Build Your Digital Brand on LinkedIn

Remember Adrian Monk in his detective series? He was a tidy freak, but it was his obsessing over details that helped him solve those murder cases. Like Mr. Monk, I’m feeling persnickety, and just as Monk wisely points out that the dead guy in the dark room couldn’t have turned off the lights, it bugs me that people using LinkedIn don’t take advantage of the ability to have a personalized URL for their profile. To me it seems obvious and it’s so easy to get one! When you sign on to LinkedIn, you get an elongated URL that’s automatically generated. You — yes, you — can customize this URL so it is simple to remember and supports your personal brand. In my opinion, claiming your name here is key, but my preference shouldn’t stop you from inventing something else. Like coming up with a personalized license plate, you just need to think it through. If you were a tattoo artist, you might use “inkbeneaththeskin” or if you were the CEO of a bakery chain, maybe you’re “dollars4donuts”. For a straightforward solution, take my LinkedIn URL as an example. At the time I set up my account I was able to customize the last text to “marionguthrie”, my name. If you have a common name like Tom Smith or Cathy Jones, you may need to add a middle initial or a code, or you may decide to go the customized route with a word that reflects on your competency. Then you can use your LinkedIn URL in your signature line or any place where you want to direct interested people to a summary of your professional accomplishments; i.e. your LinkedIn profile. It’s a value added! While we’re talking about LinkedIn, another pet peeve of mine is this: please try to get at least three recommendations. Three is LinkedIn’s suggested minimum. Recommendations are your ad; your third-party endorsement. They humanize your profile and make you more appealing and credible. Superman’s list of jobs outlining him as a reporter and sometimes superhero become so much more colorful and engaging when there’s a recommendation that says, “He leaps tall buildings in a single bound.” Don’t you think? Also be “in with the in-crowd” and take advantage of the three website links on your LinkedIn profile. Include links to your personal website as well as your company’s. Be creative. Since I haven’t finished my company website yet, one of my links provides a list of my Talent Zoo articles written to date, which gives me a chance to showcase some of my writing. If you’ve joined Tumblr or Gust or any other community, you can use that URL too. (With Facebook, use with caution; ask yourself, “What would Mary Poppins say?”) These links help build up your persona as a business executive who is participating in the digital age, not just standing on the sidelines. Last but not least, there is great value in generating content on LinkedIn that can also be published (if you check the birdie box) on Twitter. Why bother? Aside from the fact that you might learn something (oh, I sound like my Mom), the updates you write and post in that little LinkedIn box at the top of your profile are a great way to stay top of mind with your LinkedIn contacts and it helps build your credibility when you share interesting news stories or blogs or opinions. In addition, when you check that Twitter box, your LinkedIn update will post automatically to your Twitter. And voila, you’ve amplified your message’s reach. It’s not like Facebook, Twitter, About.Me, or Google+ (although I’m not sure any one has figured out Google+ quite yet). LinkedIn is a distinctive social media tool and it’s all about business. So use it to find opinion leaders in your field, to locate your next speaker for that association meeting, or to uncover the heads of those companies you’re targeting for your next sales effort. Or use it to discover who to network with to find that next project or that next job. Just do me a favor and personalize your LinkedIn URL. When you attach that URL to your communications, you’re creating a link to your profile where folks can see just how good you really are. As far as being a bit compulsive, it gives me solace that Mr. Monk was far worse. Here’s some proof!

 

Finding Your One Thing

Before you start building your marketing plan for 2013, have you decided whether your company’s identity is more like Procter & Gamble or if it’s more like Rubbermaid?  It’s an important distinction. You see, P&G’s attention is on their products and they have developed unique brand identities for each of them.  But Rubbermaid’s brand approach defines all of their products as sturdy, durable, and the right solution for my storage problems.  So what about your company? Another way to think of it is, if Apple equals Innovation and Disney is Magic, what is your brand? Is it unique products, each with its own identity? Or is it one name and what that encompasses? Just like the guy in City Slickers, before you go running off deciding which social media campaigns to launch and whether or not you need a mobile app, you’ve got to decide on that “one thing”, and that is the voice of your brand and the focus of your strategy across every network, and in every channel.

 

5 Ways the New Facebook Builds Brands

On March 30, brand pages on Facebook that have not made the change to the new Timeline format will automatically be converted. This means that if you haven’t updated your company’s page by Friday, Facebook will do it for you. The impetus behind the new format is that Facebook wants businesses to act and interact like people.  Steering away from a “buy now” approach, they’ve incorporated strong visuals, fan loyalty techniques, and storytelling to encourage brand interaction. They’re imposing some guidelines too.  Facebook’s design lead Sam Lessin explains: “The key with cover photos is storytelling and expression. We want to create a good experience for everyone, and we think these guidelines really help brands…They’re encouraging people to create engaging content that people want to come back to.”

When you start to examine the new format, you’ll quickly see that there are five major modifications in these Facebook brand pages. First, like a cover photo on a magazine, there’s a widescreen image at the top of the page. This is your brand’s first impression to attract your audience. And to ensure that you keep it inviting, Facebook has imposed image guidelines that exclude your using this space as a billboard for website addresses, contact information, or promotions.

Second, placed vertically on the right is the historical timeline. This is an opportunity to showcase your brand’s stories. Different from the old format, here companies are able to add past events that don’t necessarily tie into the date on which they joined Facebook, i.e. a company’s founding or other milestone. This is a great method for humanizing your brand and showcasing your credibility through strong engaging content.

Third, to help you drive traffic to key areas, Facebook has introduced the ability to make selected content “sticky” for seven days. The new Timeline format gives brands the option to “pin” key information to the top of the page so you can highlight important content like that hot promotional offer or the free white paper.

Fourth, there are also some handy new admin capabilities for page managers built into the Timeline so you’ll be able to view metrics about your page performance, edit content, and respond to messages from every day users. In addition, your consumers will be able to message your brand directly and you, in turn, will be able to provide tailored responses to specific questions or comments. Also, instead of deleting posts, you can curate your content, hiding comments that are out of date or inappropriate.

Finally, in addition to these aesthetic and functional changes, this new format will be an impetus for brands to develop their own custom apps that build on Facebook’s new social applications. It will promote the development of “Open Graph” apps, which have their data tapped for ad targeting, an area of business focus for Facebook. Timeline is a sophisticated evolution of the Facebook experience; it’s one that’s grown to gain a more comprehensive and detailed picture of the user’s interactions. It will influence the way companies deliver their Facebook strategies. These new capabilities will require more time and attention but are something your business will want to maximize. What are your thoughts on this new format? I’d love to read your comments.

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