Is Your Personal Brand Stepping Out of it’s Comfort Zone?

January 31, 2012 By Leave a Comment

While waiting for his owner to return from some local shopping, Bernard here knows where his boundaries are and he is not going to stray at all, he has become too comfortable in his surroundings. Of course perhaps he knows (or has experienced) that if he were to jump out of the back of the truck he might be placing himself in danger.

Unfortunately, at work, this is something we are all a little guilty of. Perhaps on occasion, it’s not going to be life threatening, we need to take a risk or two and leap out of our comfort zone – or maybe just a gentle step will do.

Three simple things to consider as a way to step out of your personal brand comfort zone at work;

1. Bring a little more of your personality to work. Choose something from home that you are passionate about or that means a lot to you and add it to your desk, cubicle or office space. Perhaps a favourite picture, photo or desk ornament.

2. Consider adding a piece of jewellery or favourite coloured accessory and making it a regular part of your wardrobe. It does not all have to be navy and black.

3. Identify a skill or strength that you are well known for, that you have a reputation for delivering on consistently and mention it in your outgoing voicemail message. If you pride yourself on returning calls promptly, say so in your voicemail. BUT if you are not good at getting back to people do not date your voicemail either!

What can you be doing with your personal brand to step out of your comfort zone?

Paul Copcutt first aligned with personal branding after reading Tom Peters ‘Brand You 50’ in 1997. Now a sought after speaker and media resource he has been featured by Forbes, Reuters, the Wall Street Journal and Elle. He helps employees in leading Fortune 500 corporations realise they can be more successful and productive at work by NOT checking their personalities at the door.

Filed Under: Employee Brand Activation, Expressing Your Brand, Personal Branding for Careers, Personal Branding Quick Tips Tagged With: , , ,

Is Your Brand LinkedIn?

January 29, 2012 By 3 Comments

LinkedIn operates the world’s largest professional network on the Internet with a current membership of over 135 million.  Close to 60% of these members are located outside the US. The latest data shows that professionals are signing up to join at a rate that is faster than two members per second! Clearly LinkedIn has become an essential tool for professionals all over the world to network, share business expertise, find jobs, advance professional knowledge, and build personal brands.

5 Quick Tips to Brand Yourself on LinkedIn

Here are 5 tips to effectively use LinkedIn to build and promote your brand.

1) Have a headline that sells an experience

When people visit your profile the first thing they will see is your name and headline at the top of your “profile box”.  This is the most visible part of your page and you want people to continue exploring your profile.  People often fall into the trap of identifying themselves in their headline by a job title (“Accountant”) or label (“Business Major”). While this is a valid representation of what we do, it actually groups us into the same category as everyone else doing the same type of job or studying the same subject matter.

You have 120 characters to describe who you are.  This is the first place to stand out. Consider your target audience and sell an experience not a title or label.  Instead of saying you are a “psychiatrist” tell others you are “The Shrink for Entrepreneurs who want freedom, wealth, and sanity.”

2) Get a Professional Headshot

Absolutely do not leave out a photo and make sure that the photo you use is professionally done. Take the time to invest in high quality headshots as you will use them everywhere. Remember, LinkedIn is a professional business network. Your credibility is at stake so avoid photos of you at college parties or with groups of people where it is not clear which person is you!

3) Edit your LinkedIn URL to include your name

For example, www.linkedin.com/in/yourname

Do not overlook this critical branding point.  Beyond the power of simply having a profile on LinkedIn is the fact it is highly optimized on Google.  Once you adjust the URL to include your full name, your profile will always show up at the top or near the top of the first page of your Google results.   This presence on the first page of search results will reinforce your online brand identity so that opportunities do not pass you by.

4) Write your ‘Summary’ in the first person and tell a story

By using ”I am….” or “My name is…” you are speaking directly to those looking for you on LinkedIn.  While the summary is not immediately visible unless someone views your full profile, it is probably the most important area on your profile.  Treat this summary box as if it were your ‘elevator pitch’.  Convince the readers of your LinkedIn profile that you have something unique to offer. Differentiate yourself from everyone else who seemingly offers the same service or who have similar skills, experience, and background.  Michael Margolis, founder of Get Storied, tells us that “character trumps credentials”. There is plenty of space to show your credentials in the ‘Experience’ section of your profile.  Use the Summary section to tell your story and show your character!

Also, your name is a key word and by using it in your summary you are improving the appearance of your name and profile when other search for you online.

5) Ask for recommendations (and recommend others!)

