The 5 Non-Negotiable Rules for Professional Branding - a podcast by Jeffrey Bradbury

In this episode of the Jeff Bradbury Show, Jeff shares his 5 Non-Negotiable Rules for Personal and Professional Branding.
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5 Rules of Personal and Professional BrandingBe Hyper FocusedThis first one is important and a rule that I often break.When you are trying to create something that you want people to remember you for, it’s critical that you stay hyper-focused. When a user comes to your website, listens to your podcast, or sees you on Social Media, you want them to instantly connect with not only who you are, but what your message is.
This will help you not only stay on brand but keep you focused on hitting your target avatar.If you create content in multiple content streams it gets messy and tends to confuse your audience who will eventually grow to expect a certain type of content from you each week.
On TeacherCast, the content is broken down into 5 distinct categories, General EdTech, Instructional Coaching, Website Design, Podcasting, and Build your EDU Brand. It is possible that someone will visit the website interested in learning about all these topics, but more likely that they are visiting for only one topic and not interested in the others. For this reason, I offer them multiple Social Media accounts where they can feel like they are getting the content they are interested in without being bombarded by content they are not interested in.
If you look at many of the larger brands, this same philosophy applies. They might have a Twitter account for their company and an individual Twitter account to support individual applications or programs within the company.For smaller companies and those just getting started, I don’t recommend this method at all. When starting as a new brand, companies should create a single brand that is memorable, on point with their content and most of all, hyper focused on their company message.
Be AuthenticOne of the biggest lessons that anyone can learn early on in their brands is the ability to become vulnerable and authentic with their audience. It is extremely difficult to gain a subscriber, attract a podcast listener, or entice a company to work with you. On the other hand, it’s extremely easy for someone to click the unfollow or unsubscribe button and walk away forever.
Have you ever thought about how much time it takes you to gain a follower, a subscriber, or like?Out of all the 5 Rules, this is the most difficult one to live up to. Being Authentic means being vulnerable. You must put yourself “out there” to your audience in a way that makes them not only know who you are, but care about you enough for them to want to come back to you for added conversations.
For some content creators this is easy. I often see educators at conferences who have a talent for being in front of groups and letting themselves be present in the moment. For me this is scarry.For the longest time, I put up a wall between myself and my audience. For the first several years of TeacherCast, I even (on purpose) omitted my name from the website. Even to this day, I still refer to TeacherCast as “it” or in the third person. Often, I when asked how the website or podcast is doing, I respond with “it’s going great” or “we are doing some good things together”. In hindsight, this is a defense mechanism to hide how proud I am of my accomplishments and how much I am proud of how many people the podcast has affected over the years.
About 4 years into TeacherCast, I decided to add my name to the sidebar on the front page. This was a BIG STEP and a step that only happened once I met someone at a conference who said something shocking to me. They said, “I listen to your podcast all of the time, but I would never know it was you because you never mention your name on the show.” (#Ouch)...

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