Why Personal Branding?
I rebranded in 2012. It was strange to come out from behind my “brand” of “little pink house” and just sign my own name, as it were. It felt almost prideful to buy my very own name as a domain.
And yet, I wondered, if He calls me by name and you call me by name, might it not be prideful for me to call myself or my blog something more than my own name?
But I began to realize that it wasn’t as much about pride versus humility as about authenticity and being myself:
“Having a solid brand is as simple as just being yourself wherever you go.”
-Trina Holden in “The Best Branding Advice I Ever Got {Or Gave}“
Throughout the Bible, great importance is attached to names–so much so that God changed people’s names. I realized that if names are that important to God, He could be glorified by our use of our own names wherever we represent Him online. (Click to Tweet that.)
I’m over at the Allume blog today talking about personal branding along with my friend Trina. Click here to read “He Calls Me By Name: a fresh perspective on personal branding.”
Curious why other bloggers have chosen personal branding?
“As a writer and a speaker, I am my brand. I could make up a cute name for my blog and use it to market my writing, but that’s not who’s up before dawn putting ideas to paper, I am. So using my name is a natural outpouring of my thoughts and ideas and my connection to my audience.”
–Debi Stangeland, speaker
“I picked my name because it was personal and easy for people to remember when they wanted to find me again.”
–Chantel Brankshire, virtual assistant
“I chose my name as my domain because my site is more than a blog, it’s a ministry.”
–Jill Monaco, speaker and blogger
“I write a lot of different things — fiction, parenting, children’s books, and I had published books even before blogging came into the scene. I’m thankful I’ve branded my name because one tag line can’t encompass everything I do.”
–Tricia Goyer, author
“I write for other publications besides my blog and want people to recognize my name, not my site.”
–Natasha Metzler, author
“I chose personal branding because God called me to be a speaker and a writer; to be booked as a speaker and for my books to be purchased, my name needs to be known.”
–Susan Evans, writer and speaker
“As an author, my name is my brand.”
–Virginia Ann Work, author
“I made the switch in order to appear more professional, since most writers use their name as their domain name.”
–Ginger Truitt, columnist
“I chose personal branding because I want people to connect with me, with who I am, regardless of where I write.”
–Jacque Watkins, blogger
“I switched from a blog-named domain to my name because people connect with people more than brand names. (I only included my middle initial because the domain without it wasn’t available.)”
–Denise J. Hughes, author
“I felt the Lord calling me to be more open and allow people to find me more easily. Using my name for my blog allows people to do that.”
–Mary Bonner, blogger
“As an author, I have plans for many series and many books. I want my brand to extend past one book or one series and encompass anything I might write. It seemed easier to use my name as a umbrella to cover anywhere my imagination may take me!”
–Vicki V. Lucas, author
How about you? Share your branding “why” in the comments!
“I firmly believe the internet is changing. A few years ago, we followed blogs. Now, with the increase in social media, the noise that comes along with it and the interconnectedness of content we create across the web, I believe we will begin to follow people.”
–Amy Lynn Andrews
Looking for more branding tips?
Be sure to check out all the links and resources on my personal branding page (and subscribe to my newsletter for a free 3-page branding checklist for bloggers and authors!).
I use my name for one blog, but have blog name for my membership and another site. I see the pros and cons of both. I have had the blog in my name for about 10 months and it has grow with me as I change some focus which is a pro .Con I had to use my middle name for my name was taken cons. I wonder if it hard to find my site. I do use a tagline and have a domain that forwards to my site.
I would personally branded, but my name – and any combination thereof – was already taken. I try my best to brand personally still using dailycupofgrace.
That does make it tough. You know I’m always here to brainstorm if you want to try for more combinations (middle initial?). 🙂
I am really struggling with this. I just had my first book traditionally published, and it would have been great to share a domain with MY name, rather than a completely different brand (DogFur & Dandelions). But here’s my problem: Elizabeth Johnson is a rather common name. All the easy-to-say, easy-to-remember variations of it are taken (incl. middle initial/name), and adding another word (like author) just makes it way too long. So for now I’m sticking with DFD, since at least it’s memorable. But I’m wide open to suggestions for transitioning to using my own name! Thoughts??
Oh that’s a tough one, Elizabeth! My friend Kristina uses kjtanner.com, but probably even first and middle initials are already taken with a last name like Johnson. 🙂 What is your middle name? Trina had some great ideas in this post over at Allume: http://allume.com/2012/08/bestbrandingadvice/ This one definitely calls for some brainstorming… 🙂
Yes, the variations with my middle name are already taken as well – not to mention, there’s another “Elizabeth A. Johnson” who’s a feminist theologian. It’s tricky!!
Would “JohnsonElizabeth” be weird? Would it be obvious to people searching for me?
I’ll message you on Twitter–I am seeing a few options that might be a possibility, especially using extensions like .net or .me. 🙂
(And yes, confused identities can be a tricky thing to try to avoid… ;))
Love this. I echo Ginger and Jacque. 🙂 I chose to use my own name when I no longer wanted to be known by my (short-lived) pen name, and I wanted to eliminate confusion because I was using my real name for other publications (like YLCF). 🙂
Oh, now I’m trying to remember what your pen name was! 😉 But I love your name–it’s so beautiful.
Rose. 🙂
Oh that’s right! 🙂
I found this and your post at Allume very interesting. I just started blogging a month ago so it’s probably still fairly easy for me to make changes. 🙂
My name is Deanna Michelle Fitzpatrick and both Deanna Michelle and Deanna Fitzpatrick are taken as .com domain names. My husband works in Christian radio and goes by Shaun Michaels, so I was thinking I could just follow and use Deanna Michaels or do I go even longer and do Deanna M. Fitzpatrick?
Oh, I like the idea of adopting your husband’s radio name! It depends on what’s available as a .com and on social media (check out knowem.com for quick searches).
I haven’t thought about branding myself until recently. I have a company name/website and other web properties for different things. When it came to my name I did register it long ago before Facebook and all the social media as a place to share my life with family and friends.
But now with all these different places to share, it almost makes your blog worthless if all your doing is sharing personal ramblings.
But if you are pushing a service or selling something, the best way now is doing it with authenticity and being you! The big push from Google is all about Authorship and personal branding so now is the time to get to it if that is what you want to do.
Thanks for sharing…
Yes, Google’s emphasis on Authorship definitely is pointing the way toward personal branding being the way of the future. Thanks for commenting.
Ack! This just reminds me that I bought my name domain and still haven’t done anything with it. 😛 I need to get on that one of these days.
It all takes time, doesn’t it?!