Personal brand seems like a buzz word these days. It comes around every few years and becomes the trend of coaching communities with many people teaching the same mundane ideas of what it means to package YOU and your creativity, uniqueness, knowledge or skills. Coaches skate by teaching you business techniques without truly defining what this thing we call a personal brand is …
Or why it’s even important – especially for creatives.
And that is why we’re here. To talk all things Black creatives personal branding – to go deep and shift our perspective to what personal branding is truly about, YOU!
Before we dive in to the how you can build a bad a$$ personal brand, let’s look at WTF this thang is.
So, What IS A Personal Brand?
I make no separation between my work as an artist, and my work as a human being.
Paul Robeson
Simply put, it is the UNIQUE value you bring to your work. Personal branding is a wild ride that EVERY creative should take.
And for Black creatives personal branding can be an efficient means to an end of their survival era.
See. Creatives, artists especially, are innate entrepreneurs. But like any other gift, it has to be refined. And then packaged and positioned. The idea is generally money-related. So we also want to guarantee that profit will be in the forecast too.
The idea is that your creativity can remain unexplained & unpredictable. But cashflow to your pockets becomes predictable.
Many creatives look up and realize they’ve now entered the entrepreneurship realm. In a whirlwind, you want answers to questions – how to call in your dream clients, get aligned opportunities, vibe out loud, and get paid to exist.
That’s a personal brand …
But let’s go deeper.
A personal brand is also a LIFE tool:
- a personal diary or journal, to track your personal + professional growth & development
- an ideation station, to organize and structure a gazillion half-baked creative ideas into a single symbiotic offer
- it’s your “Do what tf I want” brave space for healing & unmasking, setting boundaries, & being completely unapologetic in your authenticity
A personal brand has little to do with developing your business. Instead, it has EVERYTHING to do with developing YOU!
Don’t believe me? Here’s 7 ways ~
7 Ways a Personal Brand Helps Develop YOU
1) Believe in your worth.
See what the people see to understand your ultra unique value add to the world & embrace ALL OT IT!
2) Study your craft.
Immerse yourself in your craft – eat, sleep and breathe it until your craft adapts to YOU
3) Make your own experience.
Take what you know and what’s natural to create your own experience to share with people
4) Be yourself.
Everyone else is taken so there’s that *kanye shrug*
5) Build your village.
Find your folks and vibe out with em! this is especially great for introverts, anxious beans & HSP’s who find engaging draining, unless done in very specific engagement energizing, compared to most other things
6) Always show up prepared.
Learn what you need to keep yourself prepared for opportunities, as Audria Richmond would say … so that YOU are ready for the YES!
7) Be consistent, professional, and on time.
Integrate systems that help support your whimsicalness, BUT helps you stay on your A game even when you’re having an off day.
For Black creatives personal branding is economically LIT right now. In today’s digital age, Black creativity is being highlighted to no end in a push to become normalized. This normalization is empowering us to take up (more) space – creating access and representation for many generations of Black creatives to come.
Now that we know what a personal brand is, from a different perspective. Let’s talk about how to build your bad a$$ brand by:
- Committing to your brand messaging, with the 3 C’s
- Shaping your personal brand’s identity in 6 ways
- Securing your brand’ sustainability with a 4 step plan
Each way builds on the next so you can seamlessly audit your own brand in making it more attractive.
Most people overthink these ways and the process steps, so I’ma try to seal this deal with a k.i.s.s (keep it simple stupid)
How to Make Your Personal Brand Attractive
3 C’s to Commit to Your Brand Messaging
Simplicity connects people. So don’t overthink your message. It’s likely that you’ve already been sharing something near and dear to your heart. But do make sure it aligns
No matter where you are in your journey you can use these steps to build or align your messaging.
- Be Consistent – create a know, like and trust factor that helps you stay top of mind to people, no matter where they find you
- Make It Clear – get to the point, the heartbeat of what you want others to take away. in streamlining words, visuals and spilled thoughts my brain generally translates this into what legacy am I documenting to leave behind.
- Give It Character – your brand is a living, breathing entity so bring it to life by treating it as such. being from otaku & kawaii life, I teach how to create your brand as an original character to really identify and embody your brand’s personality.
Speaking of identifying your brand’s personality, let’s go deeper into building your personal brand.
6 Proven Ways to Identify and Build Your Personal Brand
Your brand goes beyond your messaging and deserves to be seen at every turn. It’s like haveing a baby that you want to world to see before born, at birth, every month til they turn one, one years old, 2 years old, preschool …
Ok You get the point.
