What is a Brand Ambassador?

A brand ambassador is someone who represents an organization by portraying the features of its products or services.   Many consider the main difference between brand ambassadors and brand advocates involves brand ambassadors having more formalized relationships with the brand, often but not always involving compensation, and brand advocates are typically loyal and engaged customers willing to promote the brand without any compensation or other incentive.   Keep in mind that both terms are used interchangeably.

Leaders want employees who realize results.  Their satisfaction is even greater if results are unexpected and come from a self-motivated employee.  Being proactive and seeking ways to add value can be beneficial to both employees and organizations.  Many employees focus on simply meeting deliverables and expectations while others actively seek opportunities to excel.  Regardless of your role whether that be in management, administration, or within another professional classification, being proactive and able to articulate how your performance differs from others in ways beneficial to the organization are important to your success.

Competition for jobs is fierce and in many fields maintaining a career plan trajectory is all but a concept from the past.  Knowledge and agility can be differentiators that help you stand out from others.  Yes, in a way many are competing for their jobs whether they want to think of it in such terms or not.  Every professional should know how to create a strategy and implement tactics to better position themselves for continued employment.  Current economic conditions make this is as important as ever.

Reflect upon what opportunities exist where you can raise awareness and reinforce your value to others, management in particular.  Ideal times to proactively communicate your value include during performance evaluations and at periodic milestones such as project close outs and when participating on new teams.  Perhaps your role doesn’t permit such opportunities.  If this is the case, consider interactions you have with management and your peers and identify ways in which you can contribute and be remembered as “value added”.  To consistently grow awareness of your value with others, vary your communications and familiarize others with key aspects of your performance including your abilities on a consistent basis.  The common Problem-Action-Result (PAR) technique can prove useful in developing key examples to share with others.  While this method is typically used during interviewing, it can be a highly effective way to organize and remember information.