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Achieve Personal Brand Victory with These Olympics Lessons

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With the Olympics, the great thing about living in one country and coming from another is I get to cheer for both, because I have double the chance of celebration. Go Canada, Go Great Britain!

Having worked with a number of former athletes, the Olympics give me the opportunity to witness great triumphs and disappointments that are accompanied by wonderful stories. I appreciate and admire an athlete’s struggles and sacrifices. I am also struck by examples of this year’s younger winners being inspired, even mentored by some of the more established and successful athletes.

Joseph Schooling first met Michael Phelps when he was 13, during the Beijing Olympics when Phelps visited his local swimming club. Eight years later, he beat Phelps in the 100 metre butterfly to win the first ever gold medal for Singapore.

Over the years, the Olympics has become much more of a commercial venture, at least in some aspects. Although host nations seem to be almost guaranteed to lose money, brands like Nike and Under Armour and top athletes usually win. Michael Phelps and Usain Bolt have become huge personal brands, with significant endorsement deals and rewards for winning. Even Joseph Schooling earned $750,000 for his medal.

However, I am sure that most Olympic athletes do not ‘do it’ for the money. The investment in supporting them to get to world-class levels can cost a country’s association way more than the bonus for medaling.

For me, one of the best examples of the win being everything was the sheer surprise and joy on the face of 16 year old Canadian Penny Oleksiak when winning a gold medal. Money was not in that picture.

The Olympic brand and logo does have huge monetary and recognition value and the International Olympic Committee (IOC) is almost manic about its control. This is in part to help protect the sponsors and the huge investments they make in wanting to be recognised and associated with the event.

So what are the Olympics showing us that you can apply to your personal brand?

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Have you reached your commercial limit for LinkedIn searches?

A client contacted me this week because for the first time they had seen the notice, whilst doing LinkedIn searches, “You are approaching your limit for searches”. One day later they were told that was it for this month unless they wanted to upgrade to one of the top end accounts. This seems to be happening more and more, which suggests that LinkedIn is changing the way free accounts can… Read More »Have you reached your commercial limit for LinkedIn searches?

Do you have a face for video?

This week saw the announcement of the roll out of short 30 second video specific content from LinkedIn’s 500 or so Influencers, including the CEO Jeff Weiner. This is a screenshot above of his reply to the question – What is your personal vision statement? and in the comments my reaction. This was part of LinkedIn’s announcement on their blog – “When an Influencer you follow posts a video, that… Read More »Do you have a face for video?

5 Helpful Tips For After Attending a Conference

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Travelling to my first European speaking engagement in Slovakia really opened my eyes to the benefits of being a ‘Conference Guerilla’. I was travelling almost 14,000 km in the space of 4 days to speak for approximately one and a half hours. Just like when going on vacation, I tried to clear the decks before I went. In the end a few things had to get left unfinished and I had to accept that.

It was most important to me to ensure that everything was taken care of back home. This was key to being able to focus on the conference and my wonderful girlfriend really stepped up and took on the responsibility for my two kids.  I am really grateful because I knew they were in good hands.

There are three distinct phases of conferences – Pre, During and After. In ‘How to be  a Conference Guerrilla – Part 1’, we looked at the pre-Conference activities and in ‘How to be  a Conference Guerrilla  – Part 2’ we discussed optimizing the time while at the conference.

Overall I felt that Pre & During I did a fairly good job. What I tend to find though is that once I return home, it can all start to fall apart.

So what happens once you get back home or to the office?

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Will Volunteering Boost Your Personal Brand on LinkedIn?

Adding volunteer experience can be a great way of communicating your personal brand to your professional network. Three benefits to you of being able to see other peoples volunteer experience; You can see who in your industry, voacation or network has similar interests to you. Particularly if you are looking to connect with that person, it is another area of commonality in which to make that first approach. You can search by… Read More »Will Volunteering Boost Your Personal Brand on LinkedIn?

Are You Ready to Hog the LinkedIn Publishing Limelight?

