I did it! I waited until Day 20 to bring up Twitter. Many of you know that I LOVE to tweet so it’s taken a lot for me to wait this long before bringing up Twitter and all of it’s wonderful benefits to your personal brand. I meet people all the time who cringe at the mere mention of 140 characters because they’ve been burned by the "Eating big pancakes at IHOP with my grandma" tweets. But today, I want to encourage you to give it just one more chance. Today, I make my case for why you should bother with Twitter.
Posts Tagged ‘30 Days of Branding’
30 Days of Branding – Day Nineteen: Don’t Forget Tradition
Tuesday, March 2nd, 2010There is great value to the connections that Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and other social networks can add to your branding strategy, but there are several traditional things you need to keep in mind as well. A good resume is just as important to the branding process as a good URL on your blog. Today, I want to spend some time running through a few branding tips that people seem to forget these days in the virtual world.
Nothings Better Than a Real Handshake
This is a topic that I keep bringing up because of it’s importance to me. Social media has opened up the world in a great way. You can connect with people around the world at all times of the day and share resources, tips etc. However, there’s nothing that replaces the face-to-face connection. As you meet people virtually, try to invite them to meet in person as well. If location is an issue, try to have a phone call or video chat. These conversations take more time, but they make the relationship stronger. It also helps for people to get to know your personality and the way you hold a conversation.
30 Days of Branding – Day Eighteen: When Blogging Isn’t For You
Monday, March 1st, 2010
Alright, so we’ve spent two days talking about blogging and I know that some of you have been cursing me for it. I can feel the rage radiating through the page from all you blog-haters. Well, don’t you worry – I’m a blogger who can admit that blogging isn’t for everyone or for every stage in your life. Some people just aren’t great writers and, for others, it’s not feasible to think that it would fit in their schedules right now. However, there are many ways that you can still promote your brand using blogs as a platform without all the responsibility and time commitment of a blog on your website. Today, I’d like to share my tip for those of you who feel like blogging just isn’t for you.
30 Days of Branding – Day Seventeen: How To Fit Blogging Into Your Life
Sunday, February 28th, 2010
They say that time is money so I’m sure you’re wondering why I’m suggesting you do such a time-consuming thing as blog. Well, I suppose you can simply look at the amount of time it takes you to blog and the amount of money it brings in ($0 for you beginners) and determine that it’s not worth it. But I encourage you to think about the investment in your brand and the long term possibilities of a good blog. Yes, blogging can be quite time consuming, but it can be well worth the time. Today I want to give you some tips to help you create an informative, engaging and brand-conveying blog that fits into your busy schedule. Your work-life balance needs to be exactly that – a balance - so it’s important to do what you can to keep your branding a part of your life instead of ALL of your life.
30 Days of Branding – Day Sixteen: Why You Should Blog
Saturday, February 27th, 2010
We all know that blogging can be quite time consuming and I’m often asked why I blog when there are so many other things going on in my life. While I agree that I could use the time for other things, I maintain that blogging is a great use of my time and I’m happy to share with you the reasons why.
Share The Wealth (of Knowledge)
You know a ton of information that other people don’t know. Or, at the very least, you know it from a different perspective than anyone else. People can easily overlook their ability to blog because they think they aren’t a "subject matter expert", but that really doesn’t matter. Yes, your information should be accurate, but it’s also a good place to work out your thoughts and hear feedback from others. You do have a unique perspective and if you think about it — it’s probably good blog material. Share the wealth of knowledge you have with anyone willing to listen.
30 Days of Branding – Day Fourteen: Link It Up!
Thursday, February 25th, 2010
Once you’ve spent hours looking at iconic webpages and crafting your own site to accurately reflect your brand, services and style, you want to make sure that it gets recognition. Google and other search engines use little bots to crawl around the world wide web looking for keywords and interesting content. They archive all their knowledge and when you enter your search terms, that’s what comes up! Again I stress that I’m no search engine optimizing wizard, but I will share with you my basic knowledge that most sites are recognized based on their url, keywords and links into and out of their page. Here are my tips on promoting your site once it’s ready to be seen.
30 Days of Branding – Day Thirteen: The Simplicity of Good Design
Wednesday, February 24th, 2010
While I’m not a web designer, there are a few principles of design that definitely play into how you convey and market your brand. Each website looks very different, but all the good ones share a few common charateristics. The great thing about web design is that there are so many examples for you to pull ideas from and try. I encourage you to spend a good amount of time looking at other websites before you try to decide how you want yours to look. Try to look at industry pages, associations, and even websites in a completely different field. When I decided I wanted to create a website, I browsed hundreds of websites and made a list of things I wanted to include. While I didn’t end up going with all of them for my site, it definitely helped me to focus and think about components before design. In any case, here are my tips for a well-designed website that will spread your brand like wildfire!
30 Days of Branding – Day Twelve: Claiming Your Space in the World Wide Web
Tuesday, February 23rd, 2010
Today, I’d like to talk about the three rules of a good URL. If you’re spending months planning out every detail of your website, you had better hope that your site can be found. Believe it or not, it’s harder than you might think to choose a URL that will work for your site. For some people, choosing a URL can be quite expensive as well so it’s always good to consider alternatives. Below are my suggestions for the three keys to an easily marketable URL. I won’t claim to be a SEO (Search Engine Optimization) expert so these are basic principles that will help people find your site easily and help ensure you come up in the right Google searches. Please feel free to add your thoughts in the comments as I know you all have many more thoughts on this.
30 Days of Branding – Day Eleven: The Basics of Websites
Monday, February 22nd, 2010
As many of you know, I officially launched my website a little over a month ago. What you may not know is that it was in the works long before it was live for all to see. I took a LOT of time (maybe too much) thinking about each detail and design before moving ahead and I’m still critically thinking about it now that it’s launched. In fact, I’ve made several changes since it became live and have a few more in the works. Creating the website (with the help of a WONDERFUL designer) was a ton of work, but it’s my most important space – my home base.
In the next few days, I want to focus on the layout, design & marketing of your website so that you can convey your brand and drum up business for yourself. Today, in particular, I want to focus on the main components of your website and why I believe they are what you need to focus on.
