I was just featured by BBC in an article “Standing out when your name is John Smith” addressing the challenge of building a personal brand online if you have a common name. A starting point in this regard is claiming a proper domain name where you can build a platform for your personal brand.
Social media can be a powerful tool by which you can invite your community to engage with you and your brand. It should be noted, though, that there are no guarantees in terms of where communications may be headed. In some cases, it can turn out to be a complete PR disaster such as with the Twitter chat with hashtag #AskJameis on Twitter with Jameis Winston, Florida State University’s quarterback with a controversial past which resulted in numerous critical tweets, many with a rather morbid “humorous” twist.
As I have not personally followed the past of Mr. Winston, I am not going to comment upon the specifics of his past and whether he deserves this criticism or not. Instead, I will focus on what organizations can do to avoid facing a backlash from their social media initiatives such as on Twitter like Florida State did. These kinds of reactions, also known as “Twitterjacking,” can happen to not only sports franchises but also to big global brands such as McDonald’s which experienced a major backlash in 2012 to to their invitation to state their own #McDStories on Twitter.
Erica Derrickson quit her desk job only a year and a half ago, and already has a thriving photography business because of her implementation of social media marketing strategies. She speaks at local universities on social media, has been recently featured in Trade Secrets, and manages a Facebook group Hollywood East Actors Group which has over 8,000 members. Check out her acting reel, her film credits range from the National blockbuster The Heat (2013) which starred Sandra Bullock and Melissa McCarthy to independent films like Melt (2012) and Rafi Baby (2011).
One day, Erica Derrickson tweeted her enthusiasm over Gary Vaynerchuk’s latest best seller “Jab, Jab, Jab, Right Hook” suggesting it would be the perfect textbook if there were such a thing like a class on social media.
Always energizing to meet dynamo Gary Vaynerchuk as he always brings it all to the table as he shares his insights on social media marketing, personal branding, and on entrepreneurship either by speaking or with his book. The latest and, according to him, the final installment in his trilogy is named “Jab, jab, jab, right hook” using boxing analogies to illustrate the importance of two kinds of social media postings. Jabs are those updates intended to help, connect, and flirt with customers “in a romancing way” as he calls it, while a “right hook” is when you are going for the close or the knockout punch with an unashamed plug for whatever it is that you would like people to buy whether it is a product, service, event, idea, etc. His first book “Crush it!” was predominantly focused on going for the close in a rather aggressive manner while his second “The Thank You Economy” was all about jabs and building and sustaining long-term relationships.
In an interview with BBC Capital, I was asked about the value for professionals of developing a website where they can manage their personal brands to support their career objectives. To me, it is surprising that this is still even an issue almost twenty years after we started exploring the World Wide Web. However, as I often encounter confusion regarding both what owning your own domain implies and its value, I find it necessary to further (also wrote a related post on “Good Domain Parenting” earlier) articulate why I believe this is important and outline the first action steps. [Read more…]
Glad I made it to Cal Tech where the Skeptics Society led by Michael Shermer hosted Adam Grant for a talk on his book “Give and Take.” In his presentation, Adam offered persuasive examples of how people who are indiscriminately helpful to basically anyone who asks can get ahead by accumulating a wider network over time and that what goes around comes around.
He claims that Mark Granovetter‘s theory of the strength of weak ties still holds true in that our strong ties often do not add significant news as they are exposed to the same sources and networks as we are ourselves whereas a weak tie moves in circles yet unfamiliar with us where new opportunities can emerge. [Read more…]
I very much enjoy having my former students visit my classes and today was definitely no exception as my Internet/Social Media Marketing class was visited by Melanie and Devin Duncan. Melanie Duncan graduated in 2008 and met her future husband Devin Duncan while he was also studying at Chapman University. As true serial entrepreneurs, they have worked on, and successfully launched, a number of businesses together including CustomGreekThreads.com, LuxuryMonograms.com, Entrepreneuress Academy, PowerofPinning.com, as well as a business around the personal brand of MelanieDuncan.com. [Read more…]
When setting out to build or refine your own personal reputation and personal brand, your online presence can simply no longer be ignored. “Nobody is going to look or find that information on me online.” No? Are you kidding me? If you today would be about to hire somebody yourself, wouldn’t you Google that individual’s name at least once? And then dig deeper if something catches your attention? I bet you would.
Still, your online first impression, however important that may be, is only the first gate you need to pass to go places. What is critical next is to have an entrepreneurial mindset about yourself and your whole career. In the book, The Start-up of You, LinkedIn founder Reid Hoffman and Ben Casnocha argues for a radical move away from the notion that you will be a lifer at a major corporation being promoted every few years. Instead, we are entering a more foreign and uncertain territory in which we have to adapt and reinvent ourselves and our personal brands continuously to stay with the times and to take advantage of the best opportunities for our skills. [Read more…]
When speaking about social media, I often draw laughter when I say that I find it incredible that there are still parents out there who name their babies without first checking if the matching domain name is available. What they don’t know is that I am only half-joking when I make that statement. Perhaps “incredible” is an exaggeration but I do maintain that you could do your child a great favor if you think ahead in this regard. I registered our two kids’ domains when they were about 5-6 years old and was lucky myself to find them still being available. Yes, it is possible that .com as a top level domain will be more or less irrelevant when the time comes for them to “brand” themselves online as technology changes. Still, the expense of about $10 a year pales in comparison to all other investments parents make in their kids future and the rewards could be significant.
Case in point. In today’s class when I said the above, one of my students came up and said that that was exactly what his dad did when he was born! His name “Zachary Campbell” is a common one as well but thanks to his dad’s foresightedness, he now outranks others with the same name, even some semicelebrities. Check out his site, hire him!