Why Developers Need To Build Personal Brand
Tags: beginners, webdev, writing, watercooler
Published: 2021-04-24 12:53:17

Hello Fellow Codenewbies 👋,

I've heard the term "personal brand" before, but I didn't understand it.
What is a personal brand, and what are its benefits for developers?

## Personal Brands

> A personal brand is a widely-recognized and largely-uniform perception or impression of an individual based on their experience, expertise, competencies, actions, and/or achievements within a community, industry, or the marketplace at large.
  -- [PersonalBrand.com](https://personalbrand.com/definition/)

Building personal brands can help us get a job, speak gigs, or develop our network.
Our personal brand should say who we are and show our personality.

## How to create personal brands?

### 🗝 Consistency

Consistency makes us stand out. And what kind of consistencies do we need to create our own personal brands?

- **Consistent image**
  People can recognize us without thinking twice if we have the same profile picture and cover image/banner on our online platforms. 
![Ayu Profile Picture.png](https://cdn.hashnode.com/res/hashnode/image/upload/v1619266389531/bk0B1dYQn.png)

- **Consistent messaging**
We can create consistent messaging to tell people what we do. 
Take a look at what [Swyx](https://twitter.com/swyx) does.
He popularized and used #LearnInPublic because he helps developers learn in public.

    I don't have my own messaging yet. But I do have a consistent greeting in my articles; *Hello Fellow Codenewbies 👋*.
    I see myself as a code newbie because I constantly learn new things every day. And one of the reasons I put my notes in public is to help fellow code newbies and my future self. 

- **Consistent voice**
  It's about how we bring our personality and our brand into work. 
  [Maggie Appleton](https://twitter.com/Mappletons) is known for her [metaphors and analogies](https://maggieappleton.com/reactpotato) when she explains concepts in techs. We also know her for her idea of [*digital garden*](https://maggieappleton.com/garden).
  
## What are the impacts of personal brands on developers?

- **Building authority**
  Personal brands can help us to build authority. 
  We instantly associate her with Java when we hear the name [Angie Jones](https://twitter.com/techgirl1908). Angie is well known for her work with Java, and Oracle themselves named her **Java Champion**. People trust her and look up to her as an inspiration and a Java resource.

- **Building community**
  With personal brands, we can build a community. 
Take [Scott Hanselman](https://twitter.com/shanselman) as an example. He's been creating content to lift people up for over two decades in communities. It now leads him to work full-time with the community at Microsoft.

- **Building expertise**
  When we learn something, we want to make sure that we learn from someone who knows what they're talking about. 
People know [Josh W. Comeau](https://twitter.com/JoshWComeau) as "King of Whimsy" for his ability to create magic in a browser, and he's good at explaining the concepts.

Personal brands can help us build our value, something that can make us unique and stand out.

## Final Words

We need to have consistency to build our own personal brands to make us stand out and unique, to build our own value.

So what are your plans to build your personal brands?
Do drop your thoughts in the comment below 😀

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**Note:**
This article is written based on [Colby Fayock](https://twitter.com/colbyfayock)'s talk, [Stand out by building a personal brand](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a65mEAzDVo8&t=121s).

Thank you for reading!
Last but not least, you can find me on [Twitter](https://twitter.com/AdiatiAyu). Let's connect! 😊