I don’t get the whole “personal brand” thing.

To me, it sounds like you put your personal branding iron over hot coals and burn your initials into your forehead.
Good God, bloggers are turning into cattle with this whole branding thing. Very competitive cattle, for that matter.

I hate that expression. I think it’s the dumbest. I do.

“Personal Brands”. *Rolls eyes*

It could be that I don’t get it and perhaps I’m missing out on something truly exponentially GINORMOUSLY paramount in the blogging world. But, I don’t understand what it really is, and honestly, why it is even important. Then again, I’m a blogger who really only cares about the writing and the friendship part of the online world.

When a company approaches me, that’s an added bonus, I suppose. Yes, I’ve graciously accepted the generously bestowed upon me products and I’ve blogged a review with full disclosure and integrity. But the free shit? That’s not even close to why I started blogging, hell, I didn’t even know about THAT side of blogging back at the beginning!

I’ve been feeling sort disconnected lately, between the major serious blockage and the lack of branding knowledge. It’s put me in a serious bloggy funk.
Until yesterday. I woke up to find a comment from a local Twitter friend, DamnRedHead, Stacy Lukasavitz, That Damn Red Head…
Stacy Lukasavitz says:
March 4, 2010 at 11:22 pm (Edit)

You know what? I don’t read many blogs that would be considered in your “genre,” per se, but I love yours, and I tell people about it in person a lot. You know why? Not because you’re local (although that does help), but because you’re REAL. You don’t bother with the facetiousness and the bullshit of “personal branding” and all that crap, you’re just you, and you tell it like it is in your world and how you see the rest of it. And I respect that more than you can imagine. Seriously. I can’t say any more on this post than “keep up the good work” but I thought I’d tell you like it is, like I see it, because you’re one of the most authentic people online I’ve ever “met,” and I thought you should know. One of these days I hope we could have coffee or beers or something. You’re awesome and I love you for being real, for being you.

… and also for leaving the shoulder pads in the ’80s. :)

And that comment. Those words from an online friend whom I’ve never met…yet hope to in the very VERY near future…

It’s amazing how, sometimes someone comes along and without realizing it, puts your confusing shit into a nice, neat perspective.

Who gives a fuck.

Seriously.

I’m a blogger and a wannabe writer. I refuse to call myself a brand. I’m not a
–noun
1.
kind, grade, or make, as indicated by a stamp, trademark, or the like: the best brand of coffee.
2.
a mark made by burning or otherwise, to indicate kind, grade, make, ownership, etc.
3.
a mark formerly put upon criminals with a hot iron.
4.
any mark of disgrace; stigma.
5.
branding iron.
6.
a kind or variety of something distinguished by some distinctive characteristic: The movie was filled with slapstick—a brand of humor he did not find funny.
7.
a burning or partly burned piece of wood.
8.
Archaic. a sword.

–verb (used with object)
9.
to label or mark with or as if with a brand.
10.
to mark with disgrace or infamy; stigmatize.
11.
to impress indelibly: The plane crash was branded on her mind.
12.
to give a brand name to: branded merchandise.
13.
to promote as a brand name.

as found in dictionary.com

I’m just me. Melissa Beth Steinberg Brodsky. Nothing less. And growing more.

THIS? Is my blog.

My blog and I? We don’t care about being a brand. We care about being true to ourselves. Being the best person, blogger, mom, wife, friend, daughter, sister, aunt, etc…that we can be.

And that. Is that.