Personal Brand Audience
Your personal brand audience is all the people you have contact with and every interaction you have with them, whether random or frequent, has an impact on your image and your brand as an individual.
Now that you have assessed your personal brand, it is time to look into relationship other people have with You. Take into the consideration the following:
- Who is your audience?
- Where is your audience?
- How do you communicate with your audience?
- Who would you like your audience to be?
Who is your audience?
Your audience is all the people you have contact with – whether face to face, over the phone, digitally via email, social media networks or website. People you are in regular contact – your family, friends, co-workers, business partners and clients – but also random people you meet in various places and during various occasions – taxi driver, waiter in the restaurant, your doctor’s assistant. All of them are your audience, although you remain in different relationships with them and you most probably communicate with them in different ways.
- Private zone – people with whom you have a personal relationship: family members, friends, colleagues, sport club members, your child’s school teachers
- Business zone – people with whom you have work-related relationship: co-workers, clients, business partners, board members, suppliers, contractors etc.
- Random contacts – people you meet, but do not establish long term relationship: taxi driver, shop assistant, flight attendant, waiter in the restaurant
Where is your audience?
For personal branding this question may be tricky, because everyone everywhere is your audience. But you need to understand that depending on their physical location, your contact with them is of a different nature. Personal contact with people is different than contact over the internet and they way you speak with someone on the phone differs from the way you communicate over social media or personal hobby blog.
How do you communicate with your audience?
Once you know where your audiences are, you need to consider the way you talk with them. As sender of a message you take responsibility for being understood. You need to speak the language that will be easily understood by your audience. You need to adjust your vocabulary and tone of voice to the receiver of the message. The way you describe your job is different if you speak to the business partner and the way you explain it to a 10-year old nephew.
The tone of voice you use when you speak during the board meeting is different than when you talk with family members, or when you write a post on your hobby blog. You are in different roles and your messaging needs to be adjusted to the situation.
