#BeAwesome Archives - Page 24 of 27 - The Social Media Advisor

February 9, 2016
Content Marketing

#LoveYourBrand – The Difference Between a Personal and a Corporate Brand

Branding is a popular topic in the marketing arena and for good reason. A brand can make or break a business. To make matters more complicated, most small businesses don’t even really understand the concept of branding. They’ve heard the lingo, and they know it’s important, but the nuances of branding strategy are often still a distant consideration.

A Branding Lesson

What is branding anyway? Is it a logo or a set of specific colors? Maybe it’s a tagline or a slogan? Perhaps it is all of that combined?

Actually, no. Branding is nothing that a company or individual specifically does or presents to the public. This is where it gets tricky.

Now go back and read that again. Yes, that’s right. The audienceis in control of your brand. Does that mean you should pack it up and stop fighting the good fight? Absolutely not! The more you can implement and showcase in terms of what you want your audience to believe about you, the better. This investment in time and resources tells a story to your clients or customers about what you want your business to be.

Corporate Branding

Corporate branding is very conceptual. Most companies take a concept or an idea – a company vision – and build their branding around it. Once a business has an idea about their brand, they can then mold each and every touchpoint to reflect that brand image. Touchpoints happen whenever an individual comes into contact with your company – whether that be at the receptionist desk, through the mail, reading a magazine, or talking to an employee. Taking the time to really incorporate a corporate brand into all of the available touchpoints helps to ensure a company is consistent with their messaging.

Personal Branding

A fairly new idea on the branding horizon is the notion of personal branding. How is a personal brand different from a corporate one? The answer is simple. A personal brand is all about people. It’s about you! How do you come off in a room full of people? What impression do you give your co-workers, employees, clients, or while networking? These different perceptions are all facets of your personal brand.

This means that spending time developing a brand image for yourself is just as important as developing a brand for your business. What impression are you trying to make in person and online when it comes to your work? How can you implement those ideas into what you do as a career?

Of course, personal and corporate branding do not need to be mutually exclusive. The best of both worlds involves taken your personal branding and seamlessly incorporating that into the brand for your business. One type of branding is not more powerful than another. The sweet spot is the intersection where both personal and corporate meet and blend together.

Love the idea of branding but having a difficult time figuring out where to start or how to combine your personal brand into what your business is already doing? Our team loves helping businesses create a personal narrative and brand so that they can continue to follow their purpose and #BeAwesome!

~ Social Media is changing the way people do business. Don’t get left behind ~

Be sure to Follow us and Let’s Engage!

Hollie Clere, of The Social Media Advisor is a “#BeAwesome” Developer, Social Media Brand Builder, Content Manager, Trainer and Author in LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, Blog, Google+, YouTube, Pinterest, Instagram and the tools to manage them.

Click here for her Social Media Workshops, Classes and Seminars.

February 2, 2016
Brand Storytelling

Love Your Brand: Why Should YOU Be a Part of Your Branding?

The marketing world has caught on to the importance of branding. Branding has become such an integral part of a company’s marketing strategy. This method’s value has increased to the point that branding is no longer just a corporate policy. Small businesses, speakers, authors, job seekers and entrepreneurs are now encouraged to integrate branding into their marketing as well. However, this type of branding looks a bit different than the traditional style.

Personal Branding

Personal branding is the online persona or image that an individual projects. This includes all the digital touchpoints from the website to the blog to all the social media platforms. It includes online collaborations, live streaming, videos, or any other content created and distributed. A personal brand is a real thing and exists, regardless of the person’s acknowledgement or knowledge.

YOU as the Face of Your Brand

Perhaps you already have a business entity and brand. Maybe you’ve even invested in a quality logo, brand colors and online touchpoints. However, as you interact with people online or network with people in person – it is YOUR face that people associate with what you do. It’s your voice and your mannerisms and the energy you bring to the conversation. As content gears more towards visual – including live streaming and videos – it will be you that the audience gets to know and trust. With so much noise competing for the same small places, a genuine, authentic connection with your audience is essential. Some of the top personal brands online naturally evolve into influencers and generate the type of viral attention that most companies strive for.