Build your credibility and validation for your brand and experience by having people who know you well write recommendations on LinkedIn. Once you start adding people to your network, LinkedIn makes it easy for them to write you a recommendation.  You also have the power to review the recommendation someone writes and decide whether to add it or ask for edits or a different spin on what they wrote.  Even as a student you can request recommendations from professors, classmates, internships or virtually anyone with whom you have shared an academic experience.  Make sure to return the favor and write a recommendation for those who have taken the time to write one for you.

 Do you have any quick tips to brand yourself on LinkedIn?  Please share below.
Peter Sterlacci, Founder of BeYB – Believe. Become. Be Your Brand, combines personal branding strategy with cycling imagery to empower on-the-move careerists in global companies in Japan to shift gears, get out of the saddle, and sprint to career success.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Filed Under: Expressing Your Brand, Personal Branding for Careers, Personal Branding Quick Tips Tagged With: , , ,

Is your career facing a Kodak moment?

January 20, 2012 By 1 Comment

No doubt the business school case studies in years to come about the sad demise of Kodak and it’s brand will raise many questions about the effectiveness of it’s leaders. The filing of Chapter 11 bankruptcy by Kodak this week has many lessons for all businesses, but what can you learn from this and be sure that you are not facing the same in your career?

1. Don’t underestimate the impact your ideas have.
It was the mid-70′s when Kodak actually developed for the first digital camera. Can you imagine how far ahead they may have been in the market place and for how long had they moved on this revolutionary idea.

Personal Brand Lesson - just because your industry or vocation has done it the same way for a long time and everyone is comfortable with that way does not mean an idea out of left field is not a better one. Be willing to challenge the status quo.

2. Don’t be complacent or greedy.
Kodak leaders decided to shelve the digital camera because they felt it was going to do too much damage to their highly lucrative and profitable film business.

Personal Brand Lesson – it makes sense to maximise your value with the core strengths you have. But know that you need to continually develop yourself and add new skills. Demands and markets change, so your brand has to evolve over time. Anticipate demands and start adding to your skill set now.

3. Be Prepared to Re-brand
The plan for Kodak is to sell it’s $2 billion worth of patents and emerge as a more agile company in the printer business. They see revenue and profit in ink (HP generates $9 billion a year in ink cartridges). But does the tagline of the “Kodak Moment” still apply? Likely not, as they become less and less synonymous with photos a re-brand of the company would almost seem inevitable.

Personal Brand Lesson - the experts tell us that the workforce of the future might well be in many different vocation, not just jobs, in their lifetime. The foundation and core of your brand might remain the same, but sometimes the message and your target audience will change and a re-branding is necessary.

How do you see business the lessons from the likes of RIM and Kodak apply to your career and personal brand?

Paul Copcutt first aligned with personal branding after reading Tom Peters ‘Brand You 50’ in 1997. Now a sought after speaker and media resource he has been featured by Forbes, Reuters, the Wall Street Journal and Elle. He helps employees in leading Fortune 500 corporations realise they can be more successful and productive at work by NOT checking their personalities at the door.

Filed Under: Current Affairs, Everything is a Brand, Personal Branding for Careers, Personal Branding Quick Tips, Recession-Proof Your Career Tagged With: , , , ,

Top 5 Social Media Platforms for Career Management

May 16, 2011 By 1 Comment

How Social Media has Changed the Job Search

I created this video (click hyperlink “How Social Media has Changed the Job Search” to view) originally to demonstrate some pretty fascinating statistics about the power of social media in a job search. However, this information is equally relevant to career management. One of the strategies for establishing your personal brand online includes building profiles on professional platforms. Naturally, if you are working within a company, you will want to adhere to the company’s social media policies.

Top 5 Social Media Platforms for Career Management

How is building and participating on social media platforms helpful in career management? Networking and showing your expertise/thought leadership! Laurie Smith stated in her article, “Using Social Media as a Career Management Tool,” there are five main tools that are especially effective for business owners, executives, and professionals looking to manage their career. They include:

  1. Facebook
  2. YouTube
  3. LinkedIn
  4. Blogging
  5. Twitter

Key Ingredient BEFORE Building an Online Presence

Remember, unlocking and leveraging your personal brand is the critical step prior to building online results. Why? Simply, you want to establish your expertise in the area(s) that best match your long-range goals.

