Marketing Safari

Keynote Speaker on Social Media and Marketing for the Travel Industry

Talks and courses on social media and marketing are becoming a bigger and bigger part of my schedule. I am now booking 2011 and it looks like it's going to be an exciting year. This year and the last I've been running courses, live-blogging and giving talks at conferences in as different places as New York, Faroe Islands, Berlin and Latvia. My main focus has been on the travel industry though that is not always the case. Most popular are my two day courses on social media and Internet marketing for the travel industry.

I'm now booking 2011 and it looks like I'll be in Latvia, Belgium, Greenland, Denmark and Norway, as well as Iceland of course. Some other exciting events are being explored as well. Exact dates and location can be found on my "Keynote Speaker Schedule"

If you're interested in getting a talk at your event or a practical and effective course in your home town on how to use social media and the Internet, send me a line. 

Hjörtur Smárason
Keynote speaker on social media and marketing 
hjortur (at) scope.is 

When Does a Person Become a Brand?

People debate about the personal brand. Can a person be a brand? Is a person always a brand? Brooks Bayne challenged us marketers on Twitter, so I decided to explain how I see it.

A person is always a person, but not always a brand. Yes, a person always has a name and evokes some feelings from the people around him. But they know him personally.

Building your personal brand means building a reputation, a value related to your name, beyond those who know you personally. When your name has a meaning and value that reaches further than your personal network, you've started to build a personal brand. When your name has value and meaning that is widespread within an industry, nation wide or world wide, you can start to monetize on your brand. Artists do it, and so do actors, musicians, golfers, SEO experts, marketers, politicians... They use their personal brand to sell a product, service, an ideology, a cause. Bono is an example of a world wide brand built within the music industry but which Bono uses today to make the world a better place, to fight a cause.

Hjörtur

If this is your first time on my blog, you might want to consider subscribing to my feed or email updates (here on the left). You can also follow me on Twitter.

Avatars - How to Choose The Right Avatar

> If you're building your personal brand in Social media, I recommend you read this post too: Using Social Media to Build Your Personal Brand <

One of the most important things regarding your personal brand is your avatar. Almost all social media platforms ask for avatars. In some cases you have to choose from a library, but most of the time you can upload your own image. Like with all branding, it is important that you're consistent. So rule number one is: Use the same avatar everywhere.

In the last 24 hours a large part of the tweeple I follow have changed their visual identity. Michael Gray started the trend by going green

... and he was followed by most of the SEO's on Twitter that day. Except a few punky rebels who went blue. Or red.

One of the blue rebels and a red devil

and my green avatar in my attempt to be one of the cool kids ;)

But changing colours wasn't the only trend on Twitter yesterday. Suddenly everyone was "going manga". One after the other the avatars took on the Japanese manga style.

Mark Davidson and Lisa Dilg in their "manga outfit".

You can read Lisa's story on how manga saved her day on Twitterstars when she had gotten into this state:

I've been thinking quite a bit about avatars lately and I like personal pictures best. Eyes catch eyes, so they should be visible. Now cartoons can be nice and you can exaggerate certain character symbols in them. But those mangas are almost all made at FaceYourManga.com. It's great fun but leaves little room for differentiation. A face has a lot more to differentiate than a cartoon made online (though I have to admit that you can do amazing things on FaceYourManga). Anyway, I couldn't resist seeing what I would look like manga style:

Good examples of cartoon avatars are Maki's manga bunny, smallplaces' bug and Rohit Bargavas Lego figure:

When you're having a hard time finding a picture that does you justice (well, or shows how you want to look, instead of how you look), you might pick a picture from your college years, 20 years and 150 pounds ago. Or some even find a picture of someone else, like Rishi did:

Nope, it's actually not him licking that bottle. That discovery has been great disappointment to many of his eager followers.

Like in all marketing, standing out of the crowd is vital. You want people to recognize your avatar the moment they see it, if they come across it on another network. Using icons and logos makes that easier. Dave Winget's logo is an excellent sample of that:

Dave Winget, aka @Wingnut

But it's not as personal and inviting as having a face shot where your eyes are visible. So a combination of both is probably best. PodcastSteve and Guy Kawasaki have got excellent avatars that fulfill this criteria:

Steve's avatar is a graphic picture of him doing a podcast interview. Again, like in his name, he gets his profession across. That is excellent work. In Guy's avatar he has a hat and a pink scarf. In the background you can see green peas. It makes a good background, but there's also a message behind it. I asked Guy why he chose this avatar and he said the hat was because of this and the peas because of this.

