Part sales pitch, part brand manifesto, part inspirational sticky note to reference in moments of inner turmoil: A strong personal brand statement highlights what you produce—and your unique ability to produce it.
Writing a personal brand statement is an opportunity to define and standardize your brand for yourself, as a reminder and business growth compass. Once finalized, it can be a jumping-off point for personal website copy, social media profiles, and pitch decks.
Let’s look at how you can create a compelling personal brand statement to increase your reach and impact. With these personal branding tips, you can make a splash with any audience you want to serve.
What is a personal brand statement?
A personal brand statement is a short paragraph focusing on your strengths and expertise—and what makes you different from other professionals in your field. It distills your unique style and captures your unique value proposition for potential clients or partners, especially in comparison to competitors.
For example, a graphic designer’s personal brand statement might read: “I am a visionary designer who translates complex ideas into elegant and user-centered experiences. I believe in the power of design to solve problems and create meaningful connections.”
While they may look or sound similar, a personal brand statement is distinct from a mission statement, which highlights the motivations behind your work for potential clients. An effective personal brand statement informs your decision-making, your pitch process, and more. It’s something you can return to and ask, “Am I living up to my personal brand promise?”
Turn on screen reader support Security limitations Limitations are applied based on the file owner's organization policies View all limitations Got it To enable screen reader support, press ⌘+Option+Z To learn about keyboard shortcuts, press ⌘slashChristine Aebischer has joined the document.What should your personal brand statement focus on?
Here’s how to hit all the important details in your personal brand statement, with a few examples:
Personality
When you build a business around your personal brand, you’re selling more than your services or expertise—you’re selling yourself. As such, your personal brand statement should capture your personality.
“Understanding the core of your identity as a human being—as well as a business—is what will allow you to capitalize on that to sell [your services],” founder and serial entrepreneur Alexa Curtis tells Shopify. She’s leveraged the power of her personal brand to grow her blog into a contract with Radio Disney—and beyond.
As an influencer or content creator on social media platforms, your sense of humor or unconventional outlook may set you apart. Maybe you have a knack for demystifying dry and complex topics for broader audiences or an insatiable curiosity that takes you to far-flung places in search of answers. Whatever it is, highlight what truly differentiates you in a crowded field.
Example:
Adventurer with a hunger for life and insatiable curiosity about the world. My social media pages show you how to go anywhere, meet anyone, and try everything.
Expertise or metrics
In some fields—like consulting—technical or situational expertise is an important piece of a successful personal brand. They’re two of the main reasons potential clients would engage your services. Placing your qualifications at the core of your statement reiterates your ability to get results.
Example:
Business strategist empowering ridiculously good marketing for small businesses looking to grow their sales. My time-tested approaches to conversion rate optimization help companies increase conversions by up to 80%.
Vision
Personal goals or core values can be a compelling centerpiece for a personal brand statement, especially if your work is in service of a big goal or shift in the status quo. If you’re looking to disrupt an industry, popularize a certain style of content, or draw attention to a pressing issue, keeping the ultimate outcome in mind helps create a natural throughline.
Example:
I’m a digital marketing pioneer on the cutting edge of AI. I combine a decade of experience in marketing automation with independent deep research into generative AI to help budget-conscious small business owners improve their marketing performance without growing their team.
Target audience
If your audience or ideal client is the driving force behind your brand, making them a focal point in your personal brand statement works as a checkpoint as you move forward. This is especially useful if you serve a particular industry or focused demographic.
Example:
I craft cutting-edge marketing strategiesfor female entrepreneurs eager to get their startups off the ground. My ability to optimize the margins of creative output makes me an invaluable asset for new, ambitious companies that need a creative champion in their corner.
4 tips for writing a personal brand statement
A personal brand statement is ideally only a few sentences long, but it might also take the form of a list of words or phrases, or a greatest-hits-style intro. Whether you’re a bestselling author, marketing consultant, software developer, fitness coach, or business course creator, crystallizing your vision this way can pay off in brand clarity.
Keep this short list of tips in mind for your personal brand statement writing:
1. Make a list of attributes
You can list personal brand traits or follow a structured outline of prompts that align with the 4 Cs of personal branding: clarity, consistency, credibility, and competitiveness.
Use these tenets as prompts when crafting your personal brand statement:
- Clarity. Capture a clear understanding of what exactly you do. What service do you provide and/or how do you show up in the world? Whether you’re a founder, consultant, coach, or creative professional, get specific about your offering. That might include the medium or format you work in, or your areas of focus.
- Consistency. Stick to the key pieces of your brand identity, whether brand tone, visual style, or, in the case of content creators, how frequently you aim to release new work. You’ll want to have these firmly in mind when boiling them down for your crystallized statement of purpose.
- Credibility. Credibility demonstrates your deep understanding of common hurdles or pain points, as well as your unique capability to overcome them through past experiences, expertise, credentials, and more. If you seek to be a thought leader in your space, establishing credibility should be central to your personal brand strategy.
- Competitiveness. Understand your value proposition in the context of the competitive landscape. How is what you do different or better than other people in the same space? Focusing on competitive differentiation can also lead to an official brand positioning statement.
2. Be specific, but think broad
When writing your personal brand statement, identify the broad themes of what you do and pinpoint exactly how you do it. The more specificity, the better.
With the help of a business coach, Alexa fused the details of her own brand into a succinct pitch-style statement, translating a big-picture goal into clear actions. “My core focus is to help young people be fearless and get out of their comfort zone,” she says. “How do I do that? I do that through content, through summits, and through coaching.”
Emphasize the aspects of you that make your offering unique. “What makes a personal brand unique is the person,” Alexa says. “Your vision statement may be the same as mine, but the people who follow you are following you for your twist on it, and following me for my twist on it.”
3. Write multiple drafts
Aim for one to three sentences: enough room to mention your job title, core selling point, and style. Try writing each draft in a different voice to see which aligns with your goals—and resonates best with potential clients. Play with sentence structure, tone, and content to see what emerges.
4. Check in over time
Alexa’s Be Fearless universe began as a fashion blog, evolved into a show on Radio Disney, and eventually became a multimedia platform—with its own podcast—encouraging bold action in others, specifically young people.
For a while, Alexa says she focused on the types of content she created and the specific takeaways her followers would get from it. But as her brand evolved, she began to take a wider-angle view of her content. A comedic series on Instagram now coexists with seminars or interviews with industry leaders on her podcast.
“Now, I just want you to enter my world,” she says. “So if it's business-related or dating-related, everything is either funny or unfiltered or fearless. And that always ties back into that original statement.”
Your personal branding journey is exactly that: a journey. Consider any statement you create a snapshot of your brand in a given moment. As your personal brand changes or expands, check in and refine your statement to match.
Personal brand statement FAQ
Why do I need a personal brand statement?
Crafting a strong personal brand statement is a strategic exercise for entrepreneurs building a business or brand around their singular outlook and overall value. It can be formal or informal but is a way to solidify your approach and key selling points.
What are the 4 Cs of personal branding?
The 4 Cs are: clarity (what you do), consistency (when and where you do it), credibility (your expertise and skill), and competitiveness (how you stand out).
How should I use a personal brand statement?
A personal brand statement is a starting point for externally facing branding, like mission statements or an official elevator pitch, but it can also function as a lodestar for business success—informing which projects you pursue (or turn down) and how you execute them.