what's your brand and how much is that messing you up?
branding 101
Quick thoughts on being a brand.
I don’t want to say anything about the election because why do you need my thoughts on it. It feels different this time because the popular vote supported Donald Trump. Obviously the U.S. is mostly a non-voting country and it’s mostly because of voter suppression, but we also can’t pretend that Joe Biden and then Kamala Harris weren’t historically unpopular candidates. Clearly, the Democratic party needs to change things significantly, ideally break apart and make room for real progressive candidates who address things that people care about like wealth inequality, genocide, and climate change. But, again, you can get those takes from other places. A few I’ve personally appreciated:
Sam Kriss, unhinged and validating
This short election post
that’s it, honestly, discourse ain’t it for me today.
What this has gotten me thinking about though is the concept of niching down and how growing up in the nascency and then acceleration of social media’s ubiquity has left me with the branding brain worm. You might also have this specific worm living in between your ears. It’s been very busy since 2010, filling up your gray matter with the idea that you must always be aware of your brand, or else. According to the worm, you need to keep things simple and focused otherwise you risk the chance that people won’t know what to expect of you. Focus on one thing and for the love of god don’t be complicated about it.
I think this started as the idea that you ought to be cautious about letting unprofessional ideas or actions show up in your professional world. The bogeyman that was trotted out constantly was that the photo you posted of yourself drinking in college would ruin your career later. That has happened from time to time, but mostly hasn’t. Consequences for “bad behavior” are minimal in 2024, much more minimal than the consequences for being complicated. In fact, unprofessionalism might be the norm, at least for a loud and influential portion of the population, and it can actually be a highly effective brand.
That premise that keeping a squeaky clean profile mattered slid slowly and then very quickly into the idea that what you actually need to have is an elevator pitch, something concise that sums you up, names which identities you carry, both with privilege and without, and that you need to be able to sell that idea. You became a brand. There are some things that fall into your brand and some things that don’t. Don’t confuse your audience (no longer your network or you community or even your friends and family, your audience) by talking about things that don’t fit your brand or niche.
One little nugget that I am working on (was already, now am motivated to do so even more) is that I need to act as though I cannot be boiled down into a brand. Not only is it an impossible goal but it’s also a bad one. The idea that your actions as a person ought to fit a brand can only be worked toward at the expense of your humanity. It’s what keeps some people acting as “advocates” and some people acting in isolation or not at all. Brand guidelines can be satisfied by posting content on the Internet, empty outrage shared with atomized other brands, which is simply not sufficient when it comes to improving our very short and also long lives spent together.
There’s no conclusion here, really. Not today, just some quick thoughts and an effort at consistency. Hope you’re taking care of yourself and each other, more to come in the next couple of weeks on this theme.
Always a lot of credit goes to the people who have been my teachers, both directly and through their freely shared knowledge, and so many books.