Need to know how to write a professional bio on yourself? You’re not alone. Bio writing is difficult. It forces you to prioritize what’s most important about you. It’s an intimidating task to boil down your entire professional life into one paragraph that’s clear, concise and that works for you.

Luckily, you don’t have to start your bio from scratch. Before writing your bio, let’s dissect Dan Schawbel’s. If someone is already doing things right, why not learn from them? Personal branding guru Dan Schawbel’s short bio is an excellent example of a brand-building, professional bio that works for him. I’ll break it down, piece by piece, and show you what you can learn from it.

1. LEARN BY EXAMPLE

Dan Schawbel’s Bio:

“Dan is the leading expert in personal branding for the generation-y audience, with an award winning and world recognized Blog, a TV podcast series that he directs, Awards that he gives out, and a Magazine that benefits the American Cancer Society. He has written over 20 publications for major magazines and online resources and has been featured in Fast Company Magazine and Yahoo! Finance and is EMC’s social media expert. He is also establishing the first 360 degree personal branding website, DanSchawbel.com, creating a new standard for career development. Recently, he has redefined personal branding by establishing a collaborate wiki, which he is using to acquire knowledge from all the leading experts to establish a single definition for personal branding.”

2. ANALYSIS OF DAN’S BIO

Let’s break down Dan’s bio now, one piece at a time.

“Dan is the leading expert in personal branding.” This immediately tells you Dan’s niche, without hesitation and without confusion. When you’re writing your own bio, be crystal clear about what you do from the get-go. Your first sentence should have people nodding their heads with along with you… ahh okay, so that’s what you do.

“…for the generation-y audience.” This makes it very clear who Dan’s audience is. Personal branding focuses on achieving success by making yourself the best solution for a particular audience. It would be difficult for Dan to say he’s the leading personal branding expert in the entire world. It’s much easier to be an expert for a certain group of people - for Dan, that’s Generation Y (today’s twentysomethings). Who is your ideal audience? It could be individuals (the disabled, the elderly, women in their twenties, etc.) or groups (cancer researchers, failing not-for-profits, green startups, etc.). Choosing an audience helps you attract more ideal opportunities that better align with your long-term goals. That way, everybody wins.

“…with an award winning and world recognized Blog, a TV podcast series that he directs, Awards that he gives out, and a Magazine that benefits the American Cancer Society.” This sentence highlights Dan’s professional accomplishments. What have you done that directly backs up your first “what I do” sentence? Include your most important achievements, but be picky because you don’t have too much space.

“…He has written over 20 publications for major magazines and online resources and has been featured in Fast Company Magazine and Yahoo! Finance and is EMC’s social media expert.” This showcases Dan’s “credibility boosters” - items that build a strong argument for his authority in his field. What credibility boosters (awards, certifications, memberships, etc.) might make you a more attractive job candidate in your bio?

“…He is also establishing the first 360 degree personal branding website, DanSchawbel.com, creating a new standard for career development.” This shows what Dan is doing to stand out in his area of expertise. What things (side projects, past work, etc.) have you done that differentiates you from your peers?

“…Recently, he has redefined personal branding by establishing a collaborate wiki, which he is using to acquire knowledge from all the leading experts to establish a single definition for personal branding.” This demonstrates how Dan is contributing to his niche. Are you doing anything novel or innovative in your niche that might make you more memorable to readers of your bio? If so, be sure to include it.

3. THE NEXT STEP

This analysis is a good starting point to think about how to write your bio. The next step is to read our second post in this series: 8 Tips to Write a Professional Bio.

Good luck!

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What is a Personal Brand?

Your personal brand is your unique value articulated in a compelling, genuine, consistent and visible way. Your personal brand is held in the minds of others: it is how people feel about what do you do, why do you do it, who you do it for, and why you’re different. Your personal brand is your single most powerful tool in attaining career success. It answers the most important question about you: Why are you your audience’s absolute best choice for what you do? It applies many principles of corporate branding to you as an individual.

