Eight short animated lessons on the basics of personal branding, one for each subchapter of Chapter 1 of Personal Branding: A Manifesto on Fame and Influence. Free, with no sign-up, and played right here, lesson by lesson.
In one word: you. What a personal brand is, how it differs from a company brand, where the term came from, and why it already exists before anyone sets out to build it.
If you've been on the internet for any length of time, chances are you've come across the term personal brand. But do you know what it actually is? What personal branding even means? I'm Isaac Mashman, founder of Mashman Consulting Group and author of Personal Branding: A Manifesto on Fame and Influence.
Over the next several minutes, I will be answering that very question. If you asked me to summarize the concept personal branding in one word, I'd simply reply with “You.” In its truest, most holistic form, it is you, who you are, what people know you for, and the distinctive combination of characteristics and personality traits that only you possess.
The totality of your life experiences, your hobbies, your interests, your passions, and even your fears. All of your successes, and yes, even all of your failures. Your parents are the initial creators of your personal brand. The law of personal branding states that one does not give themselves a personal brand as it has already existed.
Imagine that you have a personal promoter tagging along 24/7. You could be sleeping in your bed enjoying the coolness of your bedroom and the comfort of your covers, yet people would still be contacting you because of who you are. This promoter is your personal brand.
But where did this term even come from? It is worth mentioning that the actual term personal branding is relatively new. It was coined by the now retired business management consultant, Mr.
Tom Peters in his 1997 article, “The Brand Called You,” for Fast Company. Personal branding is by my estimation, the world's oldest form of branding. Many common last names came from what people did. If you worked the forge, you were Smith. If you baked the bread, you were Baker.
And the town would know you for it. Personal branding came first. For fame and influence, the best definition I have come to is fame is the result of accumulated attention. There was an influencer several years ago who had millions of followers, yet she couldn't sell more than a couple dozen pieces of apparel when she launched her business.
She is an unfortunate perfect example of somebody who had fame and attention but lacked influence. Influence is represented by trust and the ability to get someone to take action or change the way that they think. Fame without influence is like fuel and oxygen without heat.
A fire needs all three to burn. Other people are the oxygen, the idea that drives them is the fuel, and the person driving the ideas is the actual heat. The first question that I ask every client is why do you want to build your personal brand?
There must be intention behind building it. No one does anything without a reason. Vanity, mission, or money. Most of us are driven by one, some by all three. Knowing which is where the work begins.
Your personal brand is not something that you created, rather is something that you are continuing to create.
Each lesson takes one subchapter of Education, the Manifesto’s opening chapter, and animates it in a few minutes: the foundation the rest of the book, and the firm’s work, is built on.
In one word: you. What a personal brand is, how it differs from a company brand, where the term came from, and why it already exists before anyone sets out to build it.
Watch Lesson 1, 3:50Pharaohs, kings, and conquerors: people have carried personal brands for as long as there has been history, and the names that lasted are still studied today.
Watch Lesson 2, 3:00Why personal branding is the world's oldest form of branding, long before any company had a logo.
Coming SoonLeaders of the last 150 years, for better and for worse, and why fame without influence is fuel and oxygen without heat.
Coming SoonFame is the result of accumulated attention: what it is, how relative it is, and why on its own it is useless.
Coming SoonInfluence is trust, and the ability to get someone to act or change the way they think: the heat in the fire that is a personal brand.
Coming SoonThe four questions the firm asks its clients for clarity before the work begins, starting with why.
Coming SoonA six-level pyramid for the reach a personal brand can aspire to, and how to see where yours stands.
Coming SoonThe chapter the series is drawn from, word for word from the Second Edition.
Read Chapter 1 (opens in a new tab)The firm’s full answer, with the laws, the pillars, and the Hierarchy in one place.
Read the GuideSee where your own personal brand stands across the five pillars of Identity Positioning™.
Take the Brand AuditPersonal Branding 101: An Unrivaled Series is a free series of short animated lessons from Mashman Consulting Group on the basics of personal branding, one for each subchapter of Chapter 1 of Personal Branding: A Manifesto on Fame and Influence.
Yes. Every lesson plays here in the browser, with no account and no sign-up.
Isaac Mashman, the founder of Mashman Consulting Group and the author of the Manifesto, narrates the series.
As each one is finished. Lessons that are out play in the player above; the rest are listed as Coming Soon until they are ready.
No. “An Unrivaled Series” is part of the series’ name. UnrivaledMCG is the firm’s learning platform for its programs.
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