Personal Branding

At the very first Podcamp Boston, CC Chapman and Mitch Joel did a great presentation on Personal Branding that altered the way I approached my web projects.  Instead of always staying in the background, I learned how important it was to own your blog and podcast, add your personality into the mix, and give your projects a human face and voice.  This is still excellent advice, for businesses or individuals.  Without a sense of personality, of humanity to our writing and work, we lose the most compelling aspect of it, and what people want the most- connections and affinity with others. (I’ll save the diatribe on Maslow’s Heirarchy of human needs for another post.)

There’s a small downside to personal branding, though.  When some web personalities become really successful, like Robert Scoble and Guy Kawasaki, they become not just a personal brand but a brand unto themselves.  They become a product.  And people expect different things out of products than they do people.

Products are supposed to be available on demand, whenever we want them.  For example, I am in the process of replacing the “twitter van”- my old Toyota Sienna minivan with over 197,000 miles on it, with something new.  The old girl is just sad looking at this point, and my husband has declared enough is enough, so I am updating my “personal brand” with a new car.  We’ve been shopping for cars for some time, but I was disappointed to find out the brand and model we wanted were sold out of 2009’s so I have to wait for a 2010.  Dealers were surprisingly blasé about selling me a car.  I would have expected them to be a bit more enthusiastic about the prospect, but only one dealership did any sort of work to really see when the models would be available, see what they could order, and give me a great deal.  When I took this offer to another dealership closer to my home to see if hey would match it, they seemed incredulous that any of this was possible.  Yet, here I sit, with the VIN number of the car in hand, awaiting its delivery in the next few days.  The bottom line in terms of branding is that I expected with this brand that the Company as a whole should be happy that I want a car from them, that they should have them ready for me unless I want something really unusual, just as if I were buying a bottle of ketchup.   And as a brand, I expect they should be willing to do at least a little to make sure I don’t go off and decide to get the large purchase elsewhere.

But when people become brands, they can never be exactly like a car or a bottle of ketchup.  They can produce great books, like Trust Agents or Six Pixels of Separation, (both written by friends of mine), that act as products or souvenirs of the people and their ideas.  But the people themselves don’t scale the same way.  They still have lives and families and friends; they need to sleep and eat and have private time.  But some of this gets murky once personal branding and actually branding start to merge.

Think about this in terms of celebrity.  I think it really started with the Beatles.  The band became more than just records and music.  They became icons, they became lunchboxes and action figures and now even video games, many years after their initial fame for just being musicians and song writers.  Now you see the merchandising of fame and celebrity being as important as what ever someone did to become famous in the first place, but what gets lost in the hype are the people themselves.  A quick trip to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame will bring this all into relief, as you see how many people get chewed up by the fame machine, and see the few that have managed to survive it.

We don’t always consider how weird and difficult a childhood someone like Michael Jackson or Lindsay Lohan have had.  We don’t think or look at them empathetically, as people.  We look at them as side shows, as entertainment, and when they seem to crack up, we say “Well, they asked for it, what did they expect?”  On some level, they just did what they did best, acting or signing or writing or whatever.  The rest became the business of being a celebrity, which has its privileges and up sides, but has just as many down sides as people take random pot shots at you, or think you have some magic you can lend them, or give them a big break so they can be just like you, or whatever.

Celebrity, the height of personal branding, breeds a certain amount of expectation and neediness in others.  We expect our celebrities to be the bottle of ketchup we can get a fix of whenever we need.  We expect them to keep on delighting us with every new project and we’re more than happy to express crushing disappointment when our appetites aren’t fed.  And the media, professional and amateur, seems only to happy to find something to criticise at every turn.  We think “Oh, what a big head they have now that they’re big shots.”     Or “Well, you don’t seem to remember that you used to be just like us before you got lucky.”  Or “Why should I feel sorry for them?  They have it easy.”  Or “Well, they’re snobby now- I can’t even seem to talk to them anymore- I guess we aren’t really friends.”