A strong personal brand makes people go out of their way to work with you and refer you to their friends, colleagues and clients. It establishes you as the “go-to person” in your field. It communicates a clear, consistent and compelling message that attracts the kind of people and opportunities that make your life fulfilling.

The goal of developing your personal brand is to differentiate yourself from the competition, and to attract ideal opportunities that put your abilities to work in a way that gives you meaning. It is the best way to manage your career today because it makes you irreplaceable to your particular audience.

Why Uncover and Develop Your Personal Brand?

Personal branding is a journey towards a happier and more successful life. It emerges from your search for your identity. It powerfully and clearly states what you want based on your values, vision and strengths. It promotes yourself based on who you are, what you stand for, what makes you unique, and what your purpose is. It is a path to self-awareness, joy and self-esteem. It is NOT creating and marketing a made up image - that’s the exact opposite of personal branding. Personal branding is 100% authentically YOU.

People often describe a strong personal brand as a magnet that attracts clients, job offers and opportunities. That’s because personal branding shows a specific group of people you are the only solution to their problem. You are not just better than your competitors - you are the only choice for a certain group of people with a particular need.

In a nutshell, your personal brand communicates:

1. Who do you serve? What group of people is your audience?
2. What do you do best?
3. Why do you do what you do? What motivates you and gives you meaning?
4. How are you different from your peers? What makes you the only choice?

How Do I Develop My Personal Brand?

Personal branding begins with some soul-searching to ensure your brand is genuine and authentic. The first step is to identify what gives you fulfillment in life. What drives you? What are you passionate about? What kinds of activities give you meaning? What do you love to do? These questions help articulate the “what drives you,” or “why” part of your personal brand. It reveals your intentions genuinely and clearly. When people know the source of your career energy, they feel better about putting you in charge of their needs.

Next, identify what you do best. How do your your passions intersect with your skills? What are you great at? What could you do all day without getting bored? What abilities do you have that consistently impress other people? These questions help articulate the “what you do” part of your personal brand. This is the need that you solve, and the reason that employers will pay you (or why clients/customers will refer you to their friends) to solve their problems.

Next, identify what makes you different from others in your field by examining your values. Do certain values drive your work ethic, such as beauty, integrity, humor, creativity or quality? Examining your values helps articulate the “what makes you different” part of your personal brand. Your values play a large role in differentiating you from your competition and provide a reason to choose you over your peers. When your values resonate with a potential employer or client, you will connect on a deeper level.

Next, identify your audience. What kind of people do you love working with? Do you prefer young children over adults, environmentally conscious people, small business owners, musicians, or the developmentally disabled? These questions help identify the “who you serve,” or audience portion of your personal brand. Personal branding is all about becoming the best at something for a certain group of people. Who will those people be?

Next, put these answers together in a compelling and genuine way. Now that you’ve done some soul-searching and laid the foundation of your brand, it’s time to show people why you’re the answer to their problems. Work on developing a polished way to talk about yourself that attracts the kinds of opportunities that bring you meaningful work. This will unify the multiple independent aspects of your brand into one clear, compelling and cohesive statement. (A future blog post will specifically address how to bring your brand together and communicate it in a compelling way, resulting in your personal brand message).

Integrate your personal brand into all aspects of your career. Your resume, bio, cover letter, web presence, interview stories, business card and email signature should all reflect the values and language used in your personal brand message. This builds brand awareness with everyone you come into contact with and increases the likelihood that people come to you with opportunities related to your brand.

Create a home online for your personal brand. People immediately go to Google for a reference check, whether they just met you at a networking event or want to hire you. That means you need to establish a web presence for your brand. Your web presence should revolve around your personal website, which should ideally be www.[yourname].com. Your website acts as the online hub for your brand. It is where people searching for you in Google will get a true taste of you who are, where readers of your business card, email signature, social network profile, etc. will go to find out more about you. It is your chance to wow and emotionally connect viewers your brand. It is your first and most important impression, and your best chance to win over new visitors from the get-go.

Increase your rank in Google results when your named is searched. The technical term for this step is Search Engine Optimization. Learn how to increase the position of your site in Google search results to increase your brand’s visibility and make it easy to find you online.

