Patrick Tanguay has written a great manifesto about the central role of tone of voice in the blog world: I Am A Media, Not The Media.
It’s in the tone and it’s part of a pattern (or lack thereof). When Sylvain Twitters about his company looking for a job candidate, he’s reaching out to his tribe, to his friends and colleagues. You know he’ll be happy to give a hand in turn when he can, you know he’ll give credit, mention partners and cite sources. He’s using the technology to enhance the social aspect. When Bubba links to his most recent ad-ridden post, without any comment and you see he’s got 666 friends, you have to wonder if the tone is right.
I’ve always been very skeptical about the whole “personal brand” movement – although I hope I come across well in my blog, and I do write here about things that are professionally relevant to me, this space is always about me as an individual, not me as simply a commercial entity. I think that anyone who is involved in this kind of thing professionally would do well to keep a clear distinction between their commercial activity and their personal space on the web.
That’s where the “personal brand” people often lose me. I want to have a beer with a person, not with a company, and all too often that distinction is lost on people. And when the lack of such distinctions starts to invade my “social” space – well, it’s boring and somewhat abusive of my time, trust and goodwill. It’s almost as if a kind of mild autism is at play – autism in the sense that there are people can’t gauge context very well and don’t understand that what is cool in one environment is the opposite in another.
See also Sylvain (cited above by Patrick) and the post to which he linked on the weekend, HOWTO network without becoming a disingenuous weasel by Merlin Mann. As Sylvain put it, it’s about an ethic of reciprocity.
Nadia says
Another attempt to infiltrate every possible personal space with marketing.
Vikram Rajan says
Principal Skinner once told Ms. Krabapul that he was amazed at her ability “to be personally offended by broad social movements.”
Point being: Personal Branding at its most basic form is being conscious of – and then taking action on – how others perceive us, i.e., our reputation.
If we choose to dress up or dress down, we’re being conscious of how others will perceive us. The “movement” has just branded what we do naturally as self-conscious professionals.
Personal Brand Marketing is how professionals use this sort of techniques to develop our practices.
So don’t be afraid.
be very afraid. :)
~ Vikram
PersonalBrandMarketing.com
mikel says
Well said, Vikram, and if that’s all it is – I’ve been practicing personal brand marketing for most of my career.
The problem is that for many it goes much further than that. It isn’t just being conscious about how others perceive us, for many, it’s about pushing a highly commercial style of interaction into social space – and often inappropriately.
It’s all about being able to contextualize appropriately and understand tone of voice – and use the appropriate tone in the appropriate context. A lot of people seem to get that wrong.