When I chose my avatar, I just picked a picture of me that I thought was nice. In the background you can see a 12.000 year old mammoth tooth and a fossil fish whispering some ancient wisdom in my ear (or whatever ;).

My wife found another picture for me that she suggested I would use. It's from a beach trip to the La Jolla beach in San Diego:

(that's actually sea weed around my neck)

Of course you could submit your photo to Hot-or-Not to see what picture gets the best score :)

So, I asked my network on Twitter this question:

Why did you choose the avatar you're using?
And here are a few of the replies I got:

@ingridf
hmm. because it is silly. it says something about my frame of mind. because it was a spontaneous moment. a good memory.

@54degrees
It's my business logo and I use it in my social media accounts to brand it.

@pprlisa
I picked my "regular" avatar because its the ONLY pic of me I have EVER liked, EVER

@rockson
It was during my real estate classses and I do not like my picture on my cards. Here is a blog post on it. http://is.gd/1D58

@LaraK
It's a photo of me that I like. It makes a good avatar b/c it's friendly and approachable, and people get a sense of who I am

@seosylph
because a) she's my sylph and b) I'm kinda shy.

How about you, why did you choose the avatar you're using? You can reply in the comments below.

Cheers
Hjörtur
(that would be @hjortur on Twitter)

Like this article? There's more coming up. Make sure you subscribe to me feed so you won't miss out on the new stuff.

Using Social Media to Build Your Personal Brand

Chris Brogan wrote a great post on the tools and methods you can use to promote your personal brand online. It's 100 great tips I encourage you to check out.

It got thinking about one thing you should have figured out before you go through that list of 100 tips. That is, what the brand is you're promoting? So here are 8 questions to answer before you go ahead:

1. What's your name?
Sounds like a silly question, but if your name is Pete or John or any other name that is shared with thousands, you may have a hard time distinguishing yourself from the rest. I can take two of my online friends as an example, Pete and Steve. They have such names. It's easier to remember than my name, Hjortur, but it's also harder to find in the crowd. So they are not just Pete and Steve, they are dr. Pete and podcastSteve. PodcastSteve is a double score because it says in the name what he does for a living (you guessed it - podcasting :). Choose a name before you register accounts on all social media so that you're promoting your brand name everywhere.

2. What's your job title?
Senior Account Manager? Assistant Director of Marketing? Marketing Manager? Some time ago I came across a guy on LinkedIn who's job title was "Director of Fun". I immediately sent him an invitation because who wouldn't want to know the director of fun? He later changed jobs and got a job as a "marketing manager". Who isn't a marketing manager in our circles? So he changed his job title to Head of Magic. Much better.

3. What's your mission?
Why are you doing this? Do you want to be a social media rock star? Or is it just for fun? Do you want clients, travel partners, speaking gigs or even publish a book? Knowing what the purpose of your online being is, will help you evaluate opportunities and make decisions on what to do and where to go.

4. What's your target group?
Are you trying to build awareness within a certain group? Connecting with people you can learn from or who would be likely to become your clients? Do you want to talk to blogging moms, internet marketers, travelers?

5. Where do you find your "targets"?
There are different social media sites for different interests. There is no need in building a profile on every social network you can find. Try to figure where your target group is most active and invest most of your time there, whether it's Twitter, Sphinn, Travellerspoint, or something completely different. Some are big enough to include most groups while others only include one specific interest.

6. What's your strength?
Realize where your biggest strength is and build on that so that you can become even stronger. Stay focused on your thing but yet aware about the environment and related areas. Make sure you have your "elevator pitch" or mantra as Guy Kawasaki would call it all worked out and put that into your one line bio, in the header of your blog, your signature in your email or forums, on your business card and else where, so that people will know right away what it is that you do and are really good at.

7. What's your weakness?
Admit it. Mine is organizing which makes me double as busy as I need to be. Don't waste your time on improving your weakness. Find someone else who's good at doing what you suck at and stay out of it. (I should take my own advice on this one ;). Focus on your strength and what you're best at, that will get you where you want to be.

8. What is your purple cow?
Related to six, this is where you are exceptional, where you stand out, are extra-ordinary. The thing about you people would actually talk about when you're not around. Often, that's the bad stuff, but find that good stuff that would make people talking and make it visible (by doing it or being it, not by saying it).

If you've got more, share it with us in the comments below.

Hjörtur

I'm a Twitter Virgin

Yes, I admit it. I have never used Twitter. Even though so much of my time is on social media sites, I haven't done twitter yet. That is, until today.

I decided to sign up. The reason I decided to do so is because a service I really like on Facebook was shut down. The Blogfriends service. I read the statement from the designers who ran out of cash and had to shut down. But they offered people to follow them on Twitter so I decided to finally go for it.