All of this is ridiculous, of course.  All that’s happened is that a greater number of people constantly want the personal attention and adoration of the person whose “made it”, and that the person can’t scale like their product can.  All this drama is happening on the side of the audience, not from the person on the pedestal, and the person can’t do much other than watch it happen, because the cat is out of the bag, and there’s little hope of getting it back in.

I don’t think there’s any easy answers here.  I think part of it is for all of us to realize that personal branding is a great thing, but once you reach the product stage, there are hidden traps along with the benefits.  And I think this is meant as a wake up call for all of us who have friends with strong personal brands, to remember that our friends still need the same love and support and attention they always got from us, even if it doesn’t always come back reciprocally- they are trying to scale, but they’re finding themselves trying to be people in a product loving world.  And that seems like a busy but pretty lonely place to be.

Tags: CC Chapman, lindsay lohan, maslow's heirarchy, michael jackson, Mitch Joel, personal branding, rock and roll hall of fame, seth godin, six pixels of separation, trust agents

Examples of Good Disclosure

When it comes to the new FTC regulations regarding disclosure in advertising, the best way to learn what to do is to read the examples given in the Guidelines themselves, or to see examples of how disclosure is done well, so you can model your disclosure accordingly.

Blogging/Magazine Article Example

One great example is a piece that Kristin Brandt from the Manic Mommies podcast did in a recent article for Real Simple Magazine.  For “teaching” purposes, I’l excerpt some examples here, with permission of the author.  Kristin was reviewing different sets of headphones, several of which she has acquired in association with her podcast, Manic Mommies.

Here’s what I’ve discovered – there is no one perfect solution. Instead, I’ve found a couple favorite headsets which, together, make the (almost) perfect solution for me:

Apple In-Ear Headphones with Remote and Mic ($79)

I’m certainly not the first person to complain about the earbuds which come with my iPhone (my biggest issue is they wouldn’t stay in my ear). But I liked the combination of a headset which I could use to listen to podcasts and music, as well as talk on the phone. So, upon the recommendation of some of my Facebook friends, I purchased a pair of Apple In-Ear Headphones, which come with three sets of ear cups, meaning I could select the size which worked best for me (and stayed in my ear).

I don’t really use the remote function of the headset, so if I had to do it again, I might chose the JBL ROXY In-Ear Headphones with Microphone which has the same listening/speaking capability at half the cost.

In this first paragraph, Kristin talks about what she purchased and who recommended them to her.  She probably did not have to say her Facebook friends recommended these to her, and she was not legally obligated to do so, but it works with the narrative perfectly, and sets up the other sources of the products below.  This is probably a case of more disclosure than perfectly necessary, but it also sets her up as a credible source, because she is talking about where she gets her information before trying a product.  Next paragraph:

iFrogz Ear Pollution Toxix ($19.99)

Sometimes, like when I’m exercising or editing our podcast, I just want a simple pair of headphones. I have a ton of “free” headphones kicking around the house, but most slip off my head and have terrible sound quality.

When I was sent two pairs of Toxix headphones to try, I actually thought they were for the kids. But after using them while on the treadmill, I came to appreciate these deceptively cute pair of headphones. They are well designed to stay on your head, even if you are bouncing around, they are tough enough to throw into my laptop case and at just under $20 I don’t worry about letting the kids use them. My kids have co-opted the headsets we received, which gives me an excuse to buy a pink pair for myself.

This is a great example, where Kristin says she was sent two pairs of headphones to try, and liked them enough she’s willing to buy a pair herself.  While she might want to say who sent her the headphones, she has disclosed that she did not purchase them herself- this is an example of a good disclosure that lets the reader know what the writer has received and they can figure out the credibility of the writer accordingly.  Example Three:

Jabra Halo ($129)

I’ll admit that I’ve dreamed of being able to cut the cord, and listen to my iPhone without a headset cable getting in my way (how many times have I dipped a cable into paint or caught it on something). Which is why I was so excited when we received the Jabra Halo Stereo Bluetooth headset at Manic Mommies HQ. After charging the headset, I was able to pair my iPhone to the headset and was soon listening to tunes sans wires. It was awesome.

