FREE Trial with Benzinga Pro happening right now!
Your personal brand is something that you cannot afford to ignore. It’s how you are perceived by others online or in the marketplace. So you want to make sure you are giving off the right impression to have the best chance at attracting valuable clients or landing a promotion you deserve.
You can fine-tune your personal brand without spending a fortune on a branding consultant. And there are tons of online personal branding courses to help you get the job done.
Quick Look: Best Personal Branding Courses
- Introduction to Personal Branding by the University of Virginia
- Learning Personal Branding by LinkedIn Learning (Formerly Lynda.com)
- Transform Your Personal Brand by LinkedIn Learning (Formerly Lynda.com)
- Strategic Self-Marketing and Personal Branding by the State University of New York
- Personal Branding Mastery: The System To Reinvent Yourself! by Udemy
- Social Selling and Personal Branding by Udemy
- Digital Body Language by Udemy
- Personal Branding — Be Seen As A Celebrity In Your Niche by Udemy
- Digital Branding and Engagement by Curtin University
What Makes a Personal Branding Course Great?
Look for these features when you scope out your options for online personal branding courses.
Self-Paced
Life is busy, so it can be challenging to meet pressing deadlines. You may want a personal branding course that allows you to work at your own pace and gives you the best chance of mastering the material, even if you only study on lunch breaks or after work.
Covers the Basics
The course should begin with a lesson on the basics of personal branding. Otherwise, you’ll struggle to comprehend more advanced concepts and techniques without a strong foundation. And if you’re a bit more seasoned, a review course should serve as an excellent refresher to get your creative juices flowing.
Affordable
It may not be worthwhile to invest in an expensive course if you only want to expand your personal branding knowledge. So look for a course that’s relatively inexpensive or free if you fall into this category. And even if you want to increase exposure for your business or elevate your career, it’s still a good idea to start with affordable courses and work your way up to pricier options.
Our Top Picks
Here are our top picks for personal branding courses from Coursera, edX, Udemy and LinkedIn Learning.
Our selections are split into 3 categories by skill level: beginners, intermediate students and advanced students. We have also included price points and a brief description of each course to make it easy to evaluate your options.
Personal Branding Courses for Beginners
These beginner courses teach you the foundational elements of personal branding.
1. Introduction to Personal Branding by the University of Virginia
- Who it’s for: Beginners
- Price: Free
Offered by the University of Virginia, this free course will teach you how to build an authentic personal brand from the ground up. You will also learn best practices for maintaining your personal brand both online and offline.
Introduction to Personal Branding includes 5 modules, beginning with a primer on personal branding, followed by lessons on building your brand’s infrastructure and digital home. And in the final 2 modules, you will learn how to maintain and protect your brand effectively. Expect to spend 5 hours working through the course material.
The class is taught by Kimberley Barker, manager for technology education and computing at the Claude Moore Health Sciences Library.
2. Learning Personal Branding by LinkedIn Learning (Formerly Lynda.com)
- Who it’s for: Beginners
- Price: Included in the monthly membership
This course from LinkedIn Learning provides an in-depth introduction to personal branding. It includes 6 modules, 2 project files and 3 chapter quizzes to test your comprehension of the material.
Influencer Marketing Pioneer Chelsea Krost shares the fundamentals of creating a solid personal brand foundation and getting noticed on LinkedIn. You’ll also learn how to develop a personal brand content calendar.
Enrollment is included in the $29 monthly LinkedIn Learning membership. But if you are not yet enrolled, grab a seat to the class for free by signing up for a 1-month trial.
3. Transform Your Personal Brand by LinkedIn Learning (Formerly Lynda.com)
- Who it’s for: Beginners
- Price: Included in the monthly membership
This course is for you if you are in the beginning stages of building your personal brand. And it doesn’t matter if you are a one-man show, entrepreneur or employee. You will discover ways to amplify your personal brand to boost visibility in the marketplace or land a more rewarding career.
The course is co-taught by Goldie Chan, a digital marketing expert, and Madecraft, a learning content company headquartered in Santa Barbara, California. It includes 7 modules on essential topics, such as sponsorships, personal brand campaigns, brand communication, promotion and visibility.
There’s no fee to enroll if you have a $29 monthly membership from LinkedIn Learning. But if you are not yet subscribed and want to test drive the course for free, sign up for a 1-month trial.
Intermediate Personal Branding Courses
Learn how to use your personal brand to get the results you want in your business and on the job. Consider these courses to show you how.
