It is all about ME! Personal branding in Property Research

Just as companies brand their products to create unique associations in the minds of their target consumers, personal branding involves the creation of strong, unique and favourable associations in the minds of the people around them. However, unlike products which have a conscious marketing program to build and maintain brand values, personal brands are often built unconsciously. Yet content creators have a complete set of tools at their disposal to ensure that they are in control of their own brand. Academics have long been judged, albeit crudely, by the volume of their published work and their ability to place it in the “right” journal. In the commercial world, by comparison, personal branding is often subsumed into the brand of the corporate paymaster. In this context letting personal branding become visible raises important issues of trust often buried by blanket bans on the use of social media for example..On the other hand, employers are increasingly using social media tools to vet applicants before offering them interviews. Such techniques range from searching the applicants Facebook or Twitter feed to conducting large background checks using search engines and other tools.This paper presents significant research into the relationship between corporate and personal branding undertaken across the whole business services sector and presents the results of a survey taken amongst corporate and academic researchers about their own efforts to build and maintain a personal brand. This is triangulated against a survey of companies within the real estate sector seeking out the corporate view.Personal branding cuts across established ideas of employment policy and the monitoring of employees as well as having an impact on the marketing drivers of real estate. It sits at the heart of what property research is and what it might become.