Personal Brand and PR

If there’s one thing established and newer agency leaders tend to agree on, it’s the ickiness of having a ‘personal brand’ and promoting your agency business.

As Matthew Freud said in a ‘rare’ interview in PR Week: “I’ve spent 40 years hiding, not completely successfully. I think if your role is to promote and amplify the people that you’re working with, you should remain hidden mostly.” Freud also said that he has “sensibly taken the view that unless you’ve got a very good reason to break cover, you probably shouldn’t.”

I mostly agree with Matthew. I chose a career in PR and comms because I love how we move in silence to manage our clients' reputations, create hype, change perceptions and entertain.

However, as Otille Ross said last week in another PR Week article, ‘PR has never had more of a PR problem.’ 

I wonder if part of ‘PRs PR problem’ is that the industry has grown up thinking we shouldn’t talk about what we do, unless we are entering an award, and as a result, we don’t own our narrative. Mainstream media and loud voices sensationalise the campaigns that have us collectively wincing, and the masses believe the negative hype.

There is nothing wrong with building an agency in silence or limiting what you share to new wins, new work, and new hires. However, there’s no denying the tide has changed, and newer independent agency leaders are setting the pace by talking about their wins, learnings, and the behind-the-scenes of their day-to-day.

Something I’ve learnt from sharing parts of my founder journey, in addition to new work and wins, it is that it provides you with an even deeper insight into all the emotions, good and bad, that come with putting your name to your words in public.

For an industry that urges leaders to own their quotes, craft narratives, sense-check tone, and strategise about the pros and cons of a message, knowing what it feels like to have your words out in the wild can help build affinity with clients.

Whether your camp ‘stay hidden’ or you are building in public because you believe that 'closed mouths don’t get fed', the reality is that the work we do doesn’t always speak for itself.

PR will continue to have a PR problem if we’re not more open, vocal, and authentic; trusted voices are important. Perhaps PR would benefit from more pros embracing visible personal brands, sharing expertise, experiences, and the value we bring to our clients.

Initially published in PR Week here