Burnish Your Brand by Sculpting with Social

Never look a gift horse in the mouth.  There has been no time in history where it has been easier or more efficient to sculpt your personal brand to highlight your passion, spotlight your skills and expose, to the world, your accomplishments.  The proliferation of platforms has made it possible to deftly create or surface a specific identity that conveys who you are, your particular interests and your ultimate objective in life. 

Let’s take stock of the possibilities.  Let’s say for example that you have a penchant for being a wine PR aficionado.  How and where do you convey that fact so your name will be associated with Wine PR when a hiring manager, HR representative or recruiter goes casting about online for a wine public relations professional?  Consider the following:

Resume: Start with your resume and craft it with an emphasis on what makes your background, experience and abilities qualified for a role as a wine PR expert.  Tailor each job with the type of experience and ability relevant to doing wine PR.  Begin your resume with a summary statement that forms your 30 second elevator speech.  See “Constructing an elevator speech.”

Blog: Try your hand at blogging about Wine PR. The key here is to be prepared to have a regular schedule of blog posts. The blog can focus on your experience, case studies, creative ideas, people who are authorities or thought leaders, what others are doing or techniques, just to name a few tactics. Also, invite your colleagues and others in the field to guest post. Also, pick a title for your blog that is intuitive, clever and interesting.  Make sure you then amortize the blog over other social infrastructure platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Quora, Pinterest, etc.

Linkedin:  Construct your LinkedIn profile to reflect the character and language of your resume.  Pay particular attention to your “Professional Headline” and “Summary Statement” insuring that they are descriptive and relevant to wine PR.  For example, the headline might read as follows: “Wine Publicist” or “Word Sommelier.”  Then your summary statement could read as: “Wine wordsmith and promoter with experience communicating, positioning and promoting wines of Napa and Sonoma.  Crafter of culinary compositions to whet your appetite and satisfy the palate.”

In addition to your profile, look for LinkedIn Groups that focus on “wine PR.”  Do a simple search to ID the groups and then depending if they are open or private, apply for membership.  With that accomplished, engage with the groups, add original thought and content and add value where and when appropriate.  Also, if there is an absence of groups related to your focus, create a Group or two that that puts a stake in the ground about “Wine PR.”  Have a mission and objective that will be attractive to others in the field.  Once completed invite others to join and collaborate.

Facebook:  First, have your Facebook profile mirror your LinkedIn profile, emphasizing your skill set and accomplishments in doing public relations for wineries, retail outlets, vineyards, varietals or whatever if your preferred calling . Next when, and as you post your updates, focus them on content, photos, opinions on topics related to the wine business and PR. That's not to say you should not post other content. The key is over time you want to build up a legacy of content that portrays your interest and experience in Wine PR. One more point. Post content that is thoughtful, instructive and interesting.

Pinterest: The Pinterest platform is a terrific vehicle for posting content that is focused and instructive. You have a couple of alternatives. Create a board focused on "Wine PR," where you pin interesting content about aspects of wine PR. It could be your own content, links to blogs about wine PR or interesting vineyard images. The other alternative is to find boards that concentrate on wine and PR and constantly post topics and pins that again are interesting, unusual and educational.

Twitter:  If you already have a Twitter handle, no issue, get a second one.  Create a handle that reflects how you want to brand yourself, for example “PRWineDiva.”  Intuitively it establishes your role as a public relations pro involved in the wine industry. 

Next, in 140 characters or less, tweet ideas, advice, news, counsel, requests, other sites (like your blog posts,) or any piece of information or knowledge that conveys something about “Wine PR.”  Do this consistently.  In addition, start following other wine divas and people whose livelihood depends on the grape.  Also follow other bloggers and reporters who write about wine.  In due time, people will start following you based on your own content and posts.  Also, register yourself on platforms like Twellow.

AboutMe: The “About.Me” platform enables you to create a universally accessible splash page that encompasses the different facets of your life.  It provides a single page where you can display graphics and a summary of your career or a biography and icons that link, in real time, to your social media profiles.  Icons are available for most of the major platforms.  Insure that your biographic information includes aspects of your experience and accomplishments in “wine PR.”  Also, consider using a graphic design or photo that features you in a setting related to the field of “wine PR.”

