Trends 2022 in Personal Branding, the meta-year

Like the last years, I expose some of the trends that I see are being incorporated. I recognize that some respond more to the idea of personal desires., but this way we have less cooked trends, something purer.

In 2020 I said 2021 would be the year of the syringe, and often fed up we have given ourselves to see them at all times and in all media. I think 2022 can be a meta-year, and not by the blissful metaverse, but because "meta" is a prefix meaning "beyond", and as you will see, some of the trends I point out walk in the direction of taking our human condition further. 

If you're short on time, I summarize the trends 2022 in a minute:

1 To connect is to keep your gaze (Let's liquidate the PowerPoint)

I guess if I just write "to connect is to keep the look" you would think that I have soaked up Mr. Wonderful. But it doesn't go that way., it goes literally.

After the pandemic, we have normalized the video-conference, the webinar,… and it seems that we have adapted well on the technical side, but not in the conceptual.

These encounters work well when we are able to keep your eyes on the camera, not to the screen. Stop looking at your audience, be it one person or two hundred, is to disconnect.

Liquidating powerpoint may seem like an exaggeration, but among my small achievements of 2021 a congress is listed (The Personal Branding Lab Day) with more than 60 interventions - most of them live- of people talking to the camera with nothing but arguments of great value and power of transformation. To connect is to keep the gaze.

2 Let's prepare for the metaverse: the world made to your exact measure

Zuckerberg he named something that is already invented but has not finished taking off. Technologies such as 5G can make a reality of a real and digital hybrid world that connects us to highly personalized content. It's not about using the Internet, but to live the Internet in an immersive experience.

An example of my guild: We can wear glasses that show us the ads on the street that we want to see. No more pads, junk food or vehicles that are out of my reach, I want to see more books, cultural offer, restaurants, Events, Excursions,… But that can also happen without glasses., watching a video on the Internet or playing with our custom avatar.

3 No logo, you don't need it. Your brand is you

Do you remember this image??

The funny thing is that there are people who have decided not to charge the brand for carrying it like this, but they have paid exorbitant amounts to play man-advertisement.

You don't need it, your brand is you, your gaze, your voice, your personality, your way of walking, your values, your community... Come back to you.

4 Homo Phigital, less screen, more meat, it's time to balance

The pandemic has super-digitized us. That has its good part... but also the bad. Getting a teenager or twenty-something to listen to you 5 minutes without looking 10 sometimes your smartphone is a chimera.

It's time to balance, some speak of "Phigital" as a concept, whose definition refers to a generation of students who do not make a distinction between the physical and digital worlds and are comfortable in both.

5 Humanizing brands as a mission (we are all ambassadors)

I see that brands are starting to realize that their best ambassadors are not the ones in the photos signing big contracts., nor celebrities, but its own people. Your technical profiles, Commercial, of research... they offer the credibility that the brand lacks.

The most traditional advertising loses steam, and now brand ambassador programs or employee advocacy they make more sense than ever.

And us, as people, we must embrace that reality. Many companies do not choose only good technical profiles, but to professionals who know how to communicate and show pride of belonging.

6 Contents with the 5 senses: if we can read, listen and watch, Best

And if we can also smell and taste, Best. The immersive experience is more complete. If I read this, but I can also hear it, that has strength. Many digital newspapers already give the option to "listen" to the text.

The Podcast is booming, because among other things it allows you to combine it with a walk, with preparing a recipe or with a break with your eyes closed. Audio rooms looked like they would have more travel, have stayed halfway. Tik Tok and the Reels and other experiences prevail in a world where attention hardly exceeds the limits of the minute.

To maintain that attention, you have to activate more than one sense.

7 Purpose is not decorative: More activism, less pasotism

If you've really found your Purpose, your raison d'ies (beyond health, money and love), it's time to activate it. Otherwise, is a mere statement of intent, a pamphlet.

Our world is seriously hurt by inequality, poverty, the climate disaster and the infodemic. And it must be saved: What can you do your bit for?? Don't write it, Do it!

8 Cure as best you can or create, generates expectation and value

Continuing activism, it would not be bad if we stopped being taxable persons on the Internet, on Whatsapp... and we would take the initiative.

The world must get rid of flat earthers, misinformants and Trolls, and for that we are the super-heroes that we will try to bring value, perspective and a certain objectivity. You can be a curator, a kind of re-distributor of valuable content, or if you dare, a creator, someone who shares their own ideas, Risky. But do not stay as a mere observer, try to add, this would be a good farewell to 2021 and a good note of the 2022 trends.

Here's the episode 50 from the podcast Everything Leaves a Mark with this theme. You can hear it in iVoox, Spotify, And Apple Podcast.

Stock Photos from Dilok Klaisataporn / Shutterstock