Branding Friday: What I Learned About Personal Branding @ IZEAFest

I still haven’t sifted through all the great notes I took at IZEAFest recently. The speakers talked a lot about personal branding, which was perfect for where I am.

Aaron Brazell made me ask myself:

• Who do I influence?
• What do I bring to the internet
• Do I really want to be internet famous and dirt poor?
• Am I helping (for free) or doing (earning $)?
• Do I have a goal for my blogs?

He told us that trying to be someone else just makes you a bad facsimile of yourself. I often look to Chris Brogan as my model of what I’d like to do. But maybe that’s not it. I couldn’t have Chris’ schedule, traveling so much. I’m sure he sacrifices a lot. I have to figure out what the brand of  Susan Payton looks like.

Chris Brogan gave a great presentation and told me (us) to be self aware, not self involved. He made me realize that people come back to me because I can help them. How can I better help them? He also said that no one is going to give me permission to move on to the next big thing. I have to give myself permission. And that struck a nerve, because I think I’ve been hanging back from whatever that next big thing is. Fear? Yes. Laziness? Sure. So I’m processing this.

As you can see, I have a lot to chew on. I’ll spend this week answering some of these questions (and you should too).