I did have one issue with the headphones – the volume control is, well, difficult to control. Sliding your finger up and down the side of one of the ear pieces is supposed to control the volume. But I found it was very touchy and, in the end, I didn’t seem to be able to control the volume much. They also cost more than I would normally pay for a pair of headphones, so I can understand how they may not be right for everyone.

Again, Kristin discloses that they got this headset through Manic Mommies HQ- clearly a promotional item sent to them, in hopes they would review it.  Kristin then does a great review of the pros and cons of the item.  We know she did not purchase the item herself, and her review seems honest and straightforward.  This should please both the person promoting the headset and the FTC because the review is based on the experiences of an actual user, with disclosure as to what sort of exchange or quid pro quo (ie. sample headset) was involved, so any consumer could figure out the believability of the review.

Podcasting example

Another great example of disclosure can be found on almost any episode of Marketing Over Coffee.  Chris Penn and John Wall regularly not only thank their sponsors, but when talking about their use of Blue Sky’s email service, or Hubspot’s various products or ventures,  they mention that they have also been sponsors of the show.  No one is left with any unclear or misleading impression of what Chis and John’s interest in promoting the sponsors might be, and when they talk about the products and services, they are doing it as genuine customers of the services they discuss.  As long as Chris and John disclose the name of the sponsors, and whatever products they get to use or play with, if provided for free or as part of a larger sponsorship or product placement, they satisfy all the FTC requirements well.

Chris does Marketing over Coffee on his own; it’s not part of his job at the Student Loan Network.  But you’ll notice if Chris talks about his day job, it’s an example of what they do during the day.  This could be seen as a promotion or testimonial about the day job, however, this is not a communication covered by the new FTC regulations.  Why?  Because the Student Loan Network is not and has not paid Chris to talk about their products on Marketing Over Coffee- there is no quid pro quo regarding Chris’s possible endorsement on Marketing over Coffee and its blog.  Therefore, no disclosure is necessary.  Chris is clearly interested in having us all use the great services the Student Loan Network provides, because it’s what he does, but this is not a paid endorsement, so it is not subject to a fine if Chris talks about his day job and forgets to mention the name of his company at the time.

Current Example- This Post

The information given above has not been paid for by anyone nor written in exchange for any product or service- it is a non-commercial transaction.   I don’t even have any affiliate ads other than a link to my Amazon Store on the “Building Blocks” page of this site, so I will tell you that all the content I produce here is done free of any sponsorship whatsoever at this point.  If you decide to buy a book I like from my Amazon store, they will give me a few pennies as a bounty on the sale, so to speak, but it’s usually less than a dollar per book- equivalent to a postage stamp.

I have, on occassion, received an item in the mail and have disclosed where it came from when I have reviewed the same and will continue to do so.

Now, while I do not formally have to disclose that I happen to know and like John, Chris and Kristin and consider them all friends, it’s probably  something that makes these examples more valuable to you, the reader.  And this is what is at the heart of the FTC’s new guidelines- they want to make sure consumers and readers of reviews, endorsements and testimonials understand what they can realistically expect and make sure they aren’t getting ripped off.  They have to have information to know how biased the reviewer may or may not be; they have to have information in order to judge the trustworthiness of the reviewer before the rule of Caveat Emptor or “Buyer Beware” takes over.

I wouldn’t have to disclose any relationship with anyone in these examples, because this is a non-commercial transaction, at best taking place within the Trust Economy, as Chris Brogan and Julien Smith might say.  It’s outside the regulation of the FTC, since there isn’t an exchange or expectation of a quid pro quo.

I hope these examples help- please keep asking questions in the comments, and I’ll try to help you sort out what may or may not be covered.  Again, the regulations go into effect December 1, 2009, and we’ll learn more and more about what’s okay and what’s not as more and more cases in the gray area are brought up.

And the bottom line is: when in doubt, disclose.  These are good rules, helping everyone be straightforward and honest about their opinions and biases for the public.  There’s nothing onerous and evil about any of this.  And if we’re lucky, blatant spam on social networks might ease up a bit, too.  Here’s hoping.

