As Gary Vaynerchuk puts it, “we’re going through a gold rush of branding.  If you get talked about enough in all these social webs/blogs, you can build a brand.”  If the people working for you have a strong presence in social media, so will your company.  This means happier employees and a more profitable business.

My slide deck on the personal brand era is below:

In August of 2007 Tom Peters wrote in an article titled The Brand Called You in FastCompany magazine:

It’s time for me — and you — to take a lesson from the big brands, a lesson that’s true for anyone who’s interested in what it takes to stand out and prosper in the new world of work.

Regardless of age, regardless of position, regardless of the business we happen to be in, all of us need to understand the importance of branding. We are CEOs of our own companies: Me Inc. To be in business today, our most important job is to be head marketer for the brand called You.

Wikipedia defines Personal Branding as: “the process whereby people and their careers are marked as brands.” A personal brand is how others perceive you. It may or may not reflect who you really are.

I find the evolution of Personal Branding similar to the evolution of advertising, initiated by Ogilvy, written about in a series of articles on the subject of positioning by Al Ries and Jack Trout, and then distilled in the book Positioning. Advertising shifted from “product feature advertising” to “positioning” in which a product needed to occupy a position in the mind of the consumer to break through the clutter.

To put it another way, your personal brand is a managed account that has a very real effect on your earning potential, your legacy and your future employment.

So while I agree with Peters that The Brand Called You is important, I’d like to extend that thought and propose that in fact we are entering The Personal Brand Era. And it is an era that will be disruptive to the business status quo.  Yet, if managed correctly, the Personal Brand Era can be profitable for both individuals and the companies for which they work. The success of your personal brand and the success of associated corporate brands are additive; they are not a threat to each other.

… finish reading The Personal Brand Era Cometh on the Chron

Perhaps our online personal brands are really pseudonyms for the Umbrella Corporation? A protective wrapper than includes a “a highly-trained security force capable of rescue, reconnaissance, and para-military operations” division. And one sub-corp that makes band aids for the kids when they skin a knee so we also get some good PR for our radical transparency.

So for the sake of argument, let’s assume that personal brand are the umbrella. Yet humans, like Tara, are very diverse creatures. We cycle through roles as Goffman’s Symbolic interactionists. From wikipedia:

…people act toward things based on the meaning those things have for them; and these meanings are derived from social interaction and modified through interpretation.

A fancy way of saying we act differently in different situations when we play different roles. As a speaker I am outgoing. As a person, not so much, testing as an introvert.

The fundamental flaw with personal brands and radical transparency is brand consumers can’t handle this dissonance. Yet a human will always be a messy puddle of emotions and role playing and bluffing and reality.

Specifically brands are strengthened as they move towards one (1) thing in the mind of the consumer. Positioning is about the internal brand singularity. From Ries:

The Law of Singularity: The most important aspect of a brand is its single-mindedness. What is a brand? A singular idea or concept that you own inside the mind of the prospect. It’s as simple or as difficult as that.

THE leading energy drink. THE best violin. THE fastest sports car.  Get it?

So real brands CAN be consistent. Coke-a-Cola is “the real thing”. Personal brands, being human, can NOT truly be consistent. Unless we hold back and show only our personal-brand-act in all public channels.

Steve Martin has an act, but that isn’t him. The fact that he inherited a personal brand of his name simply means he must live a double life, or triple life, of cover ups. Or risk not being true to the personal brand “Steve Martin” which surely isn’t him. (when did he stop doing stand up?)

So yes we have a personal brand. But they will never be as strong as a real brand.

And on that note, personal brands are horribly unfair. Think about it. People with no marketing training are compelled to come up with a brand name for all social software channels. But unlike companies that can trademark a brand; they typically don’t. And companies can buy their domain name. But how can an individual reserve their personal brand on every new social web site? So even IF an individual comes up with a great personal brand, they have no formal method of protecting it. Completely an unfair challenge to the individual. Yet there it is.

Great post on personal branding Gwen! Clearly you got me thinking. Thanks!

The image? Hans Haacke’s Blue Sail. It is every changing and completely dependent upon the fan as part of the installation. Just as our personal brands are completely dependent on how others perceive them. Whether in person or through social media. Our brands are singular and exist in the mind of the consumer, correct or not, if we wish or not, they just are. Sitting in a spot in their brain. And that is a tad bit unfair…

For the public relations professional these results are huge.  Note that Google does virtually no advertising, nor does Skype, Starbucks or Firefox. 