Quora:  A crowd-sourced information site, Quora.com is one of the pre-eminent platforms for asking questions and finding answers from [people with first-hand experience.  It is an ideal site to populate with information you know and can share with others based on your experience and knowledge.  Make liberal use of your focus to both ask and answer.

Visual CV: VisualCV.com is a virtual resume that is searchable and discoverable by search engines.  The site couches itself as “Your Resume, Only Better.)   It allows you to create an “access anywhere” a complete history of your career and accomplishments together with a portfolio.

What other platforms do you employ to burnish your brand.  Please share in your comments below.

How to Avoid a Yahoo Moment

Ignominious is how one might describe the latest Yahoo mishap, one of a long line of failures and foibles the company has endured over the last few years. The experience is rife with teaching moments for managements of traditional companies and soon-to-launch startups. Fact is, there are lessons for everyone if we just take the time to think and learn. I have given it a great deal of thought since the latest fiasco began and here is my take on avoiding a Yahoo moment.

"I am what I am" was a well-worn phrase from the Popeye cartoon series of the 1960s. Be who you are, because that is the only person you can be. Everyone else is spoken for.

Be proud of your track record and accomplishments. They have served your employers well and allowed you to be a talented ___________. You fill in the blank.

Avoid the temptation to embellish. Perhaps the biggest teachable moment is this: Say or write only what is the truth. Gilding the lily never got anyone anywhere, save maybe a fat fine or time in the hoosegow.

"Just the facts, ma'am." State what is and not what is not. You need never defend or explain your words if they are based on fact.

Be your own editor. Always check and recheck what is said and written by you or on your behalf. Ignorance is no excuse and will not save you when the fact checkers come calling. If it is about you, insure that what is said or written is the honest truth. The onus is on you, not your staff, the headhunter, the PR person, HR, or your personal assistant. The only time you need not check is if it is your obit.

Apologize and mean it. If you do get caught in a situation of obfuscation, a misnomer, factual untruth, or Yahoo moment, provide the facts, admit the mistake, and be sorry for the error. An honest mistake will not hurt you. Hiding it will. 

It’s About the Accomplishments, Stupid! Tell Them Well!

Resumes today are, or should be, more about what you have achieved not about what you do. The job market is so tight in the current economy that it is easy to hear the squeaks and squeals of people reading the thousands of resumes that are targeted at every available job. The problem is that according to a recent New York Times piece “Job seekers now outnumber jobs by six to one.”

So how is it possible to distinguish your resume from everyone else seeking to become part of the selected pile by the hiring manager? Craft a resume that clearly and boldly outlines what you have accomplished for your employers or clients and how you have helped them move the needle.

Here is a recommendation:

1. While I may stir some debate here, develop the resume in reverse chronological order to make it easy for the hiring manager to get a sense of flow of your career. The goal is to make it easy to read for the hiring manager, not you, not your fans and not your family.

2. It’s the accomplishments, stupid. To borrow and twist a quote from former president Bill Clinton. The resume is about accomplishments, not a job description.

3. So get yourself a comfortable working space, your favorite beverage, a pad of paper or an eye pad if you have one and sit down and think long and hard about all of your jobs.

4. Next, throw caution to the wind and write down four to five accomplishments for each position, giving careful thought to what you achieved for your employer, how you did it and what were the outcomes.

5. When you are finished, go back and edit each accomplishment and prioritize them all based on importance.

6. Save all of the accomplishments in a file marked “accomplishments bank.”

7. Based on the prioritization, pick the top three or four for each job and these become your primary proof points for the resume.

8. Also, feel free to mix and match the accomplishments, targeting the type of position to which you are applying, creating a customized resume for each job based on the position specs.

9. And as long as we are talking about targeting, make sure that your both your resume and cover letter are targeted to the position specs and to the company. Organizations either screen resumes by hand or automatically with software that analyzes keywords. If your letter and resume do not contain the right keywords, it is likely to end up in the "selected-out" pile. So target, target, target.

10. Lastly, don't forget the white space. Resumes that are copy heavy can easily get “selected out.” Make sure your resume is clean and easy to read so that it gets “selected in.”

At the end of the day or the “stack of resumes,” make sure your resume is the one that is included. Tell your story well and in a fashion that highlights your accomplishments not your positions.