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4-Ways Foursquare Impacts your Personal Brand

Is Foursquare a silly game? Is Foursquare just another cool iPhone app?  Or is it just another social network?  From a personal branding perspective I would like to add a different angle.

Foursquare has the potential to be a great personal branding lifestyle social network (with the integration of Twitter at this point). Personal branding is a lifestyle not just a career choice.  It is something that is lived 24/7 not just from 9-to-5.  Foursquare naturally integrates your DNA, your brand associations, and your habits into its social networking game with each check-in.

4-Ways Your Personal Brand is Impacted

1.    Lifestyle: Your habits and choices are stamped with each check-in.  For example I workout at Lifetime Fitness and after becoming the Mayor it encouraged me to continue working out more frequently.  Whether I get unseated as Mayor is not the issue, it communicates commitment and that being physically fit is critical to my personal brand.  Can I tweet that I am going to the gym?  Absolutely. A stronger message is sent however when you physically check-in at the gym?
2.    Brand Associations: It connects you with establishments or brands you want to be associated with, whether it is a food establishment that provides healthy food or a eco friendly store that you purchased furniture from.
3.    Money Trail: To truly identify what is important to a person follow how they spend their money, there isn’t a clearer indicator of values.
4.    Local Market Branding: Adding tips can be a great personal branding tool  it connects you with desired establishments/brands in local markets.  It can also create opportunities especially as you frequent specific locations more often.  In local markets it can add name recognition and adds a virtual presence even when you are not physically at the location.

Optional #5: Work Time Stamp: Work habits are reinforced since check-ins can only be done with mobile devices when you are in the physical area.

Two Basic Tips for Using Foursquare

•    Tips: Create unique tips that people will find value when they visit or are near the establishment.
•    Shouts: Brand your choices, each check-in provides you an opportunity to reinforce why you have selected the establishment or brand you are visiting.

There is a noise factor that has to be managed with Foursquare I will admit.  Broadcasting every move you make might not be the digital footprint that you are trying to create.  Below is an example @Nolascratch tweets about going to the bathroom. I am not taking a shoot at this person but I just wanted to show an example.  This tweet is about going to the bathroom which we all at some point have to go.  You must determine for yourself what reinforces your personal brand message with this tool like you do with the other social networks.

4sq_bathroom

Foursquare is a social network that will continue to evolve much like Twitter and Facebook as time progresses. see a great opportunity to reinforce your personal branding lifestyle through Foursquare.

Other Articles on Foursquare
5 Ways Foursquare is Changing the World
Foursquare vs. Gowalla: Location-Based Throwdown

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Side Projects are Bigger than Resumes



Are you focused on building a better resume?  Then my first question is why?

This is a rhetorical question and your answer probably goes something like this. To get my dream job I was taught to go to college, get an education and work that job for 30 plus years.

Part of that process is to put your experience and education on a 8.5 x 11 inch rectangle and tell the world how great you are.  What if I told you not to forget about your resume, but to change your focus and focus on creating something that matters?  i.e. A Project

Evan Williams talk at TED centered around side projects, which is how Twitter was birthed.

The Building a Better Mousetrap Mentality

We have all heard the saying, “Build a Better Mousetrap.”  William C. Hooker invented the spring-loaded mousetrap in 1894.  Since its creation there have many different versions:  electric, live-catching, glue, inert gas and the list goes on.  What has the outcome been of these upgraded mousetraps?  Better materials??  Bragging rights??  You feel cooler about using them??

How do you build a better resume? The same way you build a better mousetrap right?  You create an online resume with links right?  You use social channels right?  As a practitioner in the personal branding it is easy to force-feed this mindset down peoples throats.  (Note:  I am not saying go drink the Kool-Aid and throw away your resume, but re-think what you are focused on.)

Game Changers and their Projects

Listed below are four people who are working on some cool personal projects who won’t need a resume to get their next gig.  Guaranteed. These projects are creating major opportunities for these individuals and I guarantee you they are not tweaking their resume to death.  They are working on projects that people care about that they have a passion for.

•    Noah Brier – Creator of BrandTags.net – Fast Company 100 Most Creative People in Business (2009)
•    Evan Williams -  Founder of Twitter (Enough said)
•    Gina McCauley – Founder of Blogging While Brown – Essence Magazine 25 Most Influential African- Americans (2007)
•    Noah Everett –  Founder of Twitpics – Twitter’s most popular photo sharing site.  Valued at $10 Million?

What is your side project?

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It’s All in What You Tweet

Lego Ollie the Twitterrific bird, originally uploaded by Fredoichi.

There are many things you can do on Twitter to build your personal brand; however, when it really comes down to it, it’s all in what you tweet. Your content and activity represents you and what you have to offer others, whether they be potential followers or even prospective partners or employers.