As I have mentioned earlier my name is very easily branded. I'm the first person in history called Hjörtur Smárason (maybe that will change if I become an A-list blogger ;). And there are not many called hjortur either. So I like to be able to pick my first name as my username. But guess what. It was taken on Twitter. I was very frustrated. Twitter isn't popular in Iceland. In fact, I don't know anyone who's using it here. So who could it be that beat me to my name. I checked the profile and saw that it had actually never been used or updated. And guess what the full name was. My name. It was my own profile I created some time ago and had completely forgotten about. So I just signed in and started twittering.

Within 5 minutes of adding my connections to follow I had come across the name Shel Israel a couple of times. Never seen it before so I didn't pay much more attention to that. I added Guy Kawasaki and decided to check out updates on his blog and from there, his new website, alltop.com. It's a website with a selection of other excellent websites and their feeds. So I checked out a couple of categories including the Egos category (maybe I'll make it there one day). There I noticed an article titled My Twitter Follow Policy written by ... guess who! No other than Shel Israel. I still know nothing about that person, but I'm obviously ment to find out today. And I guess the best way will be to follow him on Twitter. I think I'll pass his screening. I'll just have to add my photo :)

So if you would like to follow me on Twitter, check me out on www.twitter.com/hjortur. I don't know yet how active I'll be, I guess we'll just have to find out. I've already got my first follower, my fellow Trendhunter HappyHotelier.

Cheers
Hjörtur

update: I should have known Shel Israel. I recognised his book. Just bad with names. Very bad :(

Lindsay Lohan's Sex Tape Scandal With Callum Best

Lindsay Lohan is a brand, like every big name actor and actress in Hollywood. Her name sells. But lately she has got negative publicity, been in rehab, involved in scandals etc. Her sun doesn' shine like it used to. Now that she is out of rehab she has to get her career back on track. So what can a young girl do?

There are a few options that get your name on the top ten list over search queries. One is getting out of a car with no pants on, but that's allready been done. Another one is taking it a step further and leaking a sex tape. Or an image that proofs the existence of a sex tape.

I must say, that the Lindsay Lohan sex tape scandal is just too perfect to be a coincident. It get's leaked in a forum where someone says she got the pic from a "friend" of Lindsay Lohan. It's a very blurry picture, as you can see, that is supposed to be taken on a mobile phone. Actually, it's impossible to see who is on that picture.

When the pic is out a few people witness Lindsay on the phone calling Callum Best, her ex-boyfriend, furious over the picture and using the horrific f-word. Neither of them acknowledges or denies the authenticity of the picture. At least not in the beginning but the phone call makes people believe that the picture is real and that there actually is a sex tape that might be found somewhere on the internet.

After a few days it is said the picture is fake and Lindsay is cleared from all negative effects of the scandal. But people still believe there is a sex tape out there that might surface any day so they will keep searching for Lindsay Lohan online.

So what happens to the poor exposed girl? She get's massive exposure, hits the top ten list of search queries and it wouldn't surprise me if she would land a new role soon where she is not just an innocent teenage girl anymore, nor a fucked up teen, but a young sexy woman. I mean, she has just proved how many millions want to see her naked. And she didn't do anything wrong, it's just someone taking advantage of the state she was in before she went to rehab at worst, and it's just a fake at best (or Best).

Excellent branding, Lindsay, and welcome back on track :)

Hjörtur

Let's Connect - Ajay Jain's book on LinkedIn

I read a book over Easter called Let's Connect: Using LinkedIn to get ahead at work written by Ajay Jain, a blogger and journalist.

The book is not a manual about LinkedIn and how to use it but a book about the principles behind using LinkedIn as a networking tool and the philosophy behind it. In it Ajay talks about how you can make the most of LinkedIn, the worlds largest network of professionals with over 17 million participants, for your professional career. Let's Connect is based on his research and interviews with participants on LinkedIn and is full of great quotes and real examples of effective use of the LinkedIn network.

I signed up on LinkedIn in September last year and it has turned out to be a great move. I have learned a lot from Questions and Answers, got to know great people and got projects and business opportunities I would never have imagined. Part of it is thanks to Ajay Jains white paper on how to use LinkedIn which was the start of this book.

This new book, Let's Connect, is full of great tips on how to make LinkedIn work for you. I realized there is still so many opportunities on LinkedIn that I haven't fully utilized yet. Business is all about communication between the right individuals and LinkedIn is the place to start that communication. As Ajay asks at the beginning of his book, "Do you want to be Linked In or Linked Out?" The choice is yours. It's a network of professionals on all levels, including executives from almost all the Fortune 500 companies, known authors and specialists. One of Ajay's examples of users of Answers is Barack Obama who posted the question: How can the next President better help small business and entrepreneurs thrive? A smart use of the LinkedIn network.