In fact while I don’t have the exact numbers, it looks to me like 40% of the top readers choice global brands are primarily built on word-of-mouth marketing and public relations.  Wow!

1. Google
2. Apple
3. Skype
4. Starbucks
5. Ikea
6. Nokia
7. Yahoo!
8. Firefox
9. eBay
10. Sony

<rant> Now if brandchannel would JUST GET AN RSS FEED I’d be happy!  Aarrrgh.</rant>

Dr. Evil: "Austin… I am your father."
Austin: Really?
Dr Evil: No, I can’t back that up.
                           … from Austin Powers Trilogy

Which relates to a perfectly executed but factually incorrect advertising campaign by AT&T:

http://www.horsepigcow.com/2006/01/wtf-or-att-can-kiss-my-rss.html

photo courtesy of Brian at Weblogs Work

I’m not even going to START with my this gets my blood boiling…okay…maybe I’ll start.

#1 – I blogged about AT&T lame-o campaign a little while back
and one of their lackey advertising dorks left a nasty comment on my
blog. Something about how a Web 2.0 blogger shouldn’t be commenting on
his brilliant advertising campaign. Ha! First of all, if they knew
their asses from the blogosphere, they would know that my background is in advertising and marketing and that their campaign sux rss.

… (more)

Working with numerous advertising agencies I can feel the agency pain.  No doubt they (AT&7) sent the A-list to the creative kick-off.  They, the ad agency, were assured that indeed AT&T had street cred with the bloggers. 

Unfortunately AT&7 is a legacy monopoly with no clue how to treat a consumer (apparently at least – I no longer user their services!).  Posting those billboards made me comment on them in Houston while driving.  I didn’t post it, but many others did and unfortunately for AT&T one of them was Tara Rogue.  Hee hee. 

Assume every customer is king and your brand will have no problems.  Bloggers are like the CIA – they are silent and will enforce what they believe in.

Saint Arnold is well known in the Houston area for their brewery tours where everyone gets a free "half cup" of beer.  But if it is a St. Arnolds mug it doesn’t matter how BIG your beer stein, you still get a "half cup."  So basically what you have is repeat offenders showing up with giant mugs (portable barrels with handles?).  Very odd for a first time attendee who of course wonders what the heck is with these people!

Saint Arnolds is now auctioning off the naming rights to their new fermentation tank.  Great public relations and with the bid at $1501 as I write this that is real money.  Here is the eBay listing.

Naming rights to new Saint Arnold fermenter

Become a saint! Win the naming rights to our newest fermenter. It is our first 120 bbl fermenter (that’s 3,720 gallons), twice the volume of our existing tanks. To put that into terms you can understand, that’s 1,653 cases of beer. The tank to be named is prominent to the tasting area. This means people will be thinking of you while enjoying a good beer. Then you can join the previous winner, St. Gonzo, along with our other saints Adrian, Brigid, Columbanus, Dorothy, Edmund, Florian, Gall, Hildegard, Idesbald, Jacobus, Lawrence, Matthew and Nicholas (all are actual saints of brewing). The proceeds will assist us in purchasing even more fermenters so we won’t run you out of beer.

In the disclosure category, Dan Keeney (a client of ours) sent me the link to St. Arnold as I believe they are a client of his.  But hey, if I could afford it, I’d be all over that fermenter.  Of course I’d probably have it signed with someone else’s name for fun, but what the heck?!?

update: And the winning bid was US $4,002.00 by elsambomeister

There is also amusement to be taken by the "Atlanta: Every day is an opening day" decision in Atlanta, particularly when you have a power house combination like the Ries’ offering Atlanta alternatives (although Hotlanta does sound silly to me).

Now, not to be outdone (via adjab) the New York Daily News brings us this:

1 boro tag? Fuhgeddaboudit!

<snip> "Brooklyn is too broad and diverse for one slogan," said Markowitz spokeswoman Jocelyn Aframe.

"It became apparent that one slogan wouldn’t be able to express all that Brooklyn has to offer."

Instead, the Brooklyn Tourism Partnership will use several slogans – which range from the classy ("Brooklyn: Bridge to the World") to the wacky ("Brooklyn: The Tenth Planet") and possibly risque ("Do It In Brooklyn") – for specific advertising campaigns.

At least they have a sense of humility acknowledging that sex in Brooklyn is so different we can officially declare it a new planet. Wow.  I mean, just wow.  HotBrooklyn maybe? 