Consistently communicate your personal brand through multiple channels. You should be posting comments on blogs, submitting tips on forums, answering questions on Q&A databases, writing book reviews, adding value to wiki articles, participating in social networks and posting original content (articles or media) related to your field. Go to conferences and events related to your area of expertise, meet people will similar passions and work on projects that excite you. These actions develop your brand’s presence within your niche, and demonstrate your passion and active participation in your field.

Establish credibility within your area of expertise online. The best way to gain credibility online is to create on-brand content related to your field. Starting a blog, contributing to other blogs or writing web articles/e-books/newsletters useful to members of your niche are excellent ways to establish yourself as a thought leader in your area of expertise. Offline, start a business, write a book, join professional organizations, take courses and get certified in areas that will increase the influence of your opinion.

Actively developing your personal branding means laying the groundwork now for a happier and more successful life later. It is a genuine process of figuring out what you want to do, who you want to do it for, and then making yourself known to those people as the best solution to their problems. If you haven’t started building your personal brand, the time to start is now. Here are some quick and easy first steps to get you started.

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In school, you’re (hopefully) taught the importance of writing for your audience. Whether you have to write an essay for your sophomore English professor, or write a research paper for a peer-review panel, everything you write has a specific audience. Keeping your readers top-of-mind whenever you write is vital to getting your ideas across successfully.

You audience determines:

1. What you say (what information you include)
2. How you say it (your writing style and tone)
3. Where you say it (where your communication ends up)

Your audience not only affects what you say on paper, but also what you say on the web. You should be thinking about the people who will be looking for you online to better decide what to put on the web about yourself.

Here are 4 questions to ask yourself whenever you write something on the web:

1. Who will end up reading this? A Facebook message to a friend can be as unprofessional as you want. That type of communication is private and secret. However, there are now tools that let employers search your Facebook wall. That means your friend Greg may not be the only person reading your wall posts anymore. Always keep in mind who might read your writing. Remember: when you post something on the web, it’s almost always permanent.
2. How much time does your audience have? The less time your viewer has, the more concise you should be. Often, visuals like graphs and diagrams convey information more effectively than long paragraphs. Saying more with less is a highly valued skill in the work world.
3. What information is your audience looking for? Think about the information your audience wants to find. On your Facebook profile, new friends want to know which interests and activities you have in common. At the same time, employers look at your wall to see interests or activities that back up your work experience or make you a more well-rounded candidate. Prioritize your audiences and choose a course of action that best suits your long-term goals. For example, if you know your potential audience includes the hiring manager of your dream not-for-profit, you may want to focus your profile on volunteering activity as opposed to less pertinent items like sports.
4. Where will your audience look? The Internet gives us instant gratification on a silver platter. In fact, if people can’t find what they’re looking for in a matter of seconds, they will give up altogether. That means that whenever you write, make sure you’re posting to the places your audience is looking. The less time they spend searching, the more likely they’ll end up reading what you wrote.

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What can you learn from Nike?

One of the most famous slogans of the century applies to you: you need to build a brand on the web, and soon. Many people are scared to build a personal brand because they’re unsure how to go about it, or have unrealistic expectations about how long it will take to see results. But the only way to find out is: just do it.

Personal branding is not an overnight process. However, simple things do give immediate results, like  posting on blogs and forums.

Personal branding does not take hours a day. The first day will probably take the longest, but after that it is smooth sailing. You want to start off with a list of blogs, forums, news sites, authors, and industry leading websites that you are going to follow and become an active member of. Active member is the key phrase. These are areas to which you are going to be contributing worthwhile content back to the world. Once you have this list of a few for each everyday you should set aside 15 minutes and for that time it is your responsibility to read newly published material and respond to it.

There is no putting off until tomorrow in personal branding because you have already started by the mere fact that you are alive. The online community has millions of people participating daily, some are passive some are active. The “Just Do It” mentality that Nike advocates is that mentality that you need to take on.

Once you have taken the initial step it is important that every week you reevaluate your list, add new items, take off less valuable ones, and work to constantly expand your network.

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