ACS Young Professionals – Personal Branding Talk

Be a Beacon – speech for ACS Young Professionals (mp3)

Had a great time meeting with everybody at the American Cancer Society’s Young Professionals – Professional Advancement Series last Thursday. I made a ninja recording with my Livescribe Pulse pen so please forgive the audio quality. The whole thing is about an hour long. Big thanks to Rachael Kaplan for bringing me in and to all the good folks who made me feel so welcome.

Getting down to fundamentals – making Brand Therapy more accessible

In the last couple of years I’ve found myself steering more of my time, attention and business towards something I’m very passionate about: that is helping people to get a handle on the things that they have to offer that are truly different, special and valuable, and then helping them to connect with a community, a market, an audience that values the very difference they bring. Then we work on how to tell the story so that those who value what you have to offer don’t miss you or overlook you because you haven’t made that story prominent or clear enough. I want everybody to have the opportunity to do more of the work that they are excited about – the work that stirs up their energy, that taps their skills and brings out their best. That also means I’d like to liberate them from having too much of their time filled with the work that they are just adequate at – the stuff you say yes to because you need to pay your bills or because you’re too polite to say no, but it’s not the stuff that gets you jazzed, the stuff that taps into your particular flavor of awesome.

I think that words can help people steer their vehicle away from the merely adequate (or worse yet, the suppressed and oppressed) and get on a course toward the awesome. But the words don’t just drop out of the air. It takes introspection, it takes reflection, it takes a search for patterns, habits, values and often a process of giving yourself permission to change. In my personal branding practice I help people through all of that, and then I capture the words that become the identifier, the entry point to make brand connections. It’s an intensive process, in fact that’s where the term brand therapy came from – I didn’t make that one up, it was one of my clients who said it first, but I loved it – it stuck. And you know what? I LOVE MY JOB! But I can’t work with everybody. There isn’t enough time, and I realize that unlike a big corporation, individuals be they business people, freelancers, artists, entertainers, coaches, consultants, or folks in career transition, aren’t all going to be in a position to enlist the one-on-one attention of their own personal brand therapist.

I’ve decided that this year I want to develop some offerings that are more accessible – entry points, if you will, that will allow more people than I could reach one-on-one to explore the concepts behind branding and learn how they can apply them to their own goals, businesses, and talents. I’ve got a few things in production that I will be releasing over the course of the year, but the first offering is a teleseminar: Personal Branding Fundamentals: Be a Beacon. In this three session class I will explore the fundamentals of personal branding, go over why and how the Internet has changed your opportunities and some of the risks of sitting on the fence, and then we will dive into the Beacon Principles to give you a foundation for effectively restating your personal brand. If you’ve been struggling with how to tell your story, if you know you’ve got something great to offer the world, but aren’t getting recognized for the value you could bring, then I hope you will consider beginning the process of exploring your foundation and clarifying your message. You can’t just aspire to reach your dreams. You’re going to have to perspire too.

And remember, when you shine you make it easier for all those around you to shine too.

Smartie-Pants

Well I suppose this is either apropos or ironic coming on the heels of my screed about divas, but I am just tickled and flattered that the fabulous Laurie Foley asked me to be her guest – her first guest, mind you – for her new podcast series called Conversations with Smart People. Perhaps that means I’m the mold that ought to be broken, but I’m going to take it as a huge compliment. One thing I know for sure is that conversations with Laurie are always fun, engaging and thought provoking. So who’s the smartie-pants now?

Keep shining!

We’re all divas now

No, not the cranky, whiney, spoiled, unreasonable cliché kind of diva, but more the self-empowered, in touch with your talents, no false modesty, make sure they don’t miss what you’re great at, lift everybody by sharing your talents kind of diva. Calling yourself a diva is a bold way of declaring your permission to be active in your personal branding. That kind of diva isn’t throwing tantrums, she’s too busy bringing her best to the audience that loves her for it. That diva knows her context and knows how to differentiate within it.

So why the talk of divas all of a sudden? Where did the bunnies go? Well I won’t kid you, Diva Toolbox picked up my article: Don’t build a personal brand on what you’re merely good at… and that put divas on the brain, and I take my metaphors where I find them.

Don’t be shy about your talents. If you can hit the C above high C then you owe it to the world to show us. That’s as true of your superpower as it is of anyone else’s.

I4U Newsletter Ends – Sign of Things to Come or a Last Gasp?

Like many of you out there, I have a bit of technolust. I like gadgets. I own a modest collection of tech gear, and I have a drawer full of retired power cords and adapters, but more to the point, I like to be in the know about the new stuff. The gizmos and thingamajigs that push the envelope or hint at cool features that might just become mainstream. Of course most don’t, but that is part of what makes it interesting. So for these reasons one of the few newsletter that I used to look forward to appearing in my email inbox was the eye-jolting green missive put together by Luigi Lugmayr & company over at I4U. It was a newsletter that did a great job of sticking to their mission – they brought you the new stuff. It felt more informative than sales-y. Like I might actually have the jump on other nerdy friends when it came to discussion of cool new laptops or innovative portable electronics. Well imagine my surprise when instead of their usual array of thumbnails of interesting gadgets I received this note:

Hello I4U News Readers,

This is our last weekly I4U Newsletter. We feel that email newsletters have had there time and are not the preferred way anymore to receive our news.
Thank you for being a subscriber and I hope you will continue to read I4U News for you daily technology news and shopping tips.