Touchpoints

As you transition to a more personal brand, it will be time to take an audit of all your online assets and tune them into the image you want to portray. This means spending some time with your good friend, Google, to make sure that your name online is directly associated and connected to your personal branding.

It will also mean investing in some decent professional headshots. Team up with an experienced photographer so that they understand your brand image when taking photographs. These brand photos are an integral part of all your online touchpoints and should weave together in a method that is consistent and on brand.

Personal Brand Enhancements

Once you have the foundation for your personal brand, look into ways to enhance what you have already created. This could be association or collaborations with other strong personal brands that make sense for your work. It could also mean developing a strong backstory or narrative and weaving it into the touchpoints. When producing any type of content, be certain to have the branding in mind during development so that whatever is created remains true to what you have built.

Developing a personal brand is also a great opportunity to reinvent you, your company or your branding strategy. Be cautious. A personal brand is not a mask or a fake persona. Your target audience will see right thought anything insincere. Be your authentic self and the right followers will automatically be drawn to you.

Understand the value of personal branding but not sure how to begin? Give us a call and we can help you brainstorm and build those touchpoints. The more you #LoveYourBrand, the more you can #BeAwesome while pursuing your purpose.

~ Social Media is changing the way people do business. Don’t get left behind ~

Be sure to Follow us and Let’s Engage!

Hollie Clere, of The Social Media Advisor is a “#BeAwesome” Developer, Social Media Brand Builder, Content Manager, Trainer and Author in LinkedIn,Facebook, Twitter, Blog, Google+ , YouTube,Pinterest, Instagram and the tools to manage them.

Click here for her Social Media Workshops, Classes and Seminars.

January 25, 2016
Social Media Marketing

New Year, New Habits – If You Like It Then You Better Put a Tag On It

In order to really get a handle on using Twitter, social media users have to understand the platform’s special features and lingo. One of the most important aspects of using Twitter is understanding and incorporating hashtags. A hashtag is a word or phrase with the # symbol placed directly in front of it. The idea of the hashtag is similar to that of a keyword on Google. These symbols can be used to quickly and efficiently search this social media platform for tweets and conversations pertaining to that particular topic. Otherwise the site is a consistent flow of disorganized and unconnected posts.

This way of categorizing topics enables users to find information on a specific area of interest but also allows users to label their tweets within a specific category so that they are easier to locate. Since Twitter is a stream of live information – being able to tag tweets to a specific topic or event allows for a better stream of viewing posts from a variety of users all talking about the same moment or idea.

Want to Create a Hashtag?

The good news is that hashtag creation is available to everyone. If a search of Twitter doesn’t come up with a tag that you’d like to use, it’s simple to create your own. It’s as easy as typing it into Twitter. No other steps are needed. Of course, there are not many hashtags available that haven’t been used yet. Also, an obscure hashtag is not likely to be found unless the creator does some significant promotionto establish presence.

Also, the Twitter Supportpage clearly states that not all hashtags or tweets are indexed. This may mean using it more frequently to ensure it makes an impact on the platform. The more recent the tweet, the more likely it will be indexed but even that is no guarantee.

Hashtag Ownership

On the surface, hashtags are not really owned by any particular business or organization. They can’t be purchased and users are welcome to use any hashtag on their account, as long as it doesn’t conflict with the Twitter Trademark Policy.

What is a Trademark Policy Violation on Twitter?

Using a company or business name, logo, or other trademark-protected materials in a manner that may mislead or confuse others with regard to its brand or business affiliation may be considered a trademark policy violation.

However, Twitter users can register their hashtags with Twubs. It’s important to remark that registering a hashtag isn’t the same as registering a trademark. It isn’t a means to keep other people from using it. There is no way to own a tag in the same way that you own a logo or domain name.