Identifying your personal brand isn’t a one time, one and done thing. Remember it is a living and breathing entity so it’s gon’ change friend. Sometimes we don’t recognize that we have come into a personal brand. And sometimes we don’t know that our brand has shifted. So the next steps are specifically for you to identify your personal brand, no matter what level you are in the game.
1. Imagine you’re creating an ad for YOU.
Think of it this way, for anything you put out into the world to work, you have to believe it first.
2. Seek opportunities to demonstrate your value.
Actively apply for stages, presentations, talks, etc. to present your personal brand. Look at it as ‘practice’ or exposure therapy to confront any fears or anxieties that may be surrounding YOU and your brand
3. Your behavior should reinforce your brand. A personal brand is a lifestyle brand so it’s best that if you talk the talk, YOU walk the walk … don’t be a poser.
4. “Packaging” is important, too. – Listen! Aesthetics matter because they not only trigger emotion, but it’s the communication shortcut of the century so lean into it
5. Constantly seek feedback. – sure we want praise, but especially look at your negative feedback to find growth opportunities.
6. Periodically evaluate your brand. – keep this cycle going to keep up with your ever-changing personal brand
Now that we’ve reached step 6 in that cycle, you can now make your brand more sustainable with a condensed 4 step brand audit.
4-Step Plan to Developing Your Personal Brand
Now that the heavy lifting has been done, you can continue to keep eyes on your brand’s public view while you dream and create in private.
Ever so often, do an audit to see how your brand has shifted into better alignment or out of alignment with this simple plan.
Step 1—Identify the brand you want to have. – do a quick gap analysis (sounds fancy yea?) by looking at what you want your brand to grow into and where your brand is now. Don’t short change yourself here. There is no vision is too big!
Step 2—Brainstorm. – Break your vision down into milestones and think of a plan of attack to reach your next brand milestone – this can be something money generating or naw. Everything in your brand won’t be direct money making activities.
Step 3—Choose your options. – Make boss decisions of which way your brand will go, what it will need and what it will offer.
Step 4—Monitor your results and share them with others. – You’ll never know whether it’s time to move the goal post if you don’t measure your goals. And thas on God & my momma. Sharing them with others will help you celebrate your wins, problem solve your woes and create systems for your rinse & repeats.
Remember that anything you do enough times can become a brand.
And with the right support, you can perfect it along the way, with ease.
Was That Helpful?
If you found this information valuable and need help uncovering and owning your self-image, packaging your knowledge or building your business, here are your next steps👇🏾
As always, I’M ROOTING FOR YOU!
GAMBATTE, NE!
About Shoppe Gal G.A.N.G. Created Special for the Creative Misfits of the World –
Welcome Home Neurodivergents. Healers. Artists. Creative Entrepreneurs.
I’ve spent the last few months listening to the cries of creatives from all walks of life wailing about not being able to build a sustainable business. In fact, a lot of creatives I’m surrounded by wish they could live their creative dreams and passions. Instead they’re burnt out working jobs that don’t even feed their souls taking them farther from their dreams – all in the name of survival.
And you know what … I get it because years ago I was she, trying to unravel myself to figure out how to rinse and repeat the successes I had from my innate gifts so that I could build on my own dream brand and business.
Thankfully, the universe heard my cry so that I could make it and then in the grand gesture of each one teach one, I’m now equipped with a special set of skillsets that help me advance creatively … but in the business world.
It doesn’t matter if you have all the answers right now. In fact, you’re not going to have all of em at this moment – it’s a process. BUT you can START. And that’s what I want to see you do NEXT. Simply, lead with your heart and let logic follow ~
The NUMBER ONE question I’m always asked is how did I get to be so confident and authentic in my art business? Welp. Here’s my helpful answer –
SHOPPE GAL G.A.N.G.
I want you to be able to DIG IN – visualize your new success and what it feels like to take those forgotten creative dreams off the shelf and really start bringing them into your reality. For real for real!
Last but not least, it’s important to know that a lot overall growth spurt feels – negative self-talk, imposter syndrome, anxiety, depression, etc. – are common and you’re NOT alone.
BUT also we’re all artists, anxious beans, and introverts. And it’s not likely that we’ll reach out to get the supporting intel from other people along their journey. We often watch from the sidelines trying to piecemeal and DIY our dreamy ideas to life. And well … that can be long, tiring, and daunting.
So, this is me being proactive, especially if you’re watching my growth and success from the sidelines trying to put it all together. Why would I give you my secrets to success? Well friend, I really do care about your success.
Aiight fam. Here’s to chasing your audacious creative dreams and showing up as the BAWSE af art entrepreneur you are ~
With love, from your intentional healing, unapologetically happy and profitably creative gal pal here to say CHASE YO’ DREAMS! It could cost your the world if you don’t.
Shoppe Gal Diaries 
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