Deloitte Technology Fast 50 Breakfast

On Tuesday, I was delighted to speak at a Deloitte Technology Fast 50 breakfast, an event aimed at reviewing with entrepreneurial technology executives on how to use their business and personal brand to grow their business and improve bottom line.

With the advent of social media, it has become increasingly important for business leaders to recognise and optimise their personal brand. Personal branding is about being yourself with purpose - and if you do not take control of your brand someone else will.

This is particularly crucial given the speed and scope of digital media. Failure to address and develop the reputational significance of a personal brand puts business at risk of anonymity or - perhaps worse still - slander.

We discussed the potential of social media and personal branding and the need for strategic thinking and continual ROI measurement. Brand strategy should be considered a pre-requisite – and not a threat or a ‘will get to it sometime’.

By the way of example, of a personal brand converting to revenue, think of Susan Boyle, the contender on Britain’s Got Talent, whose audition video received over 40 million views. The viral video helped Susan become a household name and subsequent fan pages on Facebook gave the British songstress a ready-made prospective market for her next album. Through a personal branding strategy on social media her album I Dreamed a Dream was an instant success. In six weeks of sale, the album became the biggest selling album in the world in 2009.

The key point of my presentation was to encourage leaders to be themselves with purpose. It is best to take a strategic approach to brand building - for example, with a service like our own TaurusProfile™ with set KPIs to measure return on investment.

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