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Announcement: @clayman Brand Camp Topic. Built From Scratch: Creating Something

Greg Clayman, Publisher of The Daily

Today we are excited to announce Greg’s topic for Brand Camp – NYC. The Daily is a category first: a tablet-native national news brand built from the ground up to publish original content exclusively for the iPad.

Built From Scratch: Creating Something New

Created by a small team of “intrapreneurs” within the halls of News Corporation, The Daily launched in February 2011 with the mission to provide the best news experience by combining world-class storytelling with the unique interactive capabilities of the iPad. Greg Clayman is the Publisher of The Daily, charged with managing the game-changing shifts in technology, process, subscription models and approach to content enabled by the latest developments in Tablet Media. Only a few months out from the launch of The Daily, Greg will discuss what went into building this cutting-edge product and what it takes to run it every day.

Bio

Greg Clayman is the Publisher of News Corporation’s The Daily: the first national news publication built from the ground up to create original content exclusively for tablet devices. Prior to The Daily, Greg was executive vice president of Digital Distribution & Business Development for MTV Networks and ran MTVN Mobile Media. There he managed digital business across MTVN’s channels to develop and manage new opportunities for digital content and strategic partnerships. Before joining MTVN, Greg co-founded Upoc, one of the first mobile media companies in the United States, and ran its marketing, sales and business development groups.

Register: http://bcnyc.eventbrite.com

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Dell Commercial At SXSW Starring @Baratunde + Detroiter @HajjFlemings

On the eve of SXSW Interactive 2011 in Austin, Texas a new Dell commercial was shot and released. The commercial included @baratunde @waynesutton @drgoddess @robertmurray @amoyal and @hajjflemings .

Are you tried of using a laptop or mobile devices that doesn’t stand out? It is time to get a new Dell Vostro V130 checkout our video.

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Negative Campaign Ads and Their Impact on Personal Branding

What can we learn from negative campaign ads? We can clearly see the mentality of our society. A society that lacks accountability, that blames others for things gone wrong versus one of introspection that is hardwired with a moral compass. As the campaign season has come and gone (November 2nd) this fall I wanted to reflect on the impact of negative campaign ads and personal branding.

The Influence

The influence of negative campaign ads reaches beyond politics and the campaigns that a particular candidate is running. Let’s break it down. A candidate that develops a negative campaign ad is basically telling you he/she is incapable of winning the political race with a safe margin without running the ads and there is data to support that. Any candidate that can win a political race without negative ads will run clean campaign ads, period.

Good to Great (Level 5 Leaders) - They take responsibility when something goes wrong and deflects the praise to their employees when things go right.

The Pink Elephant in the Room

It is easy to find fault with someone else and to point out their inefficiencies. It is much harder to focus internally on what value you bring to the table, communicate your true expertise, and give clear examples of how you have solved problems that benefit people other than yourself.

I look at personal branding through a different len/worldview. Personal branding is more than who you are between 9am-5pm. At it’s core personal branding it is driven by your value system. There hs been no other point of time in history when a person has had more control over their career than today with the invention of the internet and the real-time web.

As a personal brand it is time to lose the negative ad campaign mentality. Your career or life in reality are a reflection of your choices and decisions. Your career path is not the responsibility of your supervisor to mentor you, nor is their annual review of your job performance the reason for your annual salary. It isn’t HR responsibilities to put you on the career fast track. If you don’t like your reality you can change it by doing something about it by running your own clean campaign ads. Let potential employers know why they should vote for (hire you), market your value and track record of being a proven leader. Quite living an undervalued life!

Note: The video that I have included has absolutely nothing to do with negative campaign ads I prodcued it two years ago and I thought you would enjoy it.

I am your personal brand strategist Hajj Flemings and I approve this message.

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How to Be Co-signed by Your Cohorts


LeBron, LeBron, LeBron.

LeBron James, NBA superstar, chose to go to the Miami Heat after a summer of deliberation. After Thursday’s announcement you either love him or hate him. The story will be buried and exhumed many times over, so I will not go into it. However, I will go into what I feel is a remarkable side story.

James, will be joining Dwayne Wade, an existing Miami Heat player, and Chris Bosh who recently signed with Miami from the Toronto Raptors. Unless you are fan of basketball, you may ask, “who is Chris Bosh?” And this is the remarkable side of the story.

