Selling Yourself: The Art of Marketing.

Creating your personal brand is essential,

but whether you succeed or fail in doing so is up to YOU.

It is a competitive world out there- I know I'm not the only one trying to get a career; so the question is HOW TO DO IT? The key is not to over sell yourself. The key is to sell yourself as a leader; have an audience.

I have come up with six steps to keep in mind and HELP me make myself "attractive" in the social networks that employers and friends use on an everyday basis.

Step 1. Determine your objective
Take advantage of the latest social media networks to get my profile to reach employers, making relations that can be beneficial in the business world.

Step 2. Determine your audience’s aptitude
Get involved in Facebook, Blogging, Twitter & LinkedIn, relating and treating myself as one of them, but remembering to separate personal from professional.

Step 3. Carefully select your platforms and tools
Facebook to connect with friends/family. Blog- to keep readers updated about WHO I AM. Twitter & LinkedIn- to keep myself updated/connected with work related relations.

Step 4. Avoid content overload- curate the most interesting pieces
Blog/update in short and simple sentences. Not too much detail but not vague information either. Make use of different fonts/formats/images to attract attention and receive feedback.

Step 5. Empower your employees to build their personal brand
Friends or co-workers will see how useful and easy it is to interact with the social media world and will come to ask about it, or take initiative to do so as well.

Step 6. Measure the initiative’s success against your objectives
Receive feedback on what to improve is the goal, getting involved and known in every social network isn’t as important, because I will not be able to keep up with all of them. Better to start small and work yourself up than to be clueless, and look bad in ALL social media networks.

That's all for now.

Millie A.

6 Steps, 1 Brand!

Okay so I'm still new to this whole Social Media concept, but I am quickly beginning to understand why it is important, and the benefits that can come from it in my future, which is why these 6 steps, can help me in building my personal brand.

1. Determine your objective
By me knowing what I want to accomplish and how I'm willing to do it. What is the message that I want to give to my audience. I don't really tweet or blog, I use Facebook more often, but by having a facebook, twitter, and now a blog I am helping myself build a personal brand so it can help me in the future to network with companies and people.

2.Determine your audience's aptitude
Put myself in my audience's shoes and trying to figure out what they would enjoy to read. Figuring out what makes me different from everyone else can help me in building my personal brand.

3. Carefully select your platforms and tools
Me staying on top of my strategy and being consistent, so I wont lose my audience to others.

4. Avoid content overload-curate the most interesting pieces
Don't beat around the bush and get straight to the point. Too much information will bore my audience. Stick to the script and get my point out there, but also make it interesting to read that it leaves your audience wanting more.

5. Empower your employees to build their personal brand
Well I don't have any employees to empower to build their personal brand, but to friends and everyone else I would recommend putting themselves out there through social media, such as forums, blogs, facebook, twitter, etc.. Its a great way to network with people and businesses.

6. Measure the initiative's success against your objectives
Receive feedback from my audience to know what I can improve on and to know what is or isn't working. Giving good unique content that people haven't seen before will differentiate me from the rest of the crowd, helping me build my personal brand.

Jennifer Campos

camposj1@kean.edu

6 steps to get myself known in the social media world

Being the fact I don't blog, and the only form of social media I use is Facebook, and that's only for my own personal use, I could use help to get myself out in the social media world for my future.

That's why these 6 steps outlined for an easier way to get your name out there are very helpful.

Step 1: Determine your objective

My objective at this point is to further my social media use for future job opportunities. With sites liked LinkedIn, future employees can look at my profile or what I have to say and see if I would be a good fit for their company.

Step 2: Determine your audience's aptitude

For when I am online the companies I would want to pursue would be on sites like LinkedIn or possibly Twitter. A lot of people are on Facebook which I am as well but that is for my personal use and wouldn't want that to portray me to a future employer

Step 3: Carefully select your platforms and tools

When I am blogging I would talk about not just my strengths, but some of my weaknesses as well. All employers know your human and have down flaws.

Step 4:  Avoid content overload—curate the most interesting pieces

This step is an important step because you don't want to over sell yourself. To much to read is never a good sign. People won't read it.

Step 5: Empower your employees to build their personal brand

Knowing how to use social media is a very good skill, which in return can be used in your future company. I can always use my skill and possibly use it at a new job.

Step 6: Measure the initiative’s success against your objectives

The more places you expose yourself to the more chances to get in contact with future employers. If you limit yourself to only a few areas you missing out!

I will defenitely take these steps and use them to my advantage when it comes the time to look for a job.

Thanks for reading!!

Kayla Kaplan

Riveting call to action! ( jenn olivencia )

Have you been bombarded with a company’s marketing strategy that seemed to do more damage with spam than it did captivate? We’ve all been there.

It's the combination of atrocious design, poor verbiage, loud or drab colors or just targeting the wrong market (eg: the abundance of “Dear Jenn, this is what you have been waiting for to help you please that special someone…..” Viagra promotions sent to me.) Dude…really…

Let's look back at my own marketing strategy experience at work.

Creating promotions to drive traffic to our trade show booths, launching new products or getting people to follow us on our Twitter and Facebook accounts - I’m going to try to elaborate on the way we planned a promotion using social media as one of our channels:

1.       Determine your objective: During the launch of one of our eco-friendly bags (made from recycled plastic bottles), the marketing director and I collaborated to create a promotion for trade show booth traffic emphasizing on the “green” aspect of our product.

2.       Determine your audience’s aptitude: The first steep was contacting the association (who coordinated the trade show) for their pre-show attendee list. Then getting in touch with the 15,000 pre-show attendees via direct mailer and email blast informing them of our contest: a chance to win a TomTom GPS.

3.       Carefully select your platform and tools: Using hootsuite that fed into twitter and fb (the theory of “killing 2 birds with 1 stone”) helped us reach out to even more people who were not attending the trade show. We were actually able to do drive them to our website and introduce them to our new product.

4.       Avoid content overload – curate the most interesting pieces: the direct mailer was concise, colorful, yet without the overbearing jumble of design.

The rules listed on the back of the mailer (or on our email blast) the were simple and direct: 1) bring the direct mailer or a print-out of the email to our booth. 2) then pick out a bottle cap out of a bin filled with thousands of caps (our bags were made from recycled bottles…hence the bottle caps. Get it?) 3) the person who drew the bottle cap spray painted in gold was the winner of a TomTom GPS!

5.       Empower your employees to build their personal brand: On the day of the trade show (prior to the opening of the doors) my boss and I walked the lobby and told people about our promotion.

For those who didn’t receive a direct mailer/email, we gave each a green bottle cap which they would use as their “ticket” into the contest (and was our way to keep track last minute participation.) We were also able to increased our email database because in order for them to participate, they needed to give us their email address.

6.       Measure the initiative’s success against your objectives: To monitor the success of our direct mailer, we asked for all those that either received the direct mailer or email, to please bring it with them when they came for the drawing (we redeemed them as they entered the contest).

The booth drive was a hit! It did exactly what we had planned – drew thousands of attendees to our booth and increased sales of our new product. And everyone who entered into the contest those left with a sample of our new eco-friendly bag