Interestingly, Kelly Global Workforce Index™ reported on Nov. 11, 2010 that Americans say personal “branding” is key to employment opportunities. The traits individuals identified as most important in this article include:

* Verbal Communication Skills
* Technical Knowledge
* Resumes
* Written Communications
* Personal Attire
* Use of Social Media

During the next several articles, I will take you through steps to establish yourself and build your presence on these five platforms, giving you resources along the way. We’ll start with LinkedIn and look at building a stellar profile, importance of keywords (and a little known tip for a keyword-rich profile), must-have apps for your profile, building your network, and many more.

This article first appeared on Classroom to Cubicle and is cross-posted at Career Design Coach.

Kristen Jacoway is the founder of Career Design Coach, providing professional speaking, training, and one-on-one consultation focused on next-generation career marketing services. She wrote the book, “I’m in a Job Search-Now What???” and the book has frequently ranked in the Top 100 in its’ category on Amazon.

Filed Under: Personal Branding for Careers Tagged With: , , , , , , , ,

You’ve Landed a Job. Now What???

March 30, 2011 By Leave a Comment

Most people feel that when they’ve secured a job, they can take a break from career marketing. After all, you’ve spent much time and energy on your job search and you have a job. Why continue with career marketing activities?

We are Living in a Different Job Market – The Department of Labor estimates that today’s average worker will have between 10-14 jobs before the age of 38! The typical college student is 22 years old when they graduate. If this statistic holds true for you, then on average, you’d be changing jobs every 1.5 years. If you stay in practice of continual career management activities, then you’ll be ready for this change.

The World of Work has Changed - William Arruda, founder and president of Reach Communications, has often said in speeches that the world of work has changed forever. Most companies no longer have the expectation that you will stay with a company 25 years, retire, and draw your retirement check. In fact, many companies applaud and welcome innovation rather than conformity.

Your Expertise Today May Become Outdated – Consider this story: Mary is a well-known marketing executive for her company and has accelerated revenues year over year utilizing platforms such as TV, radio, magazines, and newspapers. Mary is not familiar with the new integrated communications marketing platforms, and her marketing campaigns are not garnering the success they did in the past. As Kari Fisch, Scott McLeod, and Jeff Brenaman illustrate in their popular YouTube video, “Did You Know?” TV has ~18 percent ROI for advertisements, and 24 out of 25 of the major newspapers have experienced record declines in subscriptions. What does this mean for Mary? If Mary has not continued her education to stay abreast of the latest marketing trends in mobile, digital, and social media marketing, then she may be replaced by someone who has kept up with the latest advances in the field.

Career Management is Critical to Your Success – If you practice ongoing career management, then you’ll be ready for unexpected or desired shifts. The bonus? By using these strategies, you will position yourself as an expert and may become the hunted rather than the hunter.

Kristen Jacoway is the founder of Career Design Coach, providing professional speaking, training, and one-on-one consultation focused on next-generation career marketing services. She wrote the book, “I’m in a Job Search-Now What???” and the book has frequently ranked in the Top 100 in its’ category on Amazon.

Filed Under: Recession-Proof Your Career Tagged With: , , ,

Succeeding in a “Final Jeopardy!” World

March 23, 2011 By Leave a Comment

Recently, a listing of blog topics, for a Career Collective to which I belong, prompted an association to Jeopardy! Perhaps it was the listing of categories in search of answers, but in a flash, I was thinking, “l’ll take re-tooling for 100, Alex.” And in my rapid free association, the answer “commodities” came to mind, quickly followed by, “What do you call transferable skills?”

As a career coach, I’ve long believed that one’s ability to identify transferable skills was the biggest part of the battle in conveying value to a potential new employer. And perhaps, at one time, it was. No more.

Today, any effort to re-tool, re-focus, or re-organize your job search and career management, means giving up past career models so you can re-align your efforts to meet today’s reality. And today’s reality calls for much more than a bullet list of transferrable skills put at the top of a resume and regurgitated in a cover letter.

Even if they hope against hope that that the old approach will work just one last time, I think many people know this.

You need only look at career advice columns to see big themes like re-invent, re-focus, re-launch, and re-brand – often accompanied by a list of five to ten things you should do now. Sometimes, the advice is good. More often it’s shallow. For the new reality is that job search and career management has grown in complexity. It’s no longer your skills, your credentials, your track-record – or even your brand. Nor is it your ability to package all of that in a clever elevator pitch.

Today, we live in a relationship economy where our worth is validated within the context of a community whose members know what we do, why we do it, and how we make a difference for the people we serve.  And they know this not because they’ve all seen the transferrable skills listed on our resume, but because they know our story, and have experienced it coming to life as we’ve actively engaged them in conversations that matter and lead to meaningful relationships. As a consequence, they’re more predisposed to send opportunities our way because they know, like, and trust us.

