Hopefully I’ve already convinced you that marketing yourself is important, but now you may be wondering how you actually do it. How can
you become the Gordon Ramsay of software development?
I’m not going to pretend it’s easy. Success isn’t something that’s
achieved overnight—at least not long-lasting success. But any developer can do it, and if you’re willing to do the work, it can seem easy. I’ll
briefly mention all of the key concepts here, and in the following chapters we’ll go over each one in much more detail.
Marketing yourself begins with developing a personal brand—something that you represent. You can’t be all things to everyone, so you
have to make conscious decisions about what you want to be and how
you want to present that image to the world. You also want to create a
sense of familiarity when someone is exposed to you or something you
created multiple times. Branding helps you do that.
Once you have a brand of some sort and you know what message
you’re trying to convey, you need to find a way to convey that message.
There are many different mediums you can use to get your message out
there, but one of the most prominent ones I recommend for software
developers is a blog. I consider a blog to be your home base on the
Landmine: I’m not an expert at anything; I’ve got nothing to market
Just because you don’t consider yourself an expert doesn’t mean you can’t start marketing yourself. In fact, trying to figure out how to market yourself can push you in
the direction of becoming an expert or specializing in a particular area of software
development.
Almost every developer has something to offer. You might have a unique perspective
or you might come from a different background than other software developers. Perhaps you have passions or other hobbies that other software developers or clients
would relate to. Even being a complete beginner or amateur can be an advantage if
you market it well—plenty of people want to learn from someone who’s just a few
steps ahead of them, because they can relate to that person.
The point is, don’t let not being an expert be an excuse for not marketing yourself.
No matter where you are in your career, you can benefit from trying to control and
shape your brand and from spreading the word about it.
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