Registering a tagmeans that your brand becomes attached to it and that the tag will get added to a hashtag directory. This directory allows businesses to go into some detail about the tag and why it exists.

Once you have created a unique hashtag and registered it, then it is time to market the tag as much and as often as possible. This is the way to motivate the audience to associate your registered tag with your brand. You’ll never be able to control everything that becomes tagged with your #, but the idea is to generate more presence for your business on social media.

Still have questions about how to effectively incorporate Twitter into your social media strategy? Give us a call and we can help you build an online brand that helps you #BeAwesome and develop a #NewHabit for this year!

~ Social Media is changing the way people do business. Don’t get left behind ~

Be sure to Follow us and Let’s Engage!

Hollie Clere, of The Social Media Advisor is a “#BeAwesome” Developer, Social Media Brand Builder, Content Manager, Trainer and Author in LinkedIn,Facebook, Twitter, Blog, Google+ , YouTube,Pinterest, Instagram and the tools to manage them.

Click here for her Social Media Workshops, Classes and Seminars.

January 18, 2016
Social Media Strategy

New Year, New Habits – The Value of Learning Social Media from a Social Media Manager

Is this the year that you’ve decided to truly invest in social media and make it an integral part of your company’s marketing plan? There were over 179 Million social media users in 2015. That is a huge audience and should not be overlooked when creating a marketing strategy. Incorporating social media make not sound like a difficult task, however there are a lot of variables to consider when dealing with social platforms. Here are some thought-provoking reasons to seek out a social media manager before building your social media strategy.

Social Media Marketing

When doing your own marketing, content is any bit of material created with the purpose to establish or grow online presence. This includes articles, blog posts, videos, websites, publications, podcasts and curated social media posts. A social media manager’s role is to take the most relevant and interesting content and post it at just the right moment so that the targeted audience will see it and engage with it. This means understanding the various social media platforms – including their strengths and weaknesses – and what content works best for each. It also requires understanding peak times and the best time to post, related to individual platforms. A social media manager stays on top of platform trends and knows the processes behind scheduling just the right type of content at the right time.

Social Media Engagement

Posting consistent social media content is important. However, motivating the audience to engage and then capitalizing on that engagement is the real benchmark of success. Some platforms require more attention than others. Also, there are a variety of tools available to help streamline and promote certain types of engagement. A social media manager is experienced with creating online environments that motivate organic participation. They also understand that engagementis essential and missed opportunities to engage are bad form. In fact, having social media content and not making engagement a priority is a waste of strategy and resources.

Social Media Advertising

With so many people using social media, it is an easy thing to get lost in the shuffle. Newsfeed algorithms automatically filter out quite a bit of content. Sometimes the push to be found requires a boost of social advertising. Most of the social platforms have established their own advertising options. A social media manager is familiar with the details of each of the social advertising possibilities and can show users what ads and campaigns will be more successful. They will also have the expertise to analyze and track the results in order to adapt the best possible strategy moving forward.

There is so much more to social media marketing than drafting some tweets and posts and hoping for the best. Training with a social media manager will ensure that an effective social media strategy is implemented – saving time, money and resources.

Don’t go into social media blind! Give us a call and arrange a time to discuss how we can train you to #BeAwesome with your social media marketing.

~ Social Media is changing the way people do business. Don’t get left behind ~

Be sure to Follow us and Let’s Engage!

Hollie Clere, of The Social Media Advisor is a “#BeAwesome” Developer, Social Media Brand Builder, Content Manager, Trainer and Author in LinkedIn,Facebook, Twitter, Blog, Google+ , YouTube,Pinterest, Instagram and the tools to manage them.

Click here for her Social Media Workshops, Classes and Seminars.

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#LoveYourBrand – The Difference Between a Personal and a Corporate Brand

Love Your Brand: Why Should YOU Be a Part of Your Branding?

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