How To Create A Personal Brand with the Help of Career Mentorship

Building your personal brand takes time. Over the course of your career, as you develop your skills and grow as a person, your interests, your professional focus, and even the values that drive you will likely shift. Nobody can predict the way they’ll develop and change over the years but what you can do is learn to factor those changes in when crafting your professional image. And who better to help you craft that image than an experienced career mentor.

Identifying Your Unique Value Proposition

Now, you may be sat there thinking that all this talk of ‘brand’ and ‘image’ is a little corporate. After all, even in your professional life, you’re still a person. Do you really need to sell yourself like a product or a company?

When building your personal brand, it’s important to bear in mind what a brand is and what it isn’t. Branding, at its core, is about simple and effective communication. It’s about being able to say who you are, what you do, and why every company in your space should want to hire you in as few words as possible. While it’s very much a pitch for yourself, it’s also a way to quickly communicate all your best traits.

All this to say that building a personal brand is, by its very nature, learning to tell a story about yourself. That story won’t be the full picture, just the parts that showcase you at your best. Put simply: what can you offer that no one else can? What can you do better than anyone else? What makes you unique?

Naturally, this can feel like a daunting task at first. After all, how do you know that your experiences set you apart from those around you? You might feel that your creative approach to problem solving is particularly astute, but can you be sure that your competition aren’t just as creative?

Consulting With Your Mentor

There are times when experience just can’t be beaten and when it comes to understanding the career landscape of a job role, there’s no one better to talk to than someone who has worked in that role.

Your Mentor will have seen plenty of people try to sell themselves with varying levels of success. They’ll be able to help you separate out the cliches and focus on the aspects of your brand that are the best fit for those hiring in your chosen role. Perhaps most importantly of all, they’ll be able to get to know you and help you talk through the aspects of your brand that could be serious assets in your chosen job role.

Building Your Online Presence and Network

Once you’ve decided how you want to present yourself, it’s time to start doing some presenting. While there are many ways of getting your name in front of the right people, first and foremost you should be taking advantage of social media.

In 2024, social media has become integral to networking and career development. While this can feel like an extra task for those looking to progress on the career ladder, social media also has the potential to be a liberating force, allowing you to access opportunities you might never previously have thought possible,

For example, let’s say you’re a 3D artist looking to get a job in the games industry. Your years of practice and training might look great on a CV but they’re unlikely to stand out in front of other applicants. What you really need is for the right studio to see your portfolio. Once they get a look at your unique artistic style, your nuanced understanding and application of foundational principles, and your ability to deliver high quality, professional work, they’ll be rushing to get in touch with you as soon as possible.

But how do you get your work into the hands of the right people? How do you ensure that your work gets the chance to speak for itself?

On social media, people have the chance to discover and share your work based on its merits alone. Furthermore, by inspiring people to share your work, you’re also proving that it resonates.

Of course, this is just one example, but it’s easy to see how the same logic can be applied to other jobs – particularly those that require a high-quality portfolio.

With an experienced Mentor by your side, you can put your best foot forwards online for the whole world to see. Not only will they be able to help you curate your online presence, but they’ll also have the knowledge to advise you about what kind of work is most likely to impress hiring managers for the position you’re looking to fill.

At the end of the day, while building your personal brand may seem daunting at first, with the help of a Mentor, everything will fit into place.

Whether you’re looking for a Mentor to help you reach the next stage of your career or you’re ready to become a Mentor yourself, sign up today with Career Navig8r.com