Tags: chris brigan, christopher Penn, FTC, john wall, julien smith, kristin brandt, manic mommies, Marketing over coffee, regulations, trust agents

Life as a Game

Chris Brogan had an interesting blog post about Levelling Up, or how to get your business game or life to the next stage, the next challenge, just like in a video game.  As I read the post, I realized my comments were enough for a full blog posts, so you may want to read Chris’s post first before reading further.

3 Things I Try To Remember when Life is a Game

1. Accepting Failure as part of success.  When we think about life or business as a game, it can help frame your mindset about not taking everything too seriously, and reminding you that making mistakes and getting do-overs are possible.  Having kids who sometimes seem afraid to be wrong or to fail despite having plenty of gaming experience, makes me think that I need to emphasize these points to them, so they may become a little braver at stepping out of their own comfort zone and stretch themselves a bit in order to progress, rather than paying it safe all the time.  Failure leads to learning, and while the quick and non-catastrophic failures in video games, followed by small and frequent rewards, is exactly what makes them so addicting and rewarding, we need to transfer more of this experimental attitude into our daily lives.

2. Pacing. Not everybody plays a game at the same speed.  There are those that try to master it in one day, others who take detailed notes and create guide maps and walk-throughs for others, those that ask for help, seek cheats and short cuts, and those that slowly persevere, doing it their own way, solving each puzzle on their own, no matter how frustrating.  Going at your own pace, the one you are comfortable with, is perfectly fine.  You don’t have to go or do the same things as everyone else- there are multiple pathways to victory, and each has its own virtues.  It can be hard to maintain your own sense of pace when others seem to be doing more, going faster, maybe even reaping rich rewards.  But your pace has its own benefits, and if you are constantly comparing yourself to others, it’s easy to lose a sense of where you are going.

For example, I’ve signed up to walk the Philly Half-Marathon.  This is a big fitness goal for me, and I have a training schedule I’m trying to stick to, and often walk with a few friends.  Their pace can be quicker than mine, but I am confident that by taking my time, worrying about putting one foot in front of the other, working up in distance and then worrying about time, is what feels right to me and will get me to the finish line just as well as people who are worried about time and pace from the very beginning.  The focus is different, the path is different, but we’ll each walk that 13.1 miles and get to the end under our own power, despite having taken differently paced journeys to the goal.

3. Cheats and Shortcuts can be helpful- ask for help.  My kids frequently want to buy “cheatbooks” or code books, that contain secrets within games they own, to make things easier along the path.  I regularly object to these, in part because taking short cuts to finish a game that costs $50 seems like shortening the lifespan of this investment considerably.  But sometimes, we all need help.   There’s a puzzle we don’t understand; we lack some experience that would shed light on our problems; we’re frustrated and clearly getting in our own way on the path to success.

It can be difficult to ask for help, from friends, families, teachers, mentors- it can make you feel inadequate.  We can’t rely on others to rescue us all the time, but when you’re stuck, reaching out for help isn’t a sign of weakness, but a sign of strength and self-insight.  When I feel boxed into a corner in my thoughts, often a quick call or email to someone like Chris Penn or CC Chapman can help me put a new spin on my problems, and at least take a look at them from a fresh perspective.  Even calling my mom or dad can help tremendously- if it’s a kid issue, they certainly have more experience than I do when it comes to raising teens, and will laugh at me and with me about the crazy stuff we go through.

Knowing when to call for help, and when you are relying on help is often tricky.  In school, it was easier to ask for help, and the deadlines and project specifications are often much more precise than in real life.  Heck, my kids get rubrics for everything, but I have yet to see a rubric for being the perfect mom, or creating a successful business.  Part of this is because no matter how many How To books you read, success is defined internally as much as it is externally.  No one else can set your path for success, because what that means is different for everyone.

That’s the biggest obstacle to using game theory in real life, actually.  Life does not come with a “You’ve Won!” graphic and a place to enter your initials.  The rewards and punishments creep up on you from time to time, they’re not always predictable or evenly spaced.  They can be cumulative, from decisions made long ago, by you, or even by your family.  Randomness plays a big factor- are you in the right place at the right time?  Can you recognize opportunity when it comes knocking?  Have you overlooked valuable opportunities because you thought they seemed small and insignificant at the time?

