Friday, April 03, 2009

Personal Branding is the new link bait

Not a day goes by when I don't come across an article about how to brand yourself using Facebook, or the current new media darling Twitter. One of these personal branding champions, Gary Vynerchuk, who Owen Thomas likes to call serial 'Twitter abuser' has just gotten himself a $1 million, 10-book deal.

So, what does a nifty personal branding campaign look like. In short, it is a series of cute online activities. A sample checklist is given below:

1. Posting touching pictures of yourself or a lost of mantras. Originality does not matter.

2. Heartwarming personal story in form of a About Me or a blog post: something on the lines of "My father was a deadbeat. I taught myself..." the idea is stoke feelings of sympathy or inspiration. Sadly, most personal branding activities online turn people into loathsome smart asses.

3. A website that sounds like a great headline: e.g. myhusbandneedsajob.com

4. A funny Youtube video compilation: If video is not your thing, write at least one top 10 list. It is so in these days.

5. Tweet often and spam others to follow you. Of the 20,000 people you choose to follow, 5000 will follow you just by looking at your snappy short profile and tweet frequency.

This is all I can you tell you about Personal Branding, social media style.

Allow me to end by asking you this:
Do you want to become famous, like Madonna? Or, do you want to become useful, like Gandhi?

Related Reading:
Web2.0 hall of fame: 22 ways to brand oneself online

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Tuesday, March 31, 2009

Would you like a degree in Facebook, Orkut and Twitter?

And while we are at it, a degree in blogging, podcasting and using Flickr? And be willing to pay $5676 for the course? The Birmingham City University in UK is offering a course in Social media. Commenting on this course, columnist on Politico website says this on Twitter,

Is about as brilliant as a degree in email would have been ten years ago.
What do I think? For $5776, I could pay for a couple of online journalists at my startup for local journalism, Bighow. For $5776, I could have gone ahead with my planned series of free Online Journalism Courses across India, being able to hold at least 6 of such events. The basic course material is already up here.

Bottomline: nothing like learning by doing. Start learning about social media by registering for a couple of social networking sites and blog daily.

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