Please consider to follow us on Twitter and subscribing to our RSS feed.

I mean what’s going on here? The company is continuing on, but the newsletter is going away? Is this a sign of new marketing truths from a progressive company that has always had it’s eye on the future? Or is this a last gasp of a failed campaign? Perhaps they got the reach, but couldn’t convert the readers, or maybe the readers simply stopped opening it because we’re all so flooded these days with a zillion more newsletters than ever before.

So why do I care, and why should you? It’s not because I thought that this newsletter was cool – that’s too subjective. It’s the mystery that gets me. It doesn’t cost much to put out an e-newsletter, especially if you’re already aggregating the content for other purposes, which is exactly what I4U does. So it’s cheap to produce, and VERY measurable. That’s something we like in the marketing department. That’s why there is such a glut of newsletters heading your way everyday. We get to measure what happens: we know what gets opened, we know if you click, and if we’ve planned our landing pages right we know if that click led to a conversion. These things make a marketer get up early in the morning with a big smile, because what you measure you can tune.

But I4U is throwing in the towel on its newsletter contender. How low does the threshold of response have to dip to make the superior measurement ability not worth the effort? Have they found equal or better measurement through Twitter and RSS? I want to know and unless you’ve got unlimited time and resources for your marketing department, you should want to know too.

Plugins for the brain – WordCamp Atlanta 2010

Well I had a fun time last night at the kick-off of Atlanta WordCamp held over at SCAD’s Atlanta campus. Saw a lot of great folks from the Atlanta web/social media scene and a bunch of Twitter friends. It was great to see Amani Channel of Visual Eye Media running a session. However, my favorite session from last night was Topher Kohan’s talk on SEO tips for WordPress. He’s a big advocate for many of the plugins offered by Yoast so I’ll have to check some of those out. He also stirred up a smidgen of controversy over the merits of the Thesis theme/framework.

Today there are a lot of appetizing sessions on the menu. I’m torn between attending Rusty Tanton’s analytics integration discussion or Ryan Imel’s talk on parent/child theming. In the afternoon I think I’ll stick mostly to the developer track until the last slot where it is going to be another coin toss between Dave Coustan’s content strategy discussion and Tessa Horehled’s "Making your blog your business: Scale & Monetization"

There’s a lot of other great stuff so it was tough to choose. If you’re there today, I hope you’ll please find me and say hello.

I believe in you.

OK you know Julie and I have pet rabbits, right? Well when you share your home with rabbits “cute” is never in short supply. Breakfast is especially cute. I come down the stairs in the morning and they get excited – they dart around in their little pen (cute), they nudge each other excitedly (cuter), they stand on their hind legs and sniff (cutest), and sometimes one of them might even do a binky – a special little twisty twitchy hop that bunnies do (cuteness extremis). The point is they know what’s coming.

In the world of personal branding this is one target market that I have truly conquered. To the rabbits of the Cohen household my unique value proposition is clear: I am the bringer of parsley. There is no doubt in their tiny little rabbit minds. My consistent behavior in the marketplace has cemented my brand reputation. When it comes to the question of providing a leafy breakfast, every twitch, every binky says “I believe in you”.

So your product isn’t parsley and your market segment isn’t rabbits in the all-important 1-5 year old demographic. Maybe you’re looking for a job, or you offer consulting services, or you just opened a boutique… you know you’ve got something special to offer – are you hearing “I believe in you”? More importantly are you getting an “I believe in you” reaction? The bunnies never use the words, but their actions make it clear. And for that matter, it’s not what I say, but it’s the consistency of what I do that has won them over. (they may have big ears, but they don’t always listen)

Are your behaviors reinforcing your message or confusing it? Are your actions aligned with the brand image you are seeking?

The whole point of embarking on the personal branding journey is to focus what you offer that is unique and genuine, and then lower the barriers of understanding between you and the market segment that will find what you offer to be interesting, necessary and valuable. The first step is to believe in your own differentiation. The goal is an enduring and oft-repeated “I believe in you”.

Last Post 2009: The Beacon Principles

Well I thought I would slide one last post under the door before saying goodbye to 2009.  It’s been a hectic year, but in some ways a great one for solidifying thoughts, testing theories, falling flat on my face, dusting off and most importantly meeting some amazing people.  People, in my view, are beacons.  They may not always be switched on, but when they are they can do amazing things.  They guide, they warn, they show the way.  Sometimes they’re in lonely places, but that’s part of the price when your job is to shine.