Life is a much more open-ended game, where the journey is as important as the ending.  It’s all about how you use your experience and your assets to level up, if you want, or stay at the same level, looking for mastery before racing ahead.  For me, while I can envy those getting to their destination before I do, moving at my own pace, at my own comfort level, has had its own benefits.  While you can’t forget to challenge yourself to extend your skills and to grow, more important is that you do it when you’re ready and prepared for the challenges ahead, and give it all you got.

What do you think?  When do you accelerate or decelerate your pace?  How do you get to your goals?  What does success look like to you?

Tags: chris brogan, game theory, julien smith, pacing, trust agents

The How To Myth

A couple of my friends have recently come out with fantastic books- Mitch Joel wrote “Six Pixels of Separation“  and Chris Brogan and and Julien Smith have come out with the New York Times best selling Trust Agents.  Both books discuss how people are connecting for business over the web and how these new relationships work, but there’s been some critique that the books aren’t “How To’s” of  internet success.

This got me thinking about the whole concept of the How To.

How To permeates every aspect of our lives.  As a parent, we have a major role in teaching our children everything from appropriate social behavior to self-care – how to eat politely, how to tie your shoe, how to brush your teeth, how to get good grades- it goes on and on.   From the kid’s side, our parents and our teachers are constantly giving us the recipes to follow to learn stuff we’ll hopefully need later on in life.

After being indoctrinated in the How To all of our lives, we seem to want others to provide us with the fool-proof formula to win at whatever decide we want to do.  How many books, for example, promise us 5 easy steps to instant fame and fortune?  8 steps to flatter abs?  & habits of highly effective people?  Somehow, if we can just get the recipe right, everything will be perfect, and we’ll look better, smell better, and have the easy life of a Hollywood star, with all the fame and fortune we can imagine.

I don’t know about you, but I have found the following things to be true:

• To get what you really want, and the satisfaction that comes from attaining a goal, hard work is necessary.  It’s never handed to you.
• The Rules, the How To, the Recipe for success may seem simple, but the devil is always in the details.  Take the 10 Commandments.  Think how many pages of interpretation and commentary have been written about this simple list of things to do and not to do, at least two thousand years ago.  Clearly, it wasn’t that simple.
• I love to cook, and I love to knit.  In both of these areas, success can depend heavily on following a recipe or pattern.  Even in directions that allege to be “foolproof”, I can assure you, I can find a fool (usually me) who will make some sort of mistake executing this simple set of directions.  Let’s not even discuss the infamous Beer Cheese soup or the sweater that was about 2 inches too short, shall we?
• The Genius is always in the customization anyway.  Take a given recipe- adding a touch of your favorite herb, or adding nuts, chocolate chips and raisins into those brownies- and you take the generic “just like the picture” meal from replication of someone else’s idea to your version of the same idea, with unique elements that make it all your own.
• Customizations of the prototype to fit your own life, the hacks we all make to get the generic product to fit our needs-this is what takes things from being just “stuff” to being a part of our own creative process and learning.  You don’t learn much about painting by doing a Paint by Numbers- you may learn basic technique, but it’s the application of those techniques to your own project where genius lies.

We all want How to’s because they are comfortable, and we hope that if we see behind the veil, we’ll automatically harness someone else’s creativity and hard work, harness their insight, and somehow, leverage that to make ourselves equally as successful.  Yet we don’t need more imitations, copies and echos of the original, as much as we all yearn for that one, unique, purely special moment, great idea, or original insight of our own.

I’m currently working on a project that is a How To- but the critical element is to try to let everyone know that in using this book -1) it’s only a guideline, a coaching tool- your own milegage may vary  2)We’ll give you templates that work for us, but you have to customize it towards what you think will be best for you and 3) Never be afraid to try something new, to fail, to try again, and fail better the next time.

We only learn from making mistakes.    Some mistakes you only ever need to make once. Let me help you avoid a big one- never put dish detergent in the dishwasher, thinking it’s an ok substitute unless you want to flood your house.

