The Education of Millionaires - Michael Ellsberg [102]
Soon she found herself with a small but growing and devoted following online. Some people started asking her to coach them on their own video marketing efforts, and like that, she had clients, and money started coming in.
Maria started to gain the attention of some bigger bloggers and websites. “I started going to live events and conferences, showing up everywhere, and the people there, including the speakers onstage, would have heard of my social media and video presence. A lot of them knew who I was before I even met them.”
That’s the essence of building your own brand. People having heard of you—and having a positive impression—before you’ve even met them. If you can create that effect, doors open for you. A close second, if that’s not possible, is people getting a good impression of you very quickly when they Google you.
Maria Andros is now widely considered one of the top experts about building one’s brand and business through online video. She left her job, markets her services under her own name now (http://mariaandros.com), and has broken well into six figures of earnings, on a completely flexible, boss-free schedule.
A huge question many people have, when they venture into building a brand for themselves, is whether the brand should be their own name or whether they should come up with some name that caters to the industry/niche/market they work in. Maria is adamant that, even if you work for or own another company, you should always build up branding around your own name as well. “No matter what you’re up to, you need to market yourself and your name. Make sure you get YourName.com. If it’s already taken, put some creative twist on it, but make sure you have your own home for your own brand on the Internet, which serves as the meeting place for blogging, YouTube, Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn.”
I’ve seen many people make the mistake of trying to “brand” some kind of concept or niche rather than their own name. If they’re building a career in the telecommunications industry, for example, they’ll try to build their brand using some generic-sounding site like “Telecom Insider,” thinking that it sounds more professional or that it offers better keywords and SEO.
Unless you come up with some insanely catchy brand other than your own name, or you are planning to build up a business that you eventually want to sell, this is usually a mistake. People care much more about other people than they do about companies or keyword-laden URLs. Even if you work for another company or are building a company totally separate from your own identity, you should separately and simultaneously build up your online brand around you as a person, not around a concept, a company, or a niche. Companies, niches, and keywords come and go. Your own personal brand stays with you for life.
The single best passage I’ve ever read about branding, from the countless books on branding I’ve read, comes from the book The Brand Called You: Make Your Business Stand Out in a Crowded Marketplace by Peter Montoya. It relates directly to Maria’s point:If you’ve given in to the temptation to name your [personal brand] Alliance Capital Investment or Thinkwell Marketing and Design or some other dreadful thing, stop what you’re doing and pay attention.
You must name your [brand] after yourself. Period. No one calls to talk to Alliance Capital; they call to talk to you. No one refers Thinkwell; they give your name and number to their colleague who needs advertising. You create the value, not your company name. Let’s face it, the only reason