Elliot Reuben: the nonsense of the personal brand

I get a lot of gip about my Twitter account. I swear, make bad and often off-colour jokes, troll major brands and social media consultants for kicks and generally refuse to play the “game.” Considering a history of working in marketing and dealing with brand and PR, am I just killing my personal brand?

I certainly hope so.

Consider what personal branding is all about – the idea that you need to maintain a professional demeanour in the face of present or potential clients or networking colleagues. Sadly, there are plenty of examples of employees losing jobs over their social network postings and employers who “vet” potential employees using companies that perform online vetting.

The idea that your personal life now belongs to your employer is unbelievably offensive in what is supposed to be a “free” country. Sure, if you attend a Klan rally wearing your McDonalds uniform people are bound to get upset – you can’t blame the Klan for excluding you.* If you’re wearing a uniform, then it’s not such a stretch to think that you represent your employer somehow, but if you’re in civvies on your own time? Would you expect your employer to see you dancing badly on a Saturday night and give you a written warning about your conduct? What if you worked for Amnesty but liked to secretly read the Mail on Sunday? Or you worked at T-Mobile but had a BT landline? What business is it of anyone’s?

The answer to all of this is pretty simple. If you’re worried your employer may be social network-sensitive, don’t allow them to connect to you and sort out your privacy settings. For some people, this is sadly a reality – but they are a slightly different issue to those with “personal brands.”

"Hi. I'm a self-perpetuating media node."

The person as a brand is not a new concept. And, if you’re famous like Donald Trump then I suppose I can see the sense in it – your income is related directly to people’s perception of you. So, even if it makes you a total douche, fair enough. But that isn’t most people. Most people who go down this route are creating a professional façade for their personality – this is what your CV or LinkedIn are for, a professional interpretation of who you are. But your presence in social networks is social by definition – why are you pretending to be someone you aren’t?

The process of branding is often about making products seem more human or human-friendly – so why is that process being applied to, erm, humans? Would you ever want to meet a personal brand? How does that go? “Hi, I’m Tom. Have you read this week’s iPhone news? If you’ve enjoyed this conversation you can find me at the bar across the street later where I’ll be discussing the Wall Street protests…”

“Uh-huh….  Check please.”

I don’t subscribe to this kind of stuff because I’d rather people knew what a jerk I am before they employ me. What’s the point of pretending to be someone I’m not? They’ll find out eventually. I wouldn’t lie on my CV and say I can operate a crane, only later to destroy a building with one and sheepishly ask if I’ll be getting paid for the hours I’d done before those unfortunate deaths. The same goes for clients. If clients are sensitive, ensure they are not connected. It’s the work account that needs to be careful not the personal ones. If you’re a massively offensive and profane person, your company is unlikely to place you in a room with sensitive clients so why would you connect  with them on social networks?

Most client organisations are made up of human beings just like you. And they don’t care about what you do in your personal life. They are more likely to be offended if you pretend to be someone you aren’t and then they discover the real you. If you spend your whole life with a permagrin, soray tan, fake Rolex or Gucci handbag slapped on your person, good luck to you. But you can buy your own drinks.

It's the mark that says "Hi, I'm Chad, let's talk about articles I read on Mashable."

Branding? It’s for companies and cattle. You aren’t a brand, you’re a person.

Maybe try actually being one.

* = Zzzzzzing.

Elliot Reuben is a strategy whore and has been successfully pimped to brands as diverse as O2, Sony Electronics, Clinton Cards, T-Mobile and PlayStation; he is currently considering going the full Pretty Woman. He is @ereuben on Twitter.