Do you recall the Pringle’s old slogan: “Once you pop, you can’t stop”? Its intended meaning was that once you pop off the top of the Pringles can, you can’t stop eating – this is very similar to Personal Branding.
Actually, while I was doing my research about the slogan, I came across a smart come back “If Pringles are so good that once you pop, you can’t stop, why do they come with a re-sealable lid?” – Pringles might come with a lid, but unfortunately Personal Branding doesn’t.
About three years ago, I was tasked with hiring a team of marketers to help me run the Food Division at one of the renowned FMCG distributors in Lebanon. During the interviewing process, I was asked by one of the candidates what were my expectations of her as a marketing executive. I told her that I would understand if she doesn’t feel like working, I can also understand that she feels tired and she wants to go home, but she can never tell me that the job is done – a marketer’s job is never over!
Personal branding by definition is the process whereby people and their careers are marked as brands. Success in Personal Branding comes from self-packaging. In his book, Me 2.0, Dan Schawbel defines Personal Branding as “the process by which individuals differentiate themselves and stand out from a crowd by indentifying and articulating their unique vale preposition, whether professional or personal, and then leveraging it across platforms with a consistent message and image to achieve a specific goal.” Sounds like a lot of work, well it is!
A brand can never be self-sustainable, it requires continuous tweaking, updating, refreshing, face-lifting … this applies to your personal brand as well. Recently, I haven’t been very active on my social media platforms … who am I kidding, if I were dead I would be more active that I was for the past two months. I haven’t posted anything on my blog since mid May – and in the social media world, the world of NOW, that is a very long time. So how did putting the lid back on my personal branding can affect the taste – logically, I lost the crunchiness, the rich aroma, and the rush …
– Blog visitors dropped from an average of 2000 per month to a mere 600
– Facebook Fan page post quality (measures how engaging your Posts have been to Facebook users over a rolling seven-day window) dropped down to a BIG FAT ZERO
– My twitter mentions are close to zilch
– My spot on the Klout matrix moved from being a Persona to being a Connector – the modified Klout positions me as a Feeder
– I failed loyal readers of my blog
You can tell that my brand has suffered greatly from my disappearing act. One of the preachers of personal branding and a good friend of mine, Mohammad, said it very wisely – “Focus on being 100% present”.
In a comment from Natasha on my Personal Branding – The 10 Commandments post, she quoted Jason Hartman, who said “Your personal brand is a promise to your clients… a promise of quality, consistency, competency, and reliability.” You never break a promise!
This post is dedicated to Jason Sibert, who subscribed to my blog on February 21, 2010. Jason has his own blog entitled Internet Marketing Insider’s Secrets. Two weeks ago, Jason sent me an email and in it he said, “Hey John, I noticed you haven’t posted anything for a bit. I hope everything is OK and that you are prospering. I always look forward to your articles …” After reading Jason’s email, I sat there in complete silence, and I wasn’t sure whether to feel great that I have this level of loyalty from my readers, or feel serenely sad because I have broken a promise! I would like to sincerely thank you Jason for this wakeup call, and your kind words.
Lesson learned from all of this is that in Personal Branding, once you pop, you can’t stop – and you can forget about the lid … Think About It!
Build it and they will come, mentality… you have to exercise your branding muscles daily.
Great reminder my friend.
Very true buddy – our personal branding muscles require daily exercise and they also require a variation in our exercise techniques – this is what i refer to in my post as ” tweaking, updating, refreshing, face-lifting” – thanks for the inspiration!
I knew you were busy so I didn’t want to bug you, but I was looking forward to your return! I loved the post and can completely understand. For the past week, I have been the definition of AWOL, or at least I feel like it! The convention I work on happened. I didn’t even check in on foursquare!
Well, as you said, sometimes we lose track of things and we get consumed with the world around us – so i completely understand how you feel. I’m glad you like the post.
Dear John,
You entered the social media realm hoping to inspire people, help them with their business and get them captivated by your brand- You.
You are your brand and your readers are your customers. They receive valuable information from your posts, which is why their expectations of what you have to offer are constantly increasing. The more they read, the more they want, and this is where your blog title applies: “Once you pop, you can’t stop”. They’ve had a taste of your great brand (John Antonios) and now, they keep coming back for more.
Your never-ending job as a marketer is to meet and exceed their expectations, in order to keep them satisfied if not delighted, so that you can retain your customers. Unfortunately, you are not the only marketer out there, nor are you a monopoly in the social media world. However, you do have a great differentiation strategy that allows you to enjoy sustainable competitive advantage: Your promise of “quality, consistency, competency, and reliability”.
Sam Walton who founded Wal-Mart said that the two most important words he ever wrote were on the first Wal-Mart sign which stated “Satisfaction Guaranteed”. Your blogging, twittering, Facebooking etc…were what kept customers coming back. Once you pulled your “disappearing act” as you called it, you lost track of what got you to “a Persona” in the first place: your readers.
Loyalty is a relative term. In the fast-moving world of today, what is loyalty really? Customers look for their best interest, for whoever can keep their needs satisfied. I know you accuse me of being a realist as opposed to you, an idealist, but I look at the facts and figures you stated above and I can confidently say that they prove my point. The readers that were expecting you to satisfy them with witty posts, moved on to substitutes that were able to meet their needs during your “absence”.
Nonetheless, I say substitutes because, try as they may, your rivals can never take your readers away from you indefinitely. This is thanks to the quality of your writings, your competence as a social media marketer and your reliable brand that centers on honesty and clarity.
You owned up to your mistake. You apologized. You thanked your “customers” for giving you their feedback, and finally, you made adjustments to your branding strategy by taking corrective action. All these rare but honorable qualities that you offer your readers will get those numbers sky-high again and help you recover from this “glitch” in no time.