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“Have you been published? Do you have a book?” are common questions I am asked when I deliver keynotes and workshops. I should collect my approach to personal branding into a book, and the idea has crossed my mind a million times, but I seem to have as many excuses not to.

I had an interesting discussion with a fellow speaker at a recent conference when we talked about this whole notion that a book does not generate significant revenue, but can help clarify in your own mind what you stand for and can help clearly position your expertise and knowledge.

My first ever blog post was December 2003, so it’s not that I don’t like writing or run out of things to say! I am also one of those people that prefers the kinesthetic feel of a physical rather then digital book.  Market research suggests that the old fashioned book is not the rapidly dying media that some would have us believe.

But our social media streams are increasingly becoming a visual collection of videos, high quality images, You Tube links and GIF’s (Graphics Interchange Format).

“Visual media is the new headline.” – Unknown

The poll that I ran in one of my articles showed the following results when it came to the various visual media that people used as part of their publishing;

Read More »Are You Ready to Hog the LinkedIn Publishing Limelight?

Are You Getting the Full Story on LinkedIn?

Just like many other social networks such as Facebook, LinkedIn is not giving you all the stories or even the latest posts and updates from your network, far from it. What you are actually seeing on your LinkedIn home page are the top stories and posts (and sponsored updates). So even though you might be thinking that Joe So-and-So has disappeared, they haven’t, its just LinkedIn has decided they are… Read More »Are You Getting the Full Story on LinkedIn?

Get Noticed And Appreciated By Your Boss With These 7 Personal Brand Exercises

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It is critical to your success that others know about your personal brand and what it stands for, here are 7 ways to help you do that.

Jane was a Senior VP at one of the banks. She had been there for 15 years with regular career moves and promotions.  Now she was frustrated because  her last performance review made her realize that her desired promotion to the C-suite was blocked.

She came to me for coaching and we soon determined the reason why she was not being considered for this key move. She was invisible. Not to her colleagues or boss in the local office but to the people making the C-level decisions in New York.  The solution was clear. We had to raise her profile in New York even though she was not based there.

We put in place an action plan to raise her credibility and visibility with the decision makers.  Within 9 months she was promoted to the CFO role.

This was a classic case of the right people not knowing about Jane and her personal brand. This may be the very reason that you too are not progressing in your career or getting invited to join the latest project or team. More of the ‘right’ people need to know about your personal brand.

Here are 7 key things about your personal brand that you need to ensure everyone (who matters) knows about you;

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7 Best Practices For Being a Conference Guerrilla

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The following story is an example of how the actions recommended in this series of articles can work for you. Whilst they are intended mostly for longer conferences they can apply and work equally well to one off events.

How to be a Conference Guerrilla – Part 1 – Pre-Conference can be read here. 

In our time-crunched lives and with the option of virtual events, physically attending conferences can be a hard decision to make.  Approach events with more than just looking at the speaker line up, the complimentary networking sessions or in some cases to get the professional development credits checked off.  Instead actually measure the ‘return on investment’ of attending a conference. Start using this mindset and you will see the value to your organization and your personal brand in getting out there.

I once went to hear Keith Ferrazzi, author of “Never Eat Alone” speak at the University of Toronto’s Rotman School of Business. I learnt about the event from the organizer who had booked me to speak there a few months earlier.

I followed Keith’s advice in his book about ‘bumping‘ the speaker before they go on stage and engaging them quickly to gain a follow-up.  I had brought my copy of the book and asked him to ‘sign it before he became famous’ – a quote from the book. He commented that I had obviously read the book and I said it was (and still is) my most referred and recommended book on networking. I have even given several people copies as gifts.  I then told him that I would like the opportunity to follow up with him to discuss how to make his book the #1 business book in Canada. “Absolutely” he said and handed me his card.

As I walked away,  someone behind him had taken my lead and asked for their book to be signed.  I heard Keith ask the person….Read More »7 Best Practices For Being a Conference Guerrilla