In today’s world, it’s important to take your personal academic brand seriously if you want to amplify your platform and reach a mass audience with your work/ research. Try out these 6 tips around defining your very own personal academic brand.
These tips will help you create an outstanding personal academic brand:
- Take an inventory. Take a good look at your current online presence. With social media and the web, you have two choices – your online presence will be created for you or you can be intentional and in control of your online presence. Here at Power Your Research, we feel it is important for academics to not only be the experts but have a platform to share their work/ research with the masses. Write out your strengths and weaknesses. Identify your passions. Think about what you’re good at, what you like to do and who you want to reach with your work. These steps are the building blocks for creating a brand statement down the line.
- Distinguish yourself from your colleagues. There are plenty of talented and dependable people in every field. Pinpoint your unique angle in your field. For Dr. Howard, Founder of Power Your Research, she differentiated herself by moving from an academic who researched representation in the media, to someone who decided to work in the media. This not only made her an expert in her research area, but also someone who could speak about what it is like to work in the media. There are lots of creative ways to figure out what makes you unique in your area. Sometimes it can be hard to figure out but with some thought and guidance, you will be well on your way to building out a brand that gets your work in front of the people who need it the most.
- Talk about benefits. Let your target audience know what you can do for them. Explain why your work is important and who it is important to. Dr. Howard is someone who studied comics in graduate school, and she speaks often about the fact that most academics did not think her work was important. However, she believed it was and saw that the medium of comics could be a powerful place to document and create Black history – that made it important and that is still the crux of her brand today. So, no matter what your area is, your work is important and their is a community of people who need to know about it – even if academe has told you otherwise.
- Summarize your mission in 10 seconds or less. Be prepared to capture people’s attention quickly. Let them know what you do in 15 words or less. You can tell you’re on the right track when they ask for more details. For example, Dr. Howards brand statement is “I create experiences for free thinkers to feel empowered when they’re challenging the status quo.” With that single statement she knows who she does it for, why she does it and what her mission is.
- Ask for feedback. Survey your family, friends, customers and colleagues to find out what they think of you and your abilities. Show your appreciation for constructive criticism so they’ll keep sharing it with you. Asking the people around you to help identify your strengths is a quick way to begin to define your brand, but sometimes that isn’t enough. Here at Power Your Research we suggest identifying your brand archetype and 3 brand adjectives, along with a strong brand statement.
Stay updated. Review your personal mission statement every six months. Make new action plans so you’re always getting closer to your goals.
Learn how to put these tips into action at the Power Your Research Masterclass being offered for a short time only. Grab a virtual seat for this 90 minute value packed session using the button below (or CLICK HERE) …
A big part of building a brand as an academic is properly starting an LLC. You can do this in minutes HERE. Northwest is who I trust for all my business formation needs.
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