Global Geek News Blog

Welcome back readers!

Yesterday I covered the topic of why you should have a personal brand, and now that you know you need a personal brand, I will discuss how to create one.

There are three main things to remember when creating a personal brand: Is it unique, easy to remember, and does it say something about you?

Lets start of with finding a unique name.  While it was easier to create a unique name in the earlier days of the internet when there were fewer people and identities on the web, that doesn’t mean its impossible to create a unique name without having to resort to a huge string of meaningless numbers at the end if the name.  Creating a name by which you are known, or personal brand will typically require some creativity.  You need to pick a name that if you Google it, is not clearly used by somebody else.  It is also very important to create something fairly short that is not complicated so that people can easily remember it.

Making a name that people can recall at any time is a very important part of having a personal brand.  This is why a long string of numbers after a name that is likely not unique is a bad idea.  People will have a hard time remembering a long string of numbers compared to a catchy name.  In the years that I have had the name pcnerd37, I have found that in general conversation on forums and in chatrooms, people generally leave off the numbers when they address me.  They will also do the same with you if you choose a name with numbers.  If you must have something with a number in it, make sure that if people leave off the number, you can still be easily identified through the various search engines.

Lastly, it is a good idea to have the name say something about you as an individual.  While using some random name may be cool in some social circles, having a name that says something about you without people knowing who you are can be crucial to growing an audience online.  When I came up with the name pcnerd, it is something that is very descriptive of who I am.  When people throw my name around in general conversation, they may not be familiar with my work, but they can get a general idea of who I am from just knowing my name.  Finding a name that is descriptive of your personality can often give the name an unique quality while allowing people to have a sense of who you are without knowing anything about you, which can get your foot in the door in many situations.

These are just some general guidelines for creating a personal brand that is unique to you, but it is certainly not a comprehensive guide.  There are some things that go without saying when creating a personal brand such as do not use offensive language or symbolism, especially if you are looking for a wide audience.  Keep in mind that people of all ages and positions could be looking up your name and you don’t want to turn them off to you because of your personal brand as it could cost you many great opportunities in life.

Don’t forget to come back tomorrow when I talk about how to exploit and maintain your personal brand.  Don’t forget to leave comments on the posts as they can be beneficial to everybody when discussing a topic such as this.

-Jeremy “pcnerd37″ Bray