The most valuable chapter, and by far the largest, is chapter 5 "Ten ways to get LinkedIn to work for you". There Ajay covers these ten topics:

i Your Ever Expanding Rolodex
ii LinkedIn Answers: A Global Focus Group
iii Networking Plus
iv Branding and Marketing Yourself
v Hiring People
vi Finding a Job You Love
vii Finding Vendors and Service Providers
viii Running Background Checks
ix Entrepreneurs: Get Opinions and Investors
x Selling & Brand Building

I would have liked to see more on using LinkedIn for personal branding, but then again, personal branding is one of my special interests. Other chapters where eye opening for me about subjects I had not given much thought before.

If you are serious about advancing your professional career and making the most of your personal brand and your network, LinkedIn is a must and Ajay's book "Let's Connect" is your guide, whether you're new to LinkedIn or not.

Hjörtur

Let's Connect on Amazon.com

My Branded Baby

"A child is the ultimate startup, and I have three. This makes me rich".

This is the first sentance in Guy Kawasaki's "The Art of the Start". Well, I have four and I'm expecting my fifth startup, eeeh, child. The first four have all been a success, so we are starting up the fifth one.

Now, the baby isn't expected until May 2008. Since I work in marketing and branding, it is interesting to think about my baby's first brand. What is the first brand it will own, or wear, or know. But guess what. I just realized that my baby has all ready been branded, more then 5 months before it is expected to enter this world!

And do you want to know who did it? It wasn't me, I can tell you that. It was General Electric that did it.

After Christmas we went to the doctor for an ultrasound. And even though it is my fifth, it's always amazing to actually see the baby on the screen, alive and kicking. So, we got a few snapshots to take home and show the family. And guess what. In the upper left corner of the very first picture of my unborn baby it has been marked with a logo. The logo of General Electric!

No wonder General Electric is one of the most valuable brands in the world, if they start branding almost every human being before they are even born! I think my son (yes, it's a boy) should get a 20% discount of all purchases from General Electric as long as he lives since they branded his pictures before he was even born. And I thought Facebook was bad with invading the privacy of my personal pictures.

Out of courtesy to my unborn son, I have not added the logo of my company, Scope Communications to his picture, nor the one of any other of his sponsors. Out of respect to his privacy, I don't even show his face, only toes. It's bad enough to brand his toes on the world wide web.

Hjörtur Smárason

Personal Branding - Marketing Guru Seth Godin Gone Overboard?

Personal branding is very important in todays job market, if you want to advance your carrier. Specially if you're working freelance or as an independent consultant. You need to make a name for yourself. And not only need you be consistent in your carrier moves, you need to stand out from the crowd.

One talented marketing guy from Toronto, Saul Colt, became my connection on LinkedIn because of his creative job title - Director of fun! Now who wouldn't want to know the director of fun? If Saul's job title would have been just "Marketing Manager", I would never have noticed him, read his blog and become a connection. He has been very actively branding himself. He will probably be happy to be mentioned in the same blog post on marketing gurus and personal branding as Seth Godin and I'm pretty sure he will find my blog when he Google's "Saul Colt" (maybe I should mention Saul Colt just once more to rank higher on Google for "Saul Colt") :). Googling yourself is probably one of the best ways to monitor your personal brand. Are the top results something you want to stand for or are they pictures of you drunk on Facebook, old court rules or scandals?

Marketing Guru Action Figure?
Seth Godin is probably the strongest personal brand within marketing. He's done a great job marketing his balled head on the cover of his books and if anyone is a marketing guru, its him. But when I read his blog yesterday I thought he'd gone overboard. You see, you can now buy an actual Seth Godin Marketing Guru Action Figure. I'm not kidding. I know he's a marketing guru, I know he's a top guy, but an action figure??? Isn't that a bit over the top? It's a purple cow all right and certainly stands out from the crowd, but still ...

First I thought it was his own creation for his fans, which would have been terribly egoistic and lame, but it's not. The Seth Godin Marketing Guru Action Figure is a part of a series created by Archie McPhee and Seth Godin is in good company with Edgar Allan Poe, Jesus, Freud and Mozart. Seth is one of the few still living though. That makes this the ultimate success in personal branding. Congratulations Seth! (I'm not sure Seth Godin will read my blog though, or that I will rank high on Google for "Seth Godin", but if you do, Seth, congratulations!)

Hjörtur Smárason
(not available as an action figure yet)