Should you invest in building your personal brand?  What’s in it for you?  We sat down with Hajj Flemings, CEO & Founder of Brand Camp University, an interactive personal branding conference providing concrete and measurable tactics for growing your personal and professional identity, to get the answers to those burning questions.  Hajj is also conducting a two ­hour ground­breaking branding workshop exclusively for Detroit Young Professionals on Saturday, March 21, which is designed to help attendees establish a digital brand strategy and upgrade their online presence. Here are a few more fun facts about Hajj:

• CEO and Founder of Brand Camp University
• CEO and Co-Founder of Gokit
• Digital Brand  Strategist/Author/Speaker
• BlackEnterprise.com, Tech Columnist
• Founder of Student Ventures

Hajj on Personal Branding and What Our Young Professionals Can Expect From His Seminar:

DYP: Workshopping with Detroit Young Professionals in particular, how will you approach this Brand Camp differently, if at all?

Hajj: This is different than a conference. We’re bringing lots of thought leaders and best practices and it will be more of doing personal stories. With DYP, we will be walking individuals through an initiative.We try to take ideas and get them to re-imagine. 

DYP: What can attendees do in advance to make the most of their Brand Camp experience?

Hajj: Get focused on what is the main idea that they want to work on or distilling down to what it is that they want to work on or to one thing that they want to pack in and work on that.

DYP: Where did the Brand Camp concept come from? Where did it get its roots and how has it evolved since?

Hajj: Brand Camp started in 2008 but I wrote a book about it in 2005. I was already working with corporate brands and started to do research to figure out that people are brands and then tried to figure out how to help people develop stories. I thought, why would I wait for someone else to do it, when I can do it? Over time we have had the opportunity to bring some of the best speakers in the country and bring those minds to the city of Detroit. We’re working on our Brand School right now. I realized that being an entrepreneur is hard work and it’s not for everybody. For me to be able to grow, it would take a full commitment.

DYP: You were once a young professional in Detroit. How have the opportunities for young pros in Detroit changed over the years?

Hajj: There’s a lot of momentum and activity and attention that’s being focused on attracting our attention to young talent. If you are a millennial or have an idea, there are a lot of events to be exposed and that didn’t exist 10 years ago.

DYP: Is there anything else the attendees and DYP members should know in advance or that you would like to share?

Hajj: We always recommend attendees bring their laptops. I would also start to benchmark others who are in the same space. Also, I am working on a neighborhood initiative for neighborhoods inside the city of Detroit to help re-brand business districts and train entrepreneurs in neighborhoods.

Brand Camp x DYP Event Details

The session will focus on branding and marketing basics that can be executed by the attendees immediately with little to no marketing budget.  The tips that  we will share are best practices to build brand awareness personally and professionally.  A few of the session goals are to help each person to be searchable online, communicate their value proposition and secure the appropriate digital real estate (dot coms, social network URLs.). 

Workshop topics include: 

• Brand Identity 
• Brand Storytelling 
• How to Build a Personal Brand 
• Digital Strategy and Social Media tactics 
• Visual Imaging ­ - The usage of visuals in your brand strategy

You'll even walk away with your own professional headshot from Shawn Lee Photography! 

Similar workshops are offered at $150 per person, but DYP is able to bring these resources to our members a discounted rate of $75 for DYP Members (access the discounted entry link from the Member Portal) . Non-Member rate is $100.  

Refreshments will be served. Space is VERY LIMITED.  

REGISTER NOW!