As a loyal reader of your blog, I wish you the best of luck!
Natasha Salameh
I’m not sure how to reply to such a perfect comment – i think i will suffice by saying thank you Nat for always being there to read between the lines and highlight the essence of my posts.
Hi John, nice to have you back! I agree that marketing and branding is a consistent effort, it is never done and this is the hardest thing for individuals and companies to grasp. To remain consistently visible particularly in digital media you have to be consistently present. While your brand image remains consistent it is your visibility that suffers when you are out of sight for too long. True of traditional media as well as digital media. It is hard work but worth it.
It’s good to be back Karen – it’s such a rewarding feeling to be able to interact with like-minded intellects, such as yourself. There’s a saying in Arabic that goes something like this “Out of site, Out of heart” – this is exactly what happened to my brand – the disappearing act pulled me of the grid – we live in the world of NOW and as marketeers we can’t afford to waste a single second!
Thanks for your trust Karen, it means a lot!
John-
This was worth the wait. Now I would be curious, as a follow up, as to how long it takes after “taking a break” from your personal branding to re-establish your previous level of interest an loyalty, as measured by the metrics you’ve already outlined here.
Yeah, I know. I’m a nerd. But I believe most things CAN be quantified, and thus studied, reported, and improved. Thoughts?
Looking forward to seeing your wisdom more frequently.
I agree with you, everything can be quantified, but we should not cling on to the numbers – i’m sure you agree that we should try to understand the significance behind them. Watching the evolution of my relatively new brand is truly a learning experience. I have seen my blog readership reach a high of 816 views per day and tried to understand why, and I also got to see that number fall way below 20 and I also analyzed why! Now I want to analyze how my brand dusts it off and fly again … I will definitely be blogging about my learning and will keep you posted about the numbers 🙂
But my biggest reward my dear Craig is the interaction generated by those who visit my blog. Comments such as your put a smile on my face and push me forward to give, give, and then some. thank you!
Hi John, So nice to see you back. I thought that you were either extremely busy with other ventures or heading in another direction. You will always have your loyal followers. The fact that you lost followers is not a testament of your branding and marketing but rather a testament of their shallowness. Your content is always without doubt both valuable , informative and above all else honest, sincere and straight from the heart. P.S. You are entitled to time out, we all have issues and family crisis etc etc or just need time to evaluate fow whatever reason.
First off, thank you for believing in me and my work that much Sheila. True everyone is entitled for their time off, but i think even that has a structure. Think of it this way, if I were a TV station and all of a sudden I went of the air without any kind of warning – people would not really accept that. I’m far from being a TV station, but the point I’m trying to make is that I owe to my loyal readers and friends to be forthcoming about any intended disappearing act – don’t you agree?
Once again, thank you for being there!
John,
Well, I know that while you were taking a “break” from social media, you were very busy with your business and traveling. However, even taking a “break” proved to be valuable. You clearly demonstrated the importance of what we marketers call “keeping your momentum”, with great quantifiable results. So, thanks again (and you weren’t even trying)!
Your article also reminds me that one’s business (brand) should be considered a living and breathing entity. When there is consistent activity with one’s business, it is alive and healthy. When activity stops, it begins to wither.
Which brings me to my next thought. Because we are challenged daily with distractions and the unexpected every day, it is easy to drop the ball on our own business. That is where outsourcing comes in. One of the pay-offs of developing your brand is that later on, when your hard work has paid off, you can then afford to outsource some of the simple, but very time consuming tasks, such as certain social media activities, answering emails, maintaining marketing accounts, etc. This will leave you to the more important duties, namely decision making and working on building and expanding your own brand further.
Thanks again, John, for your thought provoking message. You just helped me form my idea for my next article as well.
All the best,
Jason Sibert
“A brand as a living entity” – i love that – it fits perfectly with what Mohammed said in his comment as well – “you have to exercise your branding muscles daily” – as you said, one has to keep the momentum going, otherwise it might wither and die!
Please do feel free to post the link to your new post as a reply to this one, I would love people to follow through- this is how we create value!
Keep’m coming!
Hi John:
I try (very hard) to remain on the social networks and interact with folks both personally and professionally every day. I also co-moderate #IMCChat with Beth Harte every Wednesday night, which helps me to stay 100% present as your dear friend says. My biggest weakness is my blog which is suffering terribly due to my day job and just not finding the time to post (although I have a long list of things to write about). I forgive myself on that one though and will get to it when the time is right.
At the same time you have to realize you are one person who can only do so much. It’s a matter of prioritizing as well. People are my priority. The exchange of ideas and knowledge is exhilerating to me.
I never really felt that you left. Your personality and energy carry on while you’re not here, ha! I enjoy your reaching out to me and always hope we can stay connected. So if we’re using the Pringles analogy, the lid is there to keep you fresh on days you may not always be able to “pop” up.
Have a great day!
I loved how you linked back to the Pringles analogy – thanks Anna. You’re right, prioritizing is key in such a busy world – I, like you, care mostly about the interaction I have with people. I consider our chats and blog comments part of that – it gives me such a rewarding feeling to do so on a daily basis.
I’d love to join in on your chat some day – please feel free to add a link to it on this post so like-minded people can join in.
Catch you on twitter!
Very nice article, my friend. Truth be told – you disappear, so will the attention you get. But, sometimes the reasons for disappearing are more important than the reasons for being here. If so, no shame in that whatsoever. Good luck John!
Social media is a way of life, I noticed too that you have been slacking lately, I know you are too busy, but one or too updates a day are better than no activity, I’m looking forward to read your blog more often.