Branding | You Brand, Inc.

Archive for the ‘Branding’ Category

Scott Scanlon

The Celebrity Personal Branding Myth

Why does every personal branding evangelist talk about a major celebrity when they preach on building a personal brand?

To begin with the top tier celebrity does not have a personal brand.

Celebrities have well crafted personal images. The top tier celebrities like Oprah, Donald Trump, Tiger Woods (before the Viagra) didn’t focus on building a personal brand.

Read Further or watch video below…

Scott Scanlon

To Branding Go Where No One Has Gone Before

I have been in development mode for the last few days… I had to take a break this weekend and watch the new Star Trek movie. After watching the movie one thing came to mind.

It was a great movie, what struck me is how the Star Trek brand was able to transition from stale brand to create a more modern and fresh image in which to leverage for many profitable years to come.

So why not do this for yourself?

I suggest you look on your personal image shelf, dust it off a bit and identify what items are stale in your personal brand or company image. Which one of these items are you not highlighting that you can leverage to re-brand and take your message and business to the next level.

Here is a quick video on my thoughts:

[pro-player width='320' height='265' type='FLV']http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2HFJeS1Yuus[/pro-player]

Scott Scanlon

Did You Use That? Sorry I Threw it Away.

If you use Twitter you would have noticed today as the stream and conversations included hashtags such as:
#fixreplies
#twitterfail
among other phrases and conversations appeared throughout the day.

In today’s world with instant response this provides a great lesson on communication of not only your brand, your message, but the key features you, your product, or your service provides.

[pro-player width='425' height='344' type='FLV']http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qIo-I8CJL24[/pro-player]

Scott Scanlon

Is Personal Branding Right For You?

The most critical question to ask yourself before you start building a personal brand… Is Personal Branding Right for Me?

Personal branding is not for everybody. The work and focus required to truly achieve a good personal brand cannot be fully appreciated unless you truly do answer this question.

So before you consider spending time crafting and creating the personal brand that defines you, your product or service, ask yourself this critical question.

How do you know if personal branding is right for you?

To answer this overall question there are other questions that you must answer.

Scott Scanlon

Personal Image Vs Personal Brand

It would be fair to warn you. There will be a reoccurring theme on our blog here the next few weeks. At least once a week I’ll be taking on what I find to be personal branding shenanigans.

My intention in doing this is to break through some of the nonsense I see around personal branding.

Also to help you focus on what truly matters and to help you with tips and advice on exceeding at whatever it is you do. So each post will slightly rail on personal branding but it will always have a very strong point.

So do you have a personal brand or a personal image?

Scott Scanlon

Define the Core of Your Personal Brand [Part 1]

The most important step to creating a personal brand is defining your personal brand.

To do this you must define the core of who you are to create the core of your personal brand.

This is the essence of you. What you are, your values, you personal mission from the inside out.

Scott Scanlon

TGIF: Twitter, Google, Internet, Facebook and How to Be Found

Found a post with tremendous insight about marketing and the pitfalls of what is the rage (social media). TGIF (Twitter, Google, the Internet, and Facebook) cannot overcome crappy products or services.

http://www.brandingstrategyinsider.com/2009/11/social-media-not-the-answer-for-weak-brands.html

How to Be Found

Another great insight comes from Brian Halligan on How to Be Found.

Brian Halligan is the founder and CEO of HubSpot, an Internet marketing software company that helps small and medium-sized businesses get found on the Internet and converts website visitors into leads and customers. He is also the author of Inbound Marketing: Get Found In Google, Blogs, and Social Media.

Be remarkable. A few years ago you needed to spend tons of funds on PR and advertising to spread the word about your your brand. Today the friction that marketing must overcome is very low for amazing and remarkable ideas that can spread on their own. Unremarkable ideas remain unfound no matter how much PR and advertising you do. So make sure you have a unique, remarkable services or product and it will spread like wildfire on the Internet if it’s truly different.
Create content. Once you have your remarkable product or service, start creating lots of content about it—including blog articles, videos, podcasts, and tweets. Remarkable content about your remarkable product gets hyperlinked from other websites. Those links send you traffic, and they also tell Google that you should be higher in the rankings.
Optimize content. Before publishing your content, you need to “optimize” it for Google and for the people on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, LinkedIn, etc who will spread it. For Google, you should include some of your “keywords” in the title of your content piece so it will be easier for Google to find it. For readers, you should make your titles as irresistible as possible. A good model for this is this blog that uses titles like “The Art of Schmoozing,” “MBA In A Page,” and “The Top 10 Lies of Venture Capitalists.”
Promote content. Once you have a remarkable piece of content that is optimized, start spreading it. Post it on your blog, email it to your newsletter subscribers, tweet it, update your Facebook fan page and LinkedIn profile with it. If the content is remarkable, others will spread it for you. As that content spreads, you will have more people follow you or subscribe to you, so that the next piece of content you publish will have a wider audience in the future.
Measure results. You need to measure your results for each channel. For example, you should compare your results for Google organic branded search, Google organic non-branded search, Google paid, blog, email, Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn group, and tradeshow campaigns to each other. For each campaign, you need to track visitors, leads, opportunities, and customers over time. Then double down on the campaigns that are working and kill the ones that aren’t.

Scott Scanlon

Example of Showcasing You or Your Product in a Powerful Story

Create a story on how your product or service was used in a powerful way.

I wanted to share with you a powerful technique that you can employ in your business that draws emotionality and creates connections with your target market.

This strategy is to showcase your product or service by telling a story how someone has used or employed it in a unique way.

You can tell a story on how this has changed their life or business. How your product or service plays into their daily life or as allows them to have a great business opportunity.

An awesome example of this comes from Evernote. A program that I use daily to keep my thoughts, visits to websites, and all types of information in one place. What does it do?

Scott Scanlon

Brand Blueprint Steve Gewecke – The Phone Pro

Steve Gewecke - The Phone Pro

Excited to share the insights as we roll out a new strategic partner and client today, Steve Gewecke, the Phone Pro. Check him out:

http://twitter.com/mlmphonepro

YouTube.com Channel

The domination process has started!

I will be posting frequent updates as we move Steve through the process of the You Brand Blueprint. Subscribe to get real world branding updates as they happen.

[pro-player width='320' height='253' type='FLV' image='http://s3.amazonaws.com/twitter_production/profile_images/103150527/Pic-20090319-001.jpg']http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iFWWheR3npo[/pro-player]