Some mistakes you make more than once.  I still insist, for example, I do not need to “swatch for guage” ie. make a small sample before knitting a huge project, hoping that the knitting gods will protect me.  I am frequently wrong on this account.

But the biggest lesson is this:  even the best how-to’s only provide guidance and suggestions based on one person’s experience and what they have researched about the experience of others, trying to shine a light on frequently encountered difficulties.  This is what Parenting books are all about.  But only you know yourself and your own unique situation, and applying these ideas to your life will require mass customization to obtain the results you want.  Lockstep copying won’t get you the best results, only customization of the recipe will.

I still get suck ed into the promise of the How To, but at least my expectations now are that it is nothing more than advice.  I will learn and master things only through trial and error, making better guesses and spurring different ideas based on what the book or expert offers, but I can’t expect that these books and lectures will fix my life- that’s my job, and mine alone.

Tags: books, chris brogan, how to, julien smith, Mitch Joel, six pixels of separation, trust agents

Trust Agents

I’ve spent the weekend reading through Trust Agents, by my friends, Chris Brogan and Julien Smith.

Trust Agents, at its heart, explains how the currency and language of the web is based on trust.  Relationships online, for business or social reasons, require that both parties trust each other immensely.  You can’t always seal every deal with a handshake over dinner anymore, and whether money changes hands or not, there’s a great deal of social capital invested between people, and they rely on the other party dealing with them fairly.

As an attorney by education and trade, I can look at the relationships people develop online as a social contract.  Each party agrees that even in the most basic “friend” relationship on social networks like Twitter or Facebook, that certain rules will be respected.  There is often a quid pro quo, where people reciprocate the friendship outreach.  Let’s break this down further-

Mary decides to join Twitter. She goes out and “follow” a bunch of people, hoping these people will reciprocate.  This “following” is like an offer of friendship or relationship, which may prove to be valuable, or it may be a burden, but just like any offer to purchase goods or interact with someone, no one has to reciprocate- it’s an offer, that’s all.  If Jim reciprocates, a relationship, however tentative, has been formed.  The offer has been accepted.  This is the basis of a basic contract, with the “consideration” that binds the contract measured in willing to spend your attention and information with Mary.  Now, if  Mary decides the ongoing trading of information and links through tweets needs to take a turn towards a constant barrage of what might be considered “spam”, she may violate this social contract, causing Jim to simply rescind the conract and unfollow her.  Jim’s opted out of Mary’s friendship, breaking their contract to connect and exchange the currency of ideas.

This social contract is the basis of online relationships.  Basic friendship relationships on social networks have led to many real world opportunities for me, ranging from personal tours of Barcelona, to speaking engagements, to meeting Richard Simmons and beyond.  There is a real store of value being built up in these social relationships that can be leveraged and translated into actual dollars and cents, and this is a large part of what Julien and Chris discuss in Trust Agents.

The point of being a Trust Agent is, of course, not to take advantage of all your friends and seeing them as walking wallets and opportunities.  Being a Trust Agent requires that you have built a network of relationships, just like the guy with a great rolodex, long before you actually need it.  As Chris Penn says, you need to bring the awesome all the time, and the the relationship currency will follow.  Then, when someone is looking for a consultant, someone to hire, a speaker- you will automatically be the first person on the list, or at least on the list of people to consider, where those who do not help others and deliver value will long be forgotten.

This is a bit of a blue ocean, bread on the water strategy.  It requires you to save -delivering value and building relationships, long before you get to spend- getting hired, or even asking some one to do a favor for you.  The more value you have stored in these relationships, the “closer” your relationships, the more durable that bond is, just like any real world relationship.

If you want to better understand the concept of how relationships work online, and how you can become a Trust Agent yourself, run out and get a copy of Trust Agents.  It’s going to be a classic guide to help people negotiate this world of online relationships, while helping you to understand the culture, and how you can leverage these relationships for success, just like Chris and Julien have done so well.

Tags: chris brogan, chris penn, chris pinchen, julien smith, podcamp barcelona, trust agents