Here are some great tips on how to enhance your personal brand with each and every tweet:

Be selective. Decide what type of content you want to promote and stick to it. Don’t tweet or retweet anything and everything. – Jennifer Turner, @Talagy

Be consistent. Use a similar format, or 2-3 formats, depending on the content, for each tweet. Become a brand people will recognize. For example, start each tweet with one word in CAPS, or always end with #jobsearch, or use personalized web address shortening services. – Jessica Silverstein, @AttysCounsel

Act selflessly. Give away useful, industry-specific tips 85 percent of the time; limit promotional tweets to 15 percent of your content. Invest your energy in connecting with your followers. – Laura Christianson, @BloggingBistro

Showcase your expertise. The best way to showcase your personal brand on Twitter is to publish “thought leadership tweets”. “Thought leadership tweets”, are personal quote tweets that demonstrate your knowledge or opinions on topics, key trends and events related to your industry or profession. – Marci Reynolds, @marcireynolds12

Be responsive. Use the @ symbol followed by the person’s Twitter name to directly address questions and /or comments to people and also respond to questions. Conversing with people via the public Twitter stream will raise your visibility and thus increase your online presence. – T.C. Coleman, @UpwardAction

Give credit where its due. Reply and RT to those in the industry or who provide relevant and insightful knowledge, what goes around will come around. Its too transparent to be fake on Twitter. – Charlie Riley, @charlieriley

Tweet with the reader in mind. Another tip I use is to seek out Twitter users who tweet with search terms similar to my blog’s audience. That way, I’m addressing folks who are most likely to find my tweets of interest. – James Dillehay, @craftmarketer

Automate value. We don’t all have time to be on Twitter 24/7. Save yourself a little sanity and use tools like SocialOomph to schedule your tweets in advance so you can share valuable and relevant content even when you aren’t on Twitter. In addition, you can use tools like Twitterfeed to automatically post new articles and updates from your blog, as well as from blogs and sites of other trusted thought leaders in your industry. – Chris Perry, @CareerRocketeer.

Special thanks to everyone who contributed to this wealth of personal branding insight!

Chris Perry, MBA is a Gen Y brand and marketing “generator,” a career search and personal branding expert and the founder of Career Rocketeer and Launchpad.

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Personal Brands – “Think Different”



In 1997 Apple Computers created the “Think Different” ad campaign.  I was inspired to look at the video clip after reading a tweet by William Arruda the other day.  When I saw this video it made me think about personal branding and I wanted to share a thought.

As a personal brand we have to not only act differently but we have to think differently. As you continue to develop your online personal brand think about how you can use Twitter and Youtube (and other social networks) so that people can experience you and experience what makes you different.  Remember the tools amplify YOU.

It’s time to “Think Different”?

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Personal Branding: Would your Personal Brand exist without social networks?

Brands_Exist_Tweet_web

Would your personal brand exist without social networks like Facebook and Twitter? Most people would say no.

Let’s take a look at where personal branding started?  The roots of personal branding are recognized to have started in 1995 and Tom Peters is known as the father of personal branding which is appropriate.  However the historical roots of personal branding go much deeper.  Actually we need to go back to the 18th century to look at a few of the pioneers.

  • Borden Milk Co. – Founded by Gail Borden
  • Sears and Roebuck – Founded by Richard Warren Sears and Alvah C. Roebuck.
  • Ford Motor Co. – Founded by Henry Ford

Do any of these names look familiar?  People didn’t create names for businesses like Google and Yahoo back in the day they used their names.  There was no separation between the person and the business; businesses were birthed out of the DNA of the person.

Personal Branding

In a nutshell your personal brand is your personal DNA it what makes you who you are.

  • Unique Value Proposition: I believe this is birthed out of your passion.  It is what makes you different it is the value that you are able to deliver on.
  • Platform: Every person has an arena or space that they will operate.  It is where you will make their mark.
  • Character: The real you, who you are when nobody is watching (not sure if that happens anymore), what you believe and your value system.

Personal branding is a process of exposing yourself to a large community in which today  social media is one of the main channels.  Every personal brand has the ability to develop a digital personality.

  • Digital Personality – It is the digital component of your personal brand that exist online in your various social networks and includes your online activity.  It is the authentic you translated into the digital world it is the stream that runs through your tweets, your avatar, and your online content.

I believe Personal branding 2.0 in the future will not separate you from your competitor because it will be the norm.  We are creating a mass army where everybody will march to the beat of the same drummer to be relevant.  After everybody is on Facebook, Twitter, Linkedin (and whatever the new social network is of the day), setting up a blog, tweets 15-20 times a day, engages their community, and produces relevant content that will be captured in social search what is next?  I am not condemning personal branding 2.0 I believe it is vital, I would not be relevant without it.

Personal Branding 1.0 will be more important in the future than Personal Branding 2.0, guaranteed.  Nailing the 2.0 component is critical in the day and age we live in especially to be relevant. The true separation will be Personal Branding 1.0 who you are and your values that people will be reading about and spreading to others.  Remember social media and personal branding doesn’t make you a better person it amplifies your voice and exposes you to a larger network of people.

I would love to hear your thoughts?

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