My first point is the book Blue Ocean Strategy by W. Chan Kim and Renee Mauborgne is a great book for those of us navigating the branding oceans with a new and different product.  It IS tempting to go with the “me to” concept particularly when you consider search engine marketing and keyword counts which by definition ONLY highlight existing market categories.  So if it takes another brand manager X amount of self control to position his product in a new category, I truly believe it takes someone familiar with SEO X + 9999999 to achieve the same position, education and facts not withstanding.

In the book Blue Ocean Strategy they cover numerous relevant business examples (it is a Harvard Press book after all).  One of the examples that may be difficult to apply to our business (don’t worry – they cover other awesome examples that ARE easy to relate) is the case of Cirque de Soleil.  Blue Ocean Strategy advocates creating strategy maps as seen at right.

The idea is to determine what you can eliminate, raise, reduce or create.  So circuses fight over star performers (did you even realize there was such a thing as a star clown?  I find that laughable. (too easy, sorry….)).  So Cirque de Soleil eliminated star performers.  Animals are expensive to care for, travel poorly, require trainers and Peta is stripping in protest anyway – so why not ELIMINATE the animals (high cost / low return = capitalism??)

Finally we see a response from PT Barnum.  OK, not that “See the Egress” crap again, rather a “secret” new show eliminating the three rings and introducing a theme. But I’ll bet buckets of chicken (sorry Pam) to doughnuts (sorry HFPD) that they are not eliminating animals or celebrity performers.  So they have higher choreographical costs, perhaps more creativity, but no significant cost reduction in performers or animals care.  Will they at least return to performing in tents?

All kidding aside (image of goat here), the point of blue sky strategy the four actions framework:

1. Reduce - which factors should be reduced well below the industry’s standard?
2. Eliminate – which factors that the industry takes for granted should be eliminiated?
3. Raise – which factors should be raised well above the industry’s standard?
4. Create – which factors should be created that the industry has never offered?

I am glad to see Barnum and Bailey thinking.  I think they need to explore their strategy a bit more and not rush to create a win/lose battle with cirque, rather they need to find some blue ocean.

So first here is the Ries position on Kodak and film versus digital cameras (as a counter point – just being fair and all….)

What about Kodak, they don’t focus on any one product or market?

Kodak bought Sterling drug, including Bayer drugs and pharmaceuticals and in essence became an unfocused company. In the last few years they have gotten out those businesses and focused on imaging products. But there are two types of imaging products, photographic and digital. At the moment, most of their business is photographic. But the future is going to be digital. Kodak is making a serious error by putting their photographic name on their digital products. What they need is a separate name for their digital products.

And here is the Maglite post on MAG-LED Technology.  For some reason I buy the putting the same brand on both.  I don’t view LED lights as a completely new category.  Just a better way to make a darn flash light that doesn’t go dead when you drop it.

We are pleased to report that Mag will soon be adding MAG-LED™ flashlights to its product line.

If these products have been a long time coming, it’s because the MAG-LED™ Technology has taken a long time to develop to the point where it is feasible to make an LED flashlight that meets Mag Instrument’s high standards of quality, durability, style and function.

Now, after years of research & development, testing and refinement, Mag Instrument is committed to introducing, in early 2006, a line of MAG-LED™ flashlights. Like Mag’s incandescent-lamp flashlights, these newest members of the Maglite® flashlight family will have the style, performance, benefits and features that both professionals and consumers have come to expect from a Maglite® flashlight, including the fact that they are built for a lifetime of service. The Maglite® design tradition will be instantly recognizable in them, and they will offer the beam-focusing capability that has always been a feature of Mag® flashlights, AND MORE!

Again, thank you for your interest in Mag Instrument and its products. We look forward to the rollout of the MAG-LED™ flashlights in the near future.

Sincerely,
The Maglite Team

So this is all do-able marketing and branding news.  I don’t view it as a brand extension; we will all ignore the Mag-LED moniker and just call the darn thing a Maglite anyway.  What I *really* want is the green laser LED version for snipe hunting.

Quote from the NYT article on U2.

"We always said it would be pathetic to be good at the music and bad at the business," said Paul McGuinness, the band’s manager since the beginning. And while U2 hasn’t become a Harvard Business School case study (at least not yet) it offers an object lesson in how media can connect with their customers.

Speaking on advertising on the web I frequently get questions like "that is not what Nike does" and I have to keep reminding folks that YOU ARE NOT NIKE!  So while I am in awe of U2 and what they have accomplished in music, in business, and in philanthropy, I would caution new artists to remind themselves YOU ARE NOT U2.  New bands have to be a new brand and build on the latest in advertising evolution.

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