Wade and James are known superstars, have been on the big screen, and have had the media hype to follow. This is Bosh’s first time in the limelight. Anyone who follows basketball knows that Chris Bosh is a solid player. But not until now has he really been considered a superstar. Which has been argued by some sports critics. Why is he at superstar status? Its because he has been co-signed. He has teamed up with two of the biggest brands in basketball. You can’t ask for better exposure.

This is the classic example of brand building by association. The examples of a brands being co-signed speak clearly:

Pontiac G6 - Oprah Giveaway
After this car was given away on the The Oprah Winfrey Show, within two weeks, Pontiac G6 awareness reached 87% among adults, while also achieving a 17% click-through rate (on the web), a Google record for the time. With a new product, your can’t ask for better exposure, after that the product has to sell itself. It was co-signed by Oprah.

Nike - Michael Jordan
Nike cut Michael Jordan a check for $500,000 for his endorsement in 1985. In 1984 Nike’s total revenue was about $900 million. By 1997, when Jordan was closing in on the fifth of his six NBA titles, it hit $9.19 billion. Case closed.

Regardless to whether brand association is orchestrated or organic, its hugely beneficial and is represented in the perceived value part of the brand value equation. Perceived value can be increased because of the association of another brand.

While Bosh is a solid player by himself, he has raised his brand equity tremendously by teaming up with cohorts of the maganitude of James and Wade. Whether they have created a dynasty by teaming together is yet to be seen. What is known is that Bosh has taken an opportunity to remove himself of the caves of Toronto and put himself in position to shine in South Beach.

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When Free Sucks: Google are you Listening? #WhenFreeSucks

I have been singing the praises of Google for years. I have talked about the brilliance of their FREE model. When Chris Anderson’s book, ‘FREE’ came out I purchased the book the first week. Whenever I needed to search for anything on the net I would always go to Google.com. Then the unthinkable happens, all of my videos were deleted from my YouTube account which is owned by Google. (Note: All of my videos were in total compliance with their terms of service.)

In an instant my YouTube account with over 13,000 views was deleted. In my mind Google is a great company so I knew they are going to respond swiftly when I contacted them about this simple mistake they made. I have entered questions into their online forum, emailed questions to YouTube, and called the Google office only to get totally ignored. I can’t begin to explain to you the level of frustration that I felt because I have gotten ZERO response from one of my favorite Brand. Over the years I have put a great deal of trust into ‘FREE’ resources like YouTube. I now understand there is always a tradeoff to ‘FREE’ and one of the main reasons is:

  • No Customer Service: Humans don’t typically service other humans that don’t pay.

The Impact to your Personal Brand and Dependence on Google

How dependent is your business on Google? I am really starting to re-think how I build my personal brand with Google and other FREE tools.

Some of the Many Google Services that I use

  • YouTube Videos
  • Gmail account emails
  • Google Docs
  • Google Calendars
  • Google Checkout

If your account is temporarily or permanently compromised what is the impact to your personal brand/business? I walked away from my FREE experience saying I would rather have a paid service that I could hold someone accountable.

Tips for Managing you Personal Brand with FREE

  • Own Your Hub: As a personal brand you need to own the main hub of their online activity. (i.e. www.ChrisBrogan.com)
  • Back-up Everything: Anything in FREE services needs to be backed up: videos, documents, important emails, etc.
  • Re-Evaluate your Dependence on FREE: Re-Evaluate everything that you have in FREE social networking sites or other FREE services you use.
  • Carefully Select Account Managers: If you have a third party managing any of your social network accounts be very careful. Your reputation can be compromised and your account suspended or deleted because of inappropriate activity (anything that violates their Terms of Service)

Blog Post on FREE Services and Frustrations

  • When Free Cost a Fortune - Mitch Joel
  • When Google Owns You – A New Chapter - Chris Brogan

I write this blog post to get you thinking and planning so that you can be proactive in managing your online personal brand. It is also validates to me that nothing in life is FREE there is always a cost. It is just a matter of who is paying, when they pay and how much. Does this mean to stop using Google or other FREE services like YouTube, Facebook, or Twitter? The answer is no but you have to manage your dependence.

Would you be willing to pay for a services that are currently FREE (i.e. YouTube) for customer service and the ability to hold someone accountable?

(Photo Credit: Google Logo Render by mark knol)

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