Real Estate Agent Personal Branding: Learning from American Idol Part 10

Thursday

Mar192009

Thursday, March 19, 2009 at 2:37PM

This is part ten of our blog series entitled: Real Estate Agent Personal Branding: Learning form American Idol. It is a fun and easy way to learn the principles of personal branding. You do not have to be an Idol fan to enjoy!

Liken Your Personal Brand to What is Already Known

When you introduce a new brand it helps to liken your personal brand to what is already known. The American Idol voters picked the top ten they would want to see on tour this summer. Each of the contestants has a distinct personality and musical style. You can even hear the judges liken members of the new "touring company" to particular musical stars. After Matt's first audition, Simon compared hime to Elliot Yamin. This week Matt was compared to Justin Timberlake and Michael Buble and Lil Rounds was compared to to Mary J. Blige. They are labeling and branding the contestants to help the voters pigeonhole them in a particular genre. As such they are positioning the contestants in the minds of the listeners.

It is easy to communicate using known commodities such as labels. The process of understanding and promoting quickens. A line from a Robert Altman’s film, The Player illustrates the point humorously. A screenwriter is hawking a new movie and describes it as a Bruce Willis film, "Ghost meets The Manchurian Candidate."

Here is an example that can apply to real estate practice: If you are launching your new blog that features local restaurant reviews you might want to call yourself ”the Ruth Reichl of [your town’s name]”. Ruth Reichl was a famous food editor for the Los Angeles Times and is now the editor in chief for Gourmet magazine. The purpose of personal branding is to create your own label. You are telling people how you want to be perceived.

How can you liken your personal brand to something or someone your target market already knows?

Click Here to view the entire American Idol- real estate agent personal branding blog series

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