Look at another beacon, a lighthouse: It stands out from the shoreline, jutting up from the rocks, clearly different from the surrounding landscape. It’s context gives it meaning – put the same building in a city skyline and it becomes lost and unable to function. Move it to the middle of a field and it loses purpose.  And what is that brilliant beam that emanates from the beacon? It is focused energy – energy with purpose, a purpose clearly understood by all, but for some an absolute necessity.

Understand the beacon principles and you understand the essential questions you need to ask yourself to build your brand:

1) How are you different? Difference is the soul of branding.  Where you’re different your competitor can’t touch you. Different is what makes you memorable and can even make you indispensable!

2) What’s your context? Context is what gives meaning to your difference. Context is understanding that your difference might be irrelevant to some, but essential to others. Identify the core market, the defining context that makes you essential!

3) What’s your focus? Focus has two faces: where you put your energy and where you put your audience’s attention. Emphasize your strengths and be conscious of the expectations you set – they are the criteria by which your brand will be judged.  Do what you’re good at and get help with the rest. Start a fire by hyper-focusing your energy – once you have ignition you can spread the flame, but you’ll never catch fire if you don’t begin with focus.

As you tuck 2009 to bed and begin to the live the excitement and promise of a new year, I hope you will ask yourself the beacon questions: How am I different? What’s my context? What’s my focus? I hope you will be a guide.

I know you will shine.

Happy 2010 everybody!

Social Media Marketing and Lemonade Stands

I get called Big D sometimes and I like to flatter myself that it is because I like to think big, however, I can’t pretend that my 270 pound, “more of me to love” frame might not have a little to do with that nickname.  So big guy, what’s your point? Well as an XXL type I’ve learned to distrust the one-size-fits-all approach in clothing and frankly, just about everything else.

I think there is one-size-fits-all epidemic in social media marketing.  There are too many experts and enthusiasts pitching solutions without regard to your business needs. I’ve got nothing against e-books, teleseminars, and online courses, but I get nervous when someone is advising that you do what they do and then point to things like numbers of Twitter followers or extensive lists of “friends” as proof of their effectiveness.  Truth is they might very well be effective at what THEY do, but unless you do what they do it may be a moot point.  Worse it can sometimes be harmful to approach your market with tactics that are out of alignment with you brand, products and services.

The point is different businesses work different ways, and the marketing that makes a success of one might make a flop of another.  Here in Atlanta it can get hot – it’s in the 60s in December today, and in July… forget about it! When it’s hot a big guy like me likes to have a little lemonade to cool off. Atlanta is a great town for a lemonade stand. Pick a busy corner, put up your stand, set your price and keep your inventory in step with demand.  The marketing approach is simple, easy to break down into component steps and therefore a very reproducible model.  You could extend it to fruit punch or sweet iced tea, however it is a lousy platform for selling enterprise software.  It’s hard to pitch 3 months of integration while sweating in the open air.  It flops for selling shoes – not enough shelves, too hard to relocate with changes in traffic patterns.  You get the idea.

If you’re enticed to jump in on the program of a social media marketer ask yourself if the one-size-fits-all formula they are promoting applies well to the services you provide. Are you in a similar price range? Are you prepared to apply all of their tactics? Are your purchase decisions made on an equivalent timetable? Are the ongoing relationships with your customers and prospects the same type of relationships that they are cultivating? Are their multi-level approvals/buy-in required to get the win?  Or can you just mix up a cold batch of product and sell it by the glass?

If the answers to these questions don’t line up well with the formula being offered, then you may be buying into magic beans – strained trust, wasted time and brand damage, not a recipe for effective marketing.

FYI for ASW3 grads

Thanks to Alan Urech for this info – thought all of my fellow Atlanta Startup Weekend alumni might find this interesting:

The MIT Enterprise Forum of Atlanta is now accepting applications from start-up companies who would like to participate in their January 13, 2010 Run It By The Pros workshop.

During this MIT Enterprise Forum event four companies will be given the opportunity to present their “ten minute pitch” to a volunteer pro panel made up of representatives from the Atlanta start up community, including an investor, serial entrepreneur and lawyer.  After the presentation and panel feedback, the audience will be given the opportunity to ask questions about the pitch and company.

There is no cost for the selected presenters to participate in this event.  The workshop will be held from 3:30 p.m. – 7:00 p.m. on Wednesday, January 13, 2010 at the law offices of Sutherland, located at 999 Peachtree Street, Atlanta, Georgia, 30309.  The judging criteria and an application are attached.

The deadline to submit your application and Executive Summary for consideration is Friday, December 4, 2009 at 12 noon.  Both documents are required to complete your application and should be sent to virginia@mitforum-atlanta.org. [not me    I put a copy of the application form and guidelines here: http://drop.io/davidscohen ]

Please forward this announcement to anyone who you feel has an interest in application.  I’ve attended a few of these and if you get accepted be ready to be put under the microscope, but it can really sharpen up your investor presentation.