Frankly, it seems like we’re now living in a “Final Jeopardy!” world. The answer is relationships. And the question is, “Today, what will drive your success?”

Walter Akana is a Reach Certified Personal Branding and Online Identity Strategist. Founder Threshold Consulting, he works with mid-career professionals and executives. His career advice has been featured online at marketwatch, cnnmoney, and online.wsj. He is a long-time blogger, and avid user of social media.

Filed Under: Expressing Your Brand, Personal Branding for Careers Tagged With: , , , ,

Your Best Job Search Resource? You!

September 26, 2010 By 1 Comment

Rely On You

Normally, when people ask about resources for job seekers, they mean something that will be useful in helping the job seeker successfully secure new employment. It could be a book, a website, an article, an assessment, a contact management tool, or a networking or professional organization. There are lots of possibilities. And all you need to do is launch your web browser to find them. So, this post isn’t about any of those.

When all is said and done, success in a job search is meeting a short-term objective on a longer journey of career success. So, as I see it, the best resource for a job seeker is his or her own good judgment in making choices that lead to successful career management. Individual choices will be different for everyone. However, there is one common theme: developing the self-knowledge to be able to recognize the right kinds of opportunities, and then exercising the discipline to get out there to meet the people who can help connect you to them.

Frankly, the world of work has undergone epic change. Part of the reason more than fifteen million Americans are out of work is not simply due to economic melt down. No, loss of jobs started well before, when companies realized they should focus on core competencies and outsource everything else. This, of course, was aided and abetted by a global leveling of the playing field, so that work could be shipped anywhere on the planet.

So, the game has changed. Dramatically.

On a fundamental level, your ability to find work is all about discerning your brand and then making your career your business.  This doesn’t necessarily mean starting your own company. But it does involve your readiness to stand up and make dramatically new choices that allow you to make a difference.

Consider the case of Binny Thomas, as related by Seth Godin in his book Linchpin: Are You Indispensable? Binny got a new job, without leaving her old one. How? As Godin relates it:

One day, Binny Thomas stood up.

She stood up, spoke up, and started doing a new job. She didn’t leave her organization, didn’t even get a new title or new responsibilities. Instead, she started doing her old job in a new way. Binny stopped going to meetings with the goal of finding deniability or problems to avoid. Instead, she started leaning in and seeking out projects where she could make a difference.

Suddenly, Binny was inspired. She was looking for opportunities instead of hiding from blame.

According to Godin, one of the most fundamental shifts in our new economy is the role of self-determination. Conformity is not the path to success; rather, how “… we respond to the opportunities and challenges of the outside world now determines how much the outside world values us.” And this affects both job search and long-term career management.

Aside from reading Godin’s wonderful book as just one step, I can’t think of a single resource that will help you decide when and how to stand up. Yet, if you are looking to find a new job and to run a successful career thereafter, you need to turn to yourself and figure out when and how you can best take charge of your career, and what resources you’re going to need to make that happen.

Cross-posted at Threshold Consulting

Filed Under: Personal Branding for Careers Tagged With: , , , , ,

Personal Branding Predictions: Top 10 for 2010

December 16, 2009 By 7 Comments

Every year since I founded my company, Reach, in 2001, I've made predictions about how the world of personal branding will evolve in the coming year. Here are my top 10 for 2010.

1. Video, Video, Video

Thanks to greater bandwidth, cheaper storage, and a proliferation of products and services that make shooting, storing, viewing, and sharing video easy (Flip video, iPhone 3GS, YouTube, vimeo, blip.tv, vodpod, etc.), video will be king in 2010.

Video is ideal because it allows careerists to deliver a complete communication and convey their personality—a critical component of branding. More services like videoBIO (a Reach Personal Branding partner) will make it easier to cost-effectively build a powerful and positive brand image using video.

2. Hiring Process

Companies will be hiring brands rather than employees. They will use social networks and Google to source talent, filter candidates, and validate credentials.

"What's your brand?" will become as standard an interview question as "Tell me about yourself." Google is already a main reference check in the job-search process. Hiring managers and executive recruiters expect serious professionals to have a powerful online identity. Google and other social media will be an even greater part of the talent-search process.

As the number of candidates for each open position increases, Google and social media will be used more often to eliminate candidates. Lack of a virtual identity or poor-quality online content will prevent you from getting the job, regardless of your credentials, connections, and experience. In 2010, if you don't show up in Google, you don't exist!