4. Strategic Self-Marketing and Personal Branding by the State University of New York
- Who it’s for: Intermediate students
- Price: Free
Strategic Self-Marketing and Personal Branding is designed for individuals who want to bolster their professional image. It’s the third course in the Career Brand Management Specialization.
You’ll learn how to implement a strategic self-marketing plan for your career, create strategies to help manage your professional reputation, develop personal branding statements and much more. Each module ends with a quiz to ensure that you’re ready to move on to the next lesson.
The class is free and takes 4 weeks to complete.
5. Personal Branding Mastery: The System to Reinvent Yourself!
- Who it’s for: Intermediate students
- Price: $199.99
Does your personal brand need a makeover? If so, look no further than this bestselling course. Top Udemy instructor Silviu Marisk shares tips and tricks to help boost your credibility, visibility and position yourself as an industry expert. You’ll have instant access to 65 lectures condensed into 4 hours of on-demand video. The course also includes 2 articles and 23 downloadable resources to supplement your learning.
Personal Branding Mastery: The System to Reinvent Yourself! caters to students, young graduates, entrepreneurs and career professionals who want to differentiate themselves from the masses. Enrollment is $199.99 and the course is backed by a 30-day money-back guarantee if you’re unsatisfied for any reason.
6. Social Selling and Personal Branding by Udemy
- Who it's for: Intermediate students
- Price: $24.99
Just $24.99 gets you a seat to Social Selling and Personal Branding. The primary goal of this course is to help improve your online presence so you can attract the right prospects and sell more on social media.
You’ll learn essential strategies that must be implemented for effective digital personal branding and social selling in the first half of the course. The second half of the course covers powerful social networking strategies and ways to identify commercial opportunities.
The course is offered by Illumeo Learning, a leading provider of condensed courses for busy professionals. Instructor Ayman van Bregt is the facilitator on behalf of Illumeo Learning and the co-founder of the Dutch Social Media Academy.
Have a LinkedIn account and working knowledge of the social media platform before you enroll.
Advanced Personal Branding Courses
Want to take your personal branding skills to new heights? Check out these advanced courses:
7. Digital Body Language by Udemy
- Who it’s for: Advanced students
- Price: $19.99
A Udemy bestseller, Digital Body Language is an advanced course that will show you how to optimize your digital brand. And if you have a negative digital image, you will learn what it takes to nurse it back to health and attract the right kind of attention.
The class includes 16 lectures jam-packed into 2 hours of on-demand video and a downloadable resource. You will also receive a certificate of completion when you reach the end of the course.
It’s facilitated by Vanessa Van Edwards, author and behavioral investigator and columnist at the Huffington Post.
You can enroll for only $19.99, but be sure to have at least 1 social media profile before you sign up.
8. Personal Branding — Be Seen as a Celebrity in Your Niche
- Who it’s for: Advanced students
- Price: $49.99
Tired of being overlooked in your industry? Consider this course from Udemy if you have all the relevant skills and knowledge needed to serve your target audience but don’t quite know how to get the word out.
Instructors Tracy A. Hanes and Alex Genadinik will show you how to implement the same strategies used by celebrities to get noticed in the marketplace. In turn, you’ll be able to attract more clients willing to pay top dollar for your products and services.
Enrollment is only $49.99 and you’ll receive instant access to 3 hours of on-demand video, 5 articles and 5 downloadable resources.
9. Digital Branding and Engagement by Curtin University
- Who it’s for: Advanced students
- Price: Free
Do you have an online personal brand but the engagement is not where you want it to be? Digital Branding and Engagement can help you get to the root of the problem and learn to communicate more effectively with your audience.
This advanced course is comprised of 4 modules on advanced digital branding topics. Facilitator Sonia Dickinson, associate professor in the school of marketing at Curtin University, covers marketer control, consumer control, content marketing, owned media assets and earned media.
The class is free and you have the option to purchase a verified certificate for $99 to showcase your newly-acquired expertise. Make sure you have access to a Google account and YouTube before you register for the class.
Choose the Right Personal Branding Course for You
Personal branding courses are ideal if you want to effectively communicate your brand to others, both online and offline. Personal branding courses are also a way to enhance your marketability as an entrepreneur or career professional in the workplace.
Consider one of our top picks, and you may unlock the secret to earning more money in your business or advance your career in record time.
Frequently Asked Questions
What are personal branding courses?
These courses help you to learn ways of promoting yourself successfully.
What factors do you look for in an excellent personal branding course?
You should consider the material, pace and costs.
Southern New Hampshire University Online
SNHU Online Offers:
- Flexible schedules
- Affordable tuition
- Online tutoring
- Access to electronic research materials
- Specialized academic advising
- Supportive online community