BlogHer Day 1: Personal Branding with Penelope Trunk, Nina Burokas & Stephanie Cockerl

I’m liveblogging friends, so the post is a little scattered and may include grammar snafus, but enjoy!!!

Key Note: How did you build your brand & once you’ve determined your brand, how do you determine traffic??

Tips:
-Establish a brand that is associated to you. Brand YOU. It’s authentic and projects what you’re most passionate about.
-Strong brands are associated with a focused message. If there is something you want to be known for as an expert, it should be a few things, not a whole slew of things (not the concept of throwing a pile of spaghetti at the wall and seeing what sticks). Find the unique topic within a larger scope of material/topics.
-Combine two topics that aren’t typically combined to create one blog post, one brand, etc - creates fresh content and brings in different users.
-Blog beyond your niche.
-Consider the headline of your post: attention-grabbing (go to: problogger.net, copyblogger.com)
-If you’re not scared that someone will call you an idiot at least once a week, question how compelling your posts are.
-Grow traffic by commenting, entering into the conversation, through blog carnivals, guest blogging.
-Growing traffic isn’t the main goal. Traffic is a byproduct of authenticity.
-Be authentically interesting and genuinely interested in other people!!!
-Have a short, catchy tagline to cover your entire brand identity (3-5 words)
-Pick a narrow topic and branch out.
-It’s all about leveraging your strengths and differentiating yourself from the crowd and be strategic. Learn how to connect to who i know, who i need to know and put together a plan to get where we need to go.
-How does success look like to us?! Ensure your branding moves you where you want to do. Be strategic about what you’re communicating and ensures that it helps sustain and inform your brand.
-Succinct pitches - Recommended website: 15secondpitch.com

Handouts:

I. HOW STRONG IS YOUR BRAND?
Brand Positioning
-Can you identify your three more relevant and compelling brand attributes?
-Do you have a brand statement or tagline that conveys your unique promist of value
-When people introduce you, do they all use the same terminology

Brand Communications
-Have you defined your key messages and developed a brand communications plan?
-Do you have a plan for addressing any perception gaps or perceived liabilities?
-Have you identified your key brand metrics and implemented a measurement process?

Brand Environment
-Do you have a strong network both inside & outside your organization & area of expertise?
-Have you implemented a process for building and adding value to your network?
-Is your personal style consistent with your brand and appropriate for your target audience?

Brand Evolution
-Have you developed a plan detailing the desired evolution of your brand?
-Do you have a process for creating brand advocates?
-Are you obtaining feedback from stakeholders on an ongoing basis?

II. TAKE YOUR WEBSITE TO THE NEXT STEP!
Promote your blog on profiles:
www.linkedin.com
www.ryze.com
www.squiddo.com

Publicize your blog:
www.myblog.com

Register your blog:
www.technorati.com (register & claim your blog!)
http://siteexplorer.search.yahoo.com (self-hosted blog can regsiter the feed too)

Social Bookmarketing Sites:
www.technorati.com
www.digg.com
del.icio.us
www.stumbleupon.com
www.addthis.com - create social bookmarketing buttons so that people can bookmark your posts wherever they want

Widgets
www.rssfeedconverter.com-can have the contests of a feed displayed as html
www.springwidgets.com
www.widgetbox.com

Widgets for podcasting
www.gcast.com
www.feedburner.com

Analyze your blog:
www.google.com/analysis
www.feedburner.com

Did you know?
www.prweb.com-One can get a feed of press releases and syndicate it
www.ezinearticles.com - Write articles and have a feed of your articles

Vanity search:
Measure your online identity: www.careerdistinction.com/onlineid/step1.html
Google Alerts: www.google.com/alerts
Lifehacker: http://www.lifehacker.com/software/top/feed-your-ego-with-rss-260726.php - feed your ego with RSS by Gina Trapani

Discover and Find Your Inner Expert

Why have a website or a blog if you can’t market it?
1. What is your passion?
2. What can you do better than anyone else you know?
3. What are you good at? Come up with five different things and narrow it down.
4. What topic are you always giving people advice on?

What if I am a business? What can I blog about?
-articles
-newsletters - give people a choice on how to receive your info
-press releases
-websites in your niche that you find useful
-top 5 or 10 list about your niche
-the most popular posts of the month/year

Build Awareness of your blog
-Become a part of a community before building a community
-Find other blogs in your niche
-Consider linking to blogs other than your own, friends, colleagues, and exchange links
-Commenting - comment to contribute to conversation, don’t spam
-Seek out guest post spots

Recommend Books: Made to Stick, The Long Tail

blogher2007

This entry was posted on Friday, July 27th, 2007 at 12:33 pm and is filed under daily murmurs. You can follow any responses to this entry through the feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.