@Monevator: Yep, I totally agree: technology will have to improve a lot so that we don’t have to constantly update everything manually.
@John: Totally, a shift will be required and this will be in a couple of years when as you say the “web 2.0″ kids get better positions in companies.
@Franklin: Well I think people know a lot more than companies how to deal with personal branding. Changing businesses mindset takes time unfortunately…
@Dan: Yes, you are right with recruitment. It will be more and more common to recruit people based on their personal brand and how they deal with it online.
@Freddie: I don’t think it’s that easy to bloc access and it depends on the kind of work. For example, in the technology/computer business, access to the Internet is essential and access to all sites, not just companies site. More and more jobs will require unlimited access to the Internet in the future and blocking it I don’t think is a “long term” solution. Works for now though…
Well, I’ve been out of a job for about 8 years now.
So I only know the world of self-employed professionals and how to grow our practices.
And personal branding, in the form of self-promotion, has always been around. And it’s been our #1 competitive advantage (and ethical disadvantage… think: ambulance chasers).
Corporations have long since used personal brands – ever since the first corporate brand. That’s what the Quaker mascot still is. Likewise, branding flourished using these characters who personified the brands’ attributes.
Of course, we just do it better when we’re representing ourselves.
So corporations will realize that Together Everybody Achieves More when they leverage the personal brands on which they are building their corporate brands. Or they create a loveable mascot, as usual.
~ Vikram Rajan
PracticeMarketingAdvisors.com
I think that corporations lose thousands of dollars daily on people doing personal blogging at work. I work at a company that has 1000’s of employees and even though we have a “no blogging, no personal email, no personal internet” policy who the heck can enforce that.
For me personally, I spend about an hour a day online out of 8.5 for personal use. But then again, it would probably be less if they gave me more work and stricter deadlines in following them. The biggest problem arise out of the fact that laziness is rampantly bred in the corporate world (at least the one that I have seen.)
Companies will have to adapt and find ways to incorporate what we are all doing outside of work in the workplace. How? I don’t even have a clue but most likely by the time they get a clue the world will be on to something else.
Sorry this was kind of a rant…. it kind of just hit a sore spot. I REALLY do ask for more work on a daily basis but since no one wants to give it to me I will just do more for me.
Jens last blog post..Hostgator- Are you Happy With Your Web Host?
@Ben – You are totally right about “…personal branding/blog stuff is what keeps them alive during the evening…” and during the day as well. Business 2.0 to me will be telecommuting, marketing, investing… mostly higher up positions… someone still has to do the grunt work.
@Jen – Companies are totally losing money from employees using companies technology for personal use. that’s why I got myself broad band and bring my own laptop to work… =)
Eric Tans last blog post..Same Contest, Double The Winners, Are You Lucky Enough?
@Eric- I don’t think the money that is being lost is from technology use but from the time taken away from the workplace- afterall most companies don’t pay extra if you are online longer but they are paying you to be there a certain number of hours a day.
Jens last blog post..Hostgator- Are you Happy With Your Web Host?
I’m not entirely sure what you meant by “Employers will have to adapt”. I think it will be a loooong time before employers run out of job seekers they can hire, after firing the idiot caught blogging at work. LOL
Dennis Edells last blog post..Do You Have Blank Blog Advertisement Slots?
Ben, how many wasted hours per day, month, year are businesses absorbing in employs not being efficient. Hours wasted emailing, surfing the net, or playing games on the computer. This is a very big concern of corporations and management. Keeping the employees focused on task and the job.
Granted there are some environments where creativity is king, denying access maybe doesn’t make sense. But most business is not in the pure creative field.
Freddie Taylors last blog post..Goal Setting Sunday: Week 18
We are definately living in the era of personal branding. Personality has become more important than product in most places. Cable news, travel shows, sports, etc. TV, in general, has become centered around individuals. We don’t watch No Reservations. We watch Anthony Bourdain.
Gennaros last blog post..Passport Cards Speed Border Crossings
Personal branding is a key to online venture if you are into online business, somehow, having a day job does not mean that blogging is just for fun or having a site is just for fun, sometimes it does pay the bills cutting off the incentives from the day job.
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I think systems will develop that make it easier to maintain our online lives, like you're seeing with lifestreaming now.