3. Branded Partners

Often more traditional in their approach to marketing and delivering their services, professional-services firms (accounting, law, consulting, etc.) are going to jump on the "brandwagon" with reckless abandon in 2010.

Two years ago, I started working with the partners of one of the Big Four accounting firms, helping them build their brands. In the past year, two of the other three firms contacted me about doing something similar.

That trend is going to increase with big law firms, consulting organizations, and other professional-services firms joining the fold.

It's a no-brainer: For professional-services firms, people are the product. But those firms (often, private partnerships) can be slow to innovate. In 2010, personal branding will be integrated into all levels in a firm—from hiring through becoming partner.

4. For-Credit Courses

Personal branding is a critical part of preparing students for successful careers.

Over the past year, I have worked with the career-services and alumni groups at many universities. Interest in personal branding will grow tremendously in universities, and for-credit courses in personal branding will be available as part of business programs and as electives.

With the jobless recovery and fewer job openings for college students, schools will focus more on helping students succeed beyond academics to find the perfect job. You will see more collaboration between university career-services organizations and academic departments as schools start to understand their role in preparing students to obtain jobs, not just skills.

5. Unified Search

We are already seeing many new services, such as addictomatic.com, that combine search results from many different search engines.

Such tools will become more common while Google, Bing, Yahoo, and other search engines will combine traditional search results with real-time content (from tools such as Twitter) and video results—making searching easier and more accurate.

Those who are building their personal brands will need to use various tools to ensure their visibility is positive and pervasive.

6. Video Search

With the huge growth in video on the Web (see prediction No. 1), we will start to see more sophisticated search capabilities within videos.

Currently, most search tools use titles and meta-tags to evaluate the video content to include in search results. That will change—making video the most powerful tool for brand-building.

Already, powerful image-recognition and search capabilities are being added to Google and incorporated into Bing. Video is next. That trend will affect what we say in the videos we produce. We will manage that content just as we do written content to ensure search-engine optimization (SEO).

7. Increased Efficiency

One of the biggest complaints I hear about social media is "I just don't have time to update my status or post to my blog."

New services are available to make the process of maintaining your brand online quicker, more efficient, and more integrated. Tools such as KnowEm, HelloTxt, and png.fm help you build your personal brand on the Web in less time and with less effort.

Those tools, along with custom personal-branding services, will make it easier to build and maintain a strong Web presence. Expect new tools that are integrated into the communications tools you currently use (such as email) to become available.

8. Personal SEO

Companies have departments to manage their websites and optimize them for Google, Yahoo, and Bing. SEO is a huge business, and it's critical to companies. Some statistics indicate that most Web searchers never go beyond the initial search results page of a Google search.

SEO is just as important to people who are looking to build their brands. Of course, most of us cannot afford to have a full-time SEO expert on staff. That's why companies such as QAlias and PeoplePond have sprung up. Their services are great for career-minded professionals—especially those who have a common name or share their name with a celebrity. More such tools will become available and popular  in 2010.

9. Digital Dirt Elimination

As Google results affect more aspects of our lives (getting a job, a loan, a date, etc.), people will engage firms such as ReputationDefender, Defend My Name, and Online Reputation Manager to eliminate digital dirt.

Such services are becoming more popular and will become as commonplace for job seekers as resume-writing or career-coaching services.

10. Permanent Mindset Shift

The confluence of Web 2.0 technologies and today's economic climate due to the subprime mortgage meltdown has changed the way we think about our careers.

The "jobless recovery" has hastened the new mindset that is taking hold in career-minded professionals. Even Boomers and Gen Xers, who grew up with some job security and a sense of company loyalty, are starting to feel the independence and freedom that is part of the new free-agent employment contract.

I have talked about the importance of managing your own career for a long time. Current economic forces and technological advances will finally solidify the mindset shift that will make that the norm.

As we start to think of ourselves as companies of one, we will be more likely and more comfortable outsourcing activities related to our personal brands—building a management team to help us achieve our professional goals.

William Arruda is a personal-branding consultant and speaker, founder of Reach Personal Branding, and coauthor of Career Distinction: Stand Out By Building Your Brand (www.careerdistinction.com). Follow him on Twitter at www.twitter.com/williamarruda.

Article originally posted at MarketingProfs on December 15, 2009

Filed Under: Discovering Your Brand, Employee Brand Activation, Everything is a Brand, Expressing Your Brand, Exuding Your Brand, Personal Branding for Careers, Personal Branding For Entrepreneurs, Personal Branding Quick Tips Tagged With: , , , , ,