The saying ‘Knowledge is power’ is only partly true. Knowledge, in itself, isn’t power. It’s the application of knowledge that’s powerful.

Which is why I enjoy providing an opportunity for event participants to ‘drill-down’ and explore the impact reputation branding, and building and maintaining trust, might have on their business or in their life specifically instead of simply applying theories vaguely or generically.

It’s one thing to know something. It’s quite another to determine how it might impact you directly, one way or another.

I often say ‘reputation branding is common sense’ but as many of us know, common sense isn’t as common as we’d like to believe. It never ceases to amaze me how many people post angry comments online, or vent their spleen in other ways and think it might have no effect.

Everything we do and say creates consequences – positive and not so positive. Taking a moment to consider what those consequences might be could mean the difference between having to eat humble pie, or worse, or having a reputation that attracts people to you for positive reasons. Read the rest of this entry »

Choosing what to call yourself online may seem frivolous and an opportunity to create a form of ‘alter-ego’ but its impact shouldn’t be underestimated. What you’re known as online can have a major impact on how you are perceived.

Far from being online identities, Twisty Poi, Sex Fruit and Stallion were all blocked by real-life officials when applications were made to register new-borns with these names, primarily because it was deemed such names were likely to create ‘social hurdles’ for the children as they grew up.

Nine year Talula Does The Hula From Hawaii (who’s actually from New Plymouth) might agree with the officials’ stance given that she was so embarrassed by her legal name she petitioned to have it changed ‘K’ instead.

Intentionally or otherwise, the name we are known by can elicit thoughts and emotions in others that may open doors or slam them shut. Hence the reason most of us think carefully before naming a new arrival Violence or Benson and Hedges (twins) – both genuine name applications! But thinking carefully when choosing a name is something many of us fail to do when we blithely create an identity on social networking sites and internet forums. Read the rest of this entry »

According to Beloit College’s ‘Mindset’ list many young Americans heading to university this year may think Germany has always been one country, Beethoven is a dog rather than a composer and Banana Republic is a fashion store rather than a politically unstable South American dictatorship.

Times change. If we assume others have a similar world-view to us we may find ourselves faced with blank faces, quizzical looks and wildly different expectations if they don’t – all of which can have a huge adverse impact on how we are perceived, which in turn affects our reputation.

Although increasing numbers of us are embracing social media with the intention of having greater and more immediate connection with our clients and contacts there is a danger that in doing so we may actually distance ourselves, and disconnect from the very people we want to engage with.

Hash-tags, bit.ly and RTs (retweets) may be second-nature to you, but if your clients or customers have no idea what you’re talking about, or feel paralysed and unable to respond, you’re more likely to irritate and annoy, rather than connect and engage.
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According to the ‘Social Media Revolution’ video from Socialnomics, 96% of Generation Y or Millennials (born between 1980 and 2000 or thereabouts) are part of an online social network and yet the fastest growing segment of Facebook is females aged 55-65 years old.

Ashton Kutcher and Britney Spears have more Twitter followers than the entire populations of Sweden, Israel, Switzerland, Ireland, Norway and Panama, and half the mobile internet traffic in the UK is for Facebook. Over 50% of the world’s population is under 30 years old and email is considered old technology by a significant number of them.

We are connecting, communicating and revealing personal and professional details about ourselves more openly than ever before. In the time it takes to read this post around 50 hours of video will be uploaded to YouTube, the world’s second largest search engine.

We tap out information about ourselves at the stroke of a key and yet rarely think about the damage that can be caused to our reputation, both online and off, by posting careless remarks and images.

Even if we don’t write the words ourselves, others are writing about us, and in this digital age of instant upload it’s worth remembering that the camera is always rolling, the microphone is always on, and there’s no such thing as ‘off-the-record’.

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It had to happen, and this week it did. I finally experienced ‘Facebook Fatigue‘.

Social networking might have become the biggest single activity on the internet, but I’m definitely starting to feel overwhelmed by the mass of social networking sites I’m encouraged to join on almost a daily basis.

Hardly a day passes without being invited to ‘Join me on … ‘ (insert whichever social networking site comes to mind). The problem is, for an increasing number of these sites, I can’t get a feel for how they actually work without signing up for an account. ‘Create your profile’ they say, without showing me anything except a sign-up or log-in page.

It’s not just public sites either. Significant numbers of businesses and face-to-faced networks have created online networking portals. All of which add to my ‘Facebook fatigue’.

Whether it’s a public site or private network, if I sign-up and become a member the pressure’s really on.

Navigating my way around the site and sorting out all the privacy and other settings that need switching on or off requires a level of intuition and understanding I don’t seem to possess. Read the rest of this entry »