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Use your own personal branding domain with GMail

GoogleApps-logoDid you know that you can take advantage of the speed and deliverability of GMail without using an @gmail email address? I didn’t but I just learned how at the Shoestring Branding site (link to article).

Before I go into details, let’s discuss the “why” – I’m not a fan of solutions that are chasing problems…

The first reason is deliverability. I’ve written about this before. It’s easy for your Internet Service Provider (ISP) to get blacklisted on major spam lists, even if you’ve never personally spammed anyone. The worst email providers, like Comcast, don’t look at your content, they look at the source of the message. If anybody on your ISP’s server has been a spammer – even in the past! – you could be blacklisted. I had an account like this from which I could never reach Comcast email addresses.

The second reason is that you look more professional if you have your own domain – and if you have your own website and/or blog, it’s likely that you do have your own domain. So for anyone who wants to use their own domain (e.g. John@smith.com), read on.

I haven’t verified this yet, but I believe the method Google uses completely bypasses your ISP’s email servers, so it will always look like you’ve emailed from GMail when those pesky Comcast email filters try to block you. And that’s exactly what you want.

The instructions on the Shoestring branding site are pretty good, so please refer to them for more details. There’s a video from Google here. The video says there’s a free version, but if you go to the URL they mention, I only see a $50/year version. However, it appears that Google still offers the free version here: http://www.google.com/apps/intl/en/group/index.html.

Update: that was fun. Google removed the free access, then said they’d inadvertently removed it and put it back. It’s available right now at the link in the previous paragraph – unless they remove it again. Got a lot of coverage on the blogs, none of it good…

Just in case the page disappears again, here’s what it looks like:

Click on the image for a larger version

Click on the image for a larger version

If you don’t have your own domain, you can buy one using a promotion GoDaddy and Google have put together for $10/year. That’s the normal GoDaddy price, but if you buy the domain through the Google portal, it comes preconfigured (not verified, but that’s what Google claims).

This is a great service – one that I will try personally.

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By Walter Feigenson – July 7, 2009

How to use Google Reader – article moved

Sorry for the inconvenience. Please read this article here.

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By Walter Feigenson – July 6, 2009

Google tools for your job search – and for tracking your personal brand

Are you using Google Alerts to track your personal brand? Or to track job opportunities? If you aren’t, you should. It’s easy and free.

You should already have a Google account, because GMail is essential for your job search – I’ve written about it here. And I hope you’ve already set up your Google profile, which gives you a free advertisement at the bottom of page one of a Google search on your name – I’ve written about that here.

Google Alerts is simple to set up and use. When you’ve created your alerts, Google will email you whenever it indexes the terms in your alert string.

Why would you want to do that?

  • To track your own name – if you’re publishing to improve your Internet profile, this is how you can measure your success. Every time somebody writes about you or your own writings get indexed, you’ll hear from Google. Just don’t get too depressed if you don’t hear from them too often.
  • To track keywords in a job search – suppose you have targeted a specific company and you want to know when they’ve hit the press (so you can be better informed as you try to find a way into the company). Just set up a Google alert for the company, product, or even an individual, and you’ll know – probably before they do!
  • To track trends in the area of your subject matter expertise – this works especially well if you’re doing something esoteric that doesn’t get much press.

How to set up alerts

Log into your Google account. Point your browser to http://google.com/alerts. Here’s what you’ll see first:

Enter your search terms, using quotes if the term is more than one word. For type, you have these choices:

For frequency, you can choose once a day, once a week, or as it happens. Then, hit the “Create Alert” button, and you’re done!

Simple, effective, elegant, and free.

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By Walter Feigenson – July 3, 2009

No more excuses: you can post to your blog directly from Word

Did you know you can post directly to your blog from Microsoft Word 2007? I didn’t, but I read about it here today. More instructions here. Thanks to Giedrius Ivanauskas for writing about it on Social Media Today (link).

Why is this important? Simple: it removes one more obstacle for the non-technical person who wants to blog.

Why blog? Because it’s your best road to becoming a subject matter expert, and that’s what we all need to be in today’s insane world.

Word 2007 supports the most important blogging platforms: WordPress, Blogger, and TypePad. The setup is easy – basically you simply provide your blogging URL, your username and password. Word does the rest. It even imports your categories (categories are like chapters in your blog – on my blog, I use my main article groups: “back in the day,” “guest speaking information,” “job seekers,” LinkedIn”, “management thoughts,” “marketing,” “personal branding,” and the category for this post, “reviews”).

If you’ve been using the WordPress editor, I think you’ll agree that Word is much easier and more complete – and most important, it’s way more familiar to almost all of us. Plus, the spelling/grammar checker is so much better, which is very important.

So, what’s missing? I’m in the process of figuring that out, since this is my test post. What I see so far:

  1. Inserting pictures may be a problem
  2. You can’t assign tags, as I always do
  3. You cannot do a preview of the post on your blog before publishing (for me, this is an absolute killer, but it may not matter to you)
  4. You cannot create a manual excerpt

Whoa! Everything I just wrote is a lie!

  1. I had no problem including a picture
  2. There’s a simple solution to items #2, #3, and a partial solution for #4! When you publish, you have the option of publishing as a draft – then you can do the rest from your WordPress editor. Not only that, but if you edit the document and republish the draft, Word is smart enough to update the draft post already on your site, so you don’t have duplicates.

The only incompatibility I found is that if you create a manual excerpt in the WordPress editor, and then re-edit in Word, you lose the excerpt. But I think the manual excerpt is actually a feature of the theme I use – I don’t think the “normal” themes allow you to create an excerpt.

This is very, very impressive, Microsoft. Good work. Too bad more people don’t know about it. With all due respect to the wonderful people who’ve made and maintain WordPress, I really prefer the Word editor.

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By Walter Feigenson – July 3, 2009

Forget the elevator pitch – you have 6 seconds for your personal branding statement

Click photo to see other photos by pink_emmie_bat

Click photo to see other photos by pink_emmie_bat

Everybody tells you that you have to have an effective 30-second “elevator pitch.”

They’re wrong – you don’t have anything like 30 seconds to make your first impression on a hiring manager, prospective client, or somebody you meet at a networking event. You have just a few seconds to introduce yourself and recite your personal branding statement.

THEN, if the other person is interested, you can go into your 30-second spiel, but only if they invite you to! If they’re not interested, don’t bother.

That’s why your personal branding statement is so important. When you meet somebody for the first time, they give you permission to politely introduce yourself, probably in a single sentence. You’ll know right away if the other person swallowed the bait by watching their body language and by judging their oral response. If they give you permission to say more, you can and should elaborate – but once again, you have to do that without boring your networking partner.

You can validate this for yourself. Try introducing yourself to somebody with your 30-second speech, and then try the same thing with your 6-second personal branding statement. See which one works better, and if you find that what I’ve said here is wrong, comment on this post and let everyone else know what your experience was.

Your personal branding statement is not your job title! It’s the essence of who you are, distilled to just a few words. Mine is: “I help you get found on the Internet.” That’s simple, succinct, and it’s enough of a teaser to get a response like: “Wow, tell me how you do that.” That’s your invitation to elaborate with your 30-second elevator pitch.

Think about this – if you’ve been in groups where people were developing and practicing their elevator pitches, how often were they sufficiently interesting so that you listened to the whole pitch attentively? How often were they boring, and how often did you finish listening without having the faintest idea what the person really meant?

stephen_hawkingstarchildBrevity begets precision. Stephen Hawking really has to work to communicate, yet he’s one of the most influential scientists in history. He has become a master at crafting his communications with the absolute minimum number of words simply because it takes him so long to create a simple sentence. While you won’t have that challenge, you should be inspired by his precision. You can blabber on for hours once the other person has given you sufficient permission, but until then think about Hawking when you craft your personal branding statement and your elevator pitch.

Your personal branding statement should be short enough to fit on one line on your business card. And you should use it there, in your email signature, in your blog postings or comments, as your LinkedIn Professional Headline, and anywhere else where it’s appropriate to promote yourself.

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By Walter Feigenson – June 11, 2009

Publishing your way into a strong personal brand

Of the many things you can do to help your Internet presence – your personal brand – publishing has the most leverage. I always say this in my presentations, and I’ve also written about it before, but here’s some proof.

Sunday, May 31, 2009, shortly after Microsoft’s new Bing search engine went public, I wrote a quick review. I thought it would be fun to write something quick, right after the release. What I didn’t count on is how much this helped my organic search results.

I’m writing this on Monday, June 1. If you search for “Bing search engine reviews” on Bing.com, my blog article is the first return!!! Microsoft’s own press release is the 8th return! Check out the my image capture, or try the search yourself. (Of course, by the time you try this, I could have been knocked off the first page.)

As you might expect, this is really exciting for me – and a little bit astonishing as well. What’s even more interesting is that my article is nowhere to be found using the same Google search. What does that mean about the Google and Bing article ranking systems?

So how does this relate to building a personal brand? It’s simple: I’m leaving “bread crumbs” on the Internet – it’s clear that I follow current trends, that I’m capable of analyzing them, and that I can put together some coherent thoughts on the subject (or so I hope).

This is all part of becoming a subject matter expert. The more evidence you have that you “get it” – whatever the “it” is for you – the more likely you are to be hired for a job you’re seeking or for a consulting assignment you’re bidding on. People are more likely to trust others they understand and think they can predict. I can tell you as a hiring manager, these were always big considerations: Joe Blow looks good in the interview, but can I predict his behavior after he’s an employee?

Notice that nothing in this equation  is an indicator of quality – your writing will have to stand on its own for that. But getting found is the first step. If you can demonstrate subject matter expertise, that’s the second step. Even if it isn’t directly related to what you do, it’s still important. Write about fly fishing if you want to. If you can show passion for fishing, the ability to think and communicate effectively, you’re very likely to show the same excellence in any job you undertake.

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By Walter Feigenson – June 1, 2009

The proper way to send and accept a LinkedIn invitation

linkedin-logoWhen you invite somebody to link to you on LinkedIn, please personalize the note that goes with the invitation. In fact, you should rarely – if ever – use the LinkedIn text defaults anywhere.

Here’s the default LinkedIn invitation text:

Walter,

I’d like to add you to my professional network on LinkedIn.

John

Pretty lame. It’s sort of like getting a birthday card from a close friend that’s signed but without any personal wishes. You probably wouldn’t do that in “real life,” so don’t do it with your LinkedIn greeting cards/invitations.

But there’s another reason: if your invitation goes to somebody you don’t know well, and if they don’t take the time to figure out who you are, they may hit the “I don’t know this person” button. If you get four of these, your account will be locked.

So what should you write? Here’s an example:

Hey Walt, we met last night at the SVASE networking event, where we spent some time talking about personal branding. Since we’re both trying to help people get found on the Internet, it would be beneficial for both of us to link.

John
john@email.address
925.555.1212

Let’s dissect this:

  • My greeting used the person’s nickname – the name he used when he introduced himself. I’m Walt in person, but Walter on LinkedIn. That’s an immediate sign that the sender knows me.
  • John provided context – where and when we met, and something about what we discussed. Very helpful.
  • He said why he wanted to link – and importantly, he told me that I would get something out of the link also, not just him.
  • He provided his contact information.

That’s probably all obvious except for the final point. Invitations come in from LI in their own messaging system. If your account is set up to send you an email when you get an invitation, you’ll receive it in your inbox, but you can’t reply because the sender’s real email address isn’t shown.

I like to reply from Outlook rather than from LinkedIn. Simple reason: I use an indexing program so I can search email and documents on my computer. For me, that’s essential, and I lose the capability if I answer from within LinkedIn. Small thing but a nice touch, because I may also want to call John before I accept the invitation.

Now a word on replying. As I said, never use the Linked in defaults! When I get an invitation – whether I accept it or not – I always send a message to the sender before accepting. I do it because I think it’s a matter of simple courtesy. If John has taken the time to craft his invitation, why shouldn’t I take a couple of minutes to reply? So, I hit the reply button (if I’m reading the message there), write my reply, hit send, and that takes me back to the invitation, which I accept.

Sometimes I get an invitation from a person I don’t know, or perhaps just don’t remember. Rather than pressing that dread “I don’t know this person” button, I’ll ask them to tell me how we know each other. If I get a reasonable reply, then I’ll accept the invitation. If not, and I don’t think the person is spamming, I’ll simply archive the message. That doesn’t count agains the sender, who may have made a simple mistake.

Should you accept all invitations? Until I started speaking on personal branding, my personal rule was to accept invitations only from people I felt I could recommend. Why? Because one key use of links is to ask your first degree links to introduce you to another of your first degree links. And you shouldn’t do that unless you feel comfortable about the person who asked.

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By Walter Feigenson – June 1, 2009

Microsoft’s new Bing search engine – worth a look

bing-logoMicrosoft’s news about their new search engine Bing almost got lost in the overwhelming coverage of Google’s next greatest thing, Wave.

If you’ve read about these two new offerings, as I have, you’ve probably been mislead, as I’ve been. While Microsoft and Google are strong competitors in the “evil company” disputes, it’s clear that Google owns the hearts of the press.

I watched about 30 minutes of the Google demo of Wave. Very nice, some really great ideas, and appropriate for a relatively small group of people who talk very loud. That’s a preliminary assessment I’ll probably come to regret making because Wave is really a platform that will be used for others to develop applications – and those will make or break it. For now, it’s a great tool for collaboration – clearly better than what’s available today. But I’m sorry to say I’ve built four Wiki sites that nobody has used. Most people don’t want to collaborate, or don’t know how, or are just too lazy.

Now let’s talk about Bing (and I don’t mean Crosby). TechCrunch published a story saying it was live finally, so I went to try the new contender.

I did the usual searches – my name, some companies I’ve worked for, local cities. Results are nice, the interface is very clean, and I’ll probably still use Google just because. Inertia is hard to overcome.

Then I tried one of the searches Erick Schonfeld suggested in his article: “rollercoasters.” Got some nice pictures – but wait…

bing-menu-contextIf you look at the left side of the screen, you’ll see that Bing claims to know something about the images it’s found. You can filter the results by size, layout (wide or tall), color (B&W or color), style (photo or illustration), and people (faces, head and shoulders). Perhaps I’m stretching things a little, but isn’t this what the so-called semantic web promised? Well, whatever you call it, I like this feature. It’s not perfect, but it’s very smart, and unlike so much we see today, it’s not a solution looking for a problem. This is something I’ve wanted ever since I started writing this blog.

Bing brings another element of data knowledge that you might find useful. Try Schonfeld’s “sore throat” query, and you’ll see that the results are categorized: remedies, relief, definition, surgery (ugh) and more. This isn’t the first time I’ve seen this in search engines, but it’s in the first product that could actually compete with Google.

Oh, while you’re looking at Bing, have a quick look at Kosmix, and check out their results for “sore throat.” It’s really lovely.

So, nice work Microsoft. Finally a serious competitor. And thanks for changing the name from Live Search. People may be crooning a new toon now that Bing is with us. (As Agent 99 used to say, sorry about that chief.)

Competition is good. Bing may re-light some of the passion in Google’s search. When you have as many users and as much success as Google has, it’s really hard to motivate (or allow) change. But Google is sure to answer with something richer than their current search, and we’ll all be better off.

In its early years, the software industry benefited from this kind of competition, but it’s long been dead. Microsoft owns applications, and Google owns search. The result is glacial development timetables for both – and often callous disregard of the needs of the customers.

This was just a cursory look at Bing – go take a look for yourself. It’s clearly worth your time.

Posted in Personal branding.

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By Walter Feigenson – June 1, 2009

Why you need a picture on your personal branding profiles

You need a picture on your LinkedIn profile. Why is that controversial? It shouldn’t be – this is your profile, and you can do whatever you want with it. If you want people to remember you, use a picture. End of story.

I’ve talked to hundreds of people about this, and I’ll share some of the excuses I’ve heard people give…

  1. I don’t have a professional picture.
    • Yeah, me too. No excuse. You probably bought some nice clothes for your interviews – well you won’t get to wear them if you don’t get any interviews. Spend a little money and get a good head shot.
  2. I don’t want people to see how old I am.
    • Get over it. They’re going to find out anyway.
  3. I don’t want people to know that I’m [African-American/Asian/Martian].
    • No slick answer on this one. It’s hard for me to relate to the problems “minorities” face. This may be a legitimate excuse, although I tend to think of it in the same terms as the age question.
  4. I don’t want to get disqualified by HR because they saw my picture.
    • I never even considered this until I saw it on Neal Shaffer’s blog. My comment on that blog stands: while HR people are not allowed to look at your picture – and may automatically disqualify you if your picture is attached to your resume – there is no way they can avoid pictures of people they are researching. So you may run into an HR person or recruiter who believes this, but I think it’s highly unlikely.
  5. I don’t know how to put my picture on LinkedIn.
    • This is the easiest objection. Just check out my blog – I have instructions for uploading your picture.

How about the benefits of using a picture, especially if you use the same one on all your profiles?

  1. Faces are easier to remember than names. If you’re out networking and you meet 30 people one evening, I guarantee you’ll remember the people who have a picture on their business card. And yes, I advise that as well as a picture on LinkedIn.
  2. Face memory isn’t just easier, it lasts longer. Thankfully, this isn’t a refereed journal, so I don’t have to cite any evidence. But you know it’s true.
  3. Images are part of your brand. That’s why companies spend soooo much money on logos. And it’s also why they use the same logo on each product, rather than changing it slightly each time. Who doesn’t know the Coca Cola or Pepsi Cola logos? You need to reinforce your brand in everything you do – that’s why I use my mug shot on my business card, my email, and my blog.

If you disagree with me, or if you want to add anything to this post, please leave comments. It would be interesting to hear some other opinions.

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By Walter Feigenson – May 25, 2009

Audience comments from a recent presentation

thumbs-up-smallThought I’d share comments from a presentation I did recently at Experience Unlimited in Oakland. They are unedited. Oh well, I did put a couple of comments in brackets – and no, I’m not going to wear a tie. Been there, done that.

This isn’t entirely self-serving. For those of you who don’t believe you can do this personal branding stuff, read the reviews. This was not a techie audience. YOU CAN DO THIS TOO!

Good Day, Walter:

THANK YOU for volunteering your time to speak yesterday at the Experience Unlimited general meeting.  Below is a snapshot of the feedback we received on your presentation.  We use a ranking scale of 1 to 5 with 1 being Excellent and 5 being Poor.

You ranked 1 – Excellent on the match between needs as a job seeker and the presentation.

You ranked 1 – Excellent on the credibility of the speaker on the topic.

You ranked 1 – Excellent on the quality and value of the audio-visual materials.

You ranked 1 – Excellent on the presentation overall.

We received 35 evaluation sheets and all indicated YES, they recommend inviting you back in the future.  Some of the comments were:

“Very Informative as well as entertaining.”

“Awesome speech.”

“Walter had a lot of good information with great examples and reasons for the power of on-line tools in the job and career searches!”

“Best presentation of Web 2.0 materials I’ve seen.  Very useful and Walt is a convincing authority on the subject.  Well done!”

“Just the information I need right now.”

“He provided timely information in a well-paced, easily comprehensive manner.”

“Walter, this was very helpful.  The WIX reference was really helpful.”

“Presented a lot of important information to today’s job seeker.  Real informative.”

“Next time focus on one element of branding, like on how to build a website.”

“Thank you! Excellent presentation!  You provided an excellent roadmap.  I’m excited to get started.  Your presentation was clear and your speaking style engaging.”

“Do hand outs with sites spelled out.” [This is too expensive for my free presentations.]

“Good info on on-line networking.”

“I like how the speaker broke the overwhelming amount of info into doable steps.”

“Relevant info for the job seeker.  Good sense of humor.  Maybe a tie for the next time you present?” [Forget the tie! You get what you get.]

“More time for this speaker.  Excellent material but not enough time for in-depth explanation.”

“I’m still a llittle worried about identify theft and would feel uncomfortable if that was talked about when doing internet personal branding.”

“Nice! Like the positive stuff.”

“Acquired a lot of specific sites that will be helpful in my journey to self marketing/self promotion.”

“Because the room is large, need to make sure ‘font’ on presentation is visible to back of room.”

“Most helpful, very specific information for improving your chance of getting noticed for that next opportunity – loved it!”

On behalf of the entire Experience Unlimited members and the Marketing team, thanks again for your participation in our program.

Zenaida Garvey
Marketing Department
Experience Unlimited Oakland Chapter

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By Walter Feigenson – May 11, 2009