What is the difference between personal branding vs. business branding? I get asked this a lot. We might take for granted that folks just understand the difference, but the truth is that it isn’t always black and white and sometimes they bleed into one another. Let’s talk about the difference between personal branding vs. business branding and figure out which is right for you.

What are personal branding & business branding?

I define personal branding as the strategic development of your public persona. You highlight and focus on your specific skills, values, mission and vision. Developing a personal brand is focused on you as a person and what you have to offer your audience.

I would define business branding similarly, except that it is centered around an entity, your business. Your business has its own unique voice, set of values and purpose. Your personal brand and your business brand may overlap, but they are not necessarily the same.

How to choose between personal branding vs. business branding

In order to decide between personal branding vs. business branding, I would ask yourself a few questions:

1. Are you providing a product or service to customers or are you developing a brand to be more desirable as an individual to a group of people (looking for a job, public figure, etc).
   1. If your goal is to land a new job or you’re crafting a persona as a public figure then personal branding is absolutely what you want to focus on.
   2. If you plan to provide a service or product you may want to consider these follow-up questions:
2. Do you plan to employ or collaborate with others or would you provide your products or services independently?
   1. If you’ll be working independently then you might want to consider focusing on a personal brand. I value transparency and authenticity and I work independently so I don’t want potential clients thinking that they are hiring a group of people rather than just myself.
   2. If you employ other people or regularly collaborate with others to provide customers with a product or service, then you may want to develop a business brand to accurately represent your business and team.
3. Will your endeavor require securing loans or investors in order to launch?
   1. If you’re looking to secure significant funds in order to provide your products or services then those resources are going to require that you have a plan to develop a high quality brand in order to attract high quality customers and provide them security and ROI.
4. Do you plan to grow this brand in the future or do you see yourself working independently?
   1. If you don’t plan to grow your business and you work independently then crafting and refining a personal brand is likely all you need.
   2. If your goal is to grow, hire more people or even sell your business one day then you want to consider developing a business brand so that you can continue to attract high quality customers, professional team members and potential buyers.

Next steps in developing your personal or business brand

After reflecting on your answers it should be more clear which type of branding you need. Your next steps would be working with a marketing partner to build out a strategy and a design partner to implement that strategy through visual design and real-life marketing pieces like a logo, website, print and packaging.

If you want some tips on finding a great professional designer then check out this post where I outline 12 questions to ask potential designers on your discovery call. Or you can skip that and pick me!

When you’re ready to put your plan into action, I would love to schedule a free consultation with you to find out what kind of brand we’ll be creating for you!