The Worlds Most Enduring Personal Brand

At 5pm Australian time September 9, the world's most recognised personal brand celebrated the fact that they’ve been around the longest.

Of course, I’m talking about Queen Elizabeth II who has out-reigned her great, great grandmother, Queen Victoria as the longest serving monarch.

Her brand was born in a time of turmoil, between two world wars, inheriting a crown at tender age of just 25. Hard to believe today that a 25 year old would be capable of taking on such a role, and encouraging to know that you can start to develop your personal brand and deal with whatever life throws at you from any age.

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Her brand has stayed consistent throughout incredible environmental change, she’s seen so many worldwide events in her 63 year reign, participating as a young woman in World War 2 war efforts, Rock n Roll, Elvis, Beatlemania and ABBA, Cuba, Watergate and the Vietnam war, the collapse of communism and the Berlin wall, open heart surgery and man on the moon. Throughout it all, her brand has remained ceremonial, resisting any urges to get entangled in politics.
The lesson here is to be focused on your purpose, never letting external change or bureaucracy tempt you to change your values.

A huge lesson from the Queens personal brand is how instantly recognised she is. Symbols of her brand are on our money and postage stamps of course, but she has maintained symbolic customs and rituals to endorse her brand. It’s Ma'am as in Ham, not Marm as in harm, curtsies and bows, pageantry, she even eats slowly because the waiting staff clear everyones plates when she finishes!
She is immediately identified from her voice, posture and dress. It is an interesting fact that the colour purple was once only to be worn by royals, it’s a particular difficult colour to manufacture therefore kept only for the best. Purple to this day still conveys a sense of quality, luxury and service. How can your personal brand become instantly recognised? Whatever colour, symbol or identifier you choose it needs to become established as your tradition.

Her personal brand sells the British brand. The royals are a huge benefit to tourism, culture and tradition, championing and supporting everything about the British way of life. How can you endorse a culture, movement or way of thinking to build your brand presence beyond yourself?

At the time of her celebration as longest reigning monarch, all over the world people are recalling when they had met the Queen, what they were doing or wearing, what she was saying or wearing.
Her brand is connected with it’s customers.
Although her actions during Princess Diana’s death tainted her brand as being ‘out of touch’, she has bounced back with huge effort going into PR and communication. She has embraced the younger royals and their more modern approach to being part of peoples everyday lives. Does your personal brand truly connect and engage with your prospects in a way that creates a lasting and emotional relationship?

The Queens brand has endured the presence of many rival brands, 12 prime ministers including her first, Winston Churchill, 11 Russian Leaders and 12 US Presidents, globally recognised brands Fidel Castro, De Gaulle, Ayatollah Khomeini and Nelson Mandela, proving that longevity and consistency can beat any competition.

Her brand stretches across 54 members of the commonwealth including Canada, Australia & New Zealand, many thousand of kilometres from her home. What goals do you have for your brand, are you thinking too small, how could you positively inspire thousands of people around the globe?

The Queens private life is a mystery, teaching us another lesson in what it takes to produce an enduring personal brand. We do know some aspects of her private life. Her love of the highlands, corgis, hunting, racing, crosswords and gin. But most of her innermost brand is guarded and therefore respected. It would be downright rude to even think of trying to pry into her personal life, and extremely odd if the Queen decided to air her dirty laundry in public. In order to become a respected brand, you don’t need to share everything about yourself. Endless selfies and ‘look at me’ stories on social media will not enhance your brand or endure people to you!
Scarcity creates demand. If we knew everything about the Queen, we wouldn’t be that interested.

Royalist or Republican, it matters not to Queen Elizabeth II. You have to admit, she has one of the most enduring personal brands we’ve ever seen and I for one am impressed by the reputation and recognition her brand has established.