Difference Between Branded Profile and Personal Profile

  • 1 min read

On my last blog post, branding rules for every entrepreneur, a debate broke out over rule #1:

1. Keep your personal life off of any social media profiles that were designed to brand you as an entrepreneur.

I wanted to clarify my viewpoint a bit more on this topic: I don’t want anyone to think that I’m advocating an “entrepreneur profile” that has no personal content and appears to be just a “robot” posting links to everything about their business and nothing about themselves. I want the entrepreneur to be very careful about what they post and make sure it doesn’t turn into a completely personal profile.

Positioning or posing

For example – it’s fine to add a political comment or two on your “entrepreneur” branded profile. But posting political commentary every day that’s not relevant to your business (obviously, if you are discussing an issue that could affect your business/industry, that’s fine) would not be okay. It’s okay to post a picture of a newborn baby or your kids every once in a while, but posting every single picture of your children every single day and NOT posting relevant entrepreneurial content is not going to further your brand.

And it’s fine to post those pictures every day on your PERSONAL social media profile – not your “entrepreneur” branded one.

In essence – you want to appear “personal” and “real,” but you don’t want to overwhelm people proving you are “personal” and “real.”

Some quick do’s and don’ts:

Do:
* Post your full name, general location (it’s okay to say “New York, NY” – but don’t post your exact address)
* Post off-topic personal content a few times per month
* Offer commentary on real-world news that is heavily discussed
* Post relevant “off topic” articles
* Talk about your hobbies and your personal interests. Especially on weekends
* Cheer (within reason) for your sports teams
* Engage and talk with your followers about anything they ask you about
* Talk about places you are traveling to for business purposes (conferences, speaking events, etc. etc.)

Don’t:
* Post off-topic content every day
* Post every single personal picture of you/your family
* Turn your profile into a source of political commentary
* Get into screaming matches with your followers.. and especially not over off-topic content
* Post every single off topic funny picture/article/website
* Talk about your family every single day.
* Talk about your non business related travels regularly (vacation? That’s fine to mention. Trip to grandma’s house? not so much)

Picture of Ben Cathers

Ben Cathers

Ben Cathers is the co-founder of InstantSocial.com – an outsourced social media provider (smo). He is the co-founder of three startups before he was 19 years old. Ben is the author of Conversations with Teen Entrepreneurs and was named in 2005 by CNN as a member of “America’s Bright Future.”  Ben has been quoted/featured in the Wall Street Journal, FOX News, ABC News, CBS News, Yahoo! Internet Life, The London Sunday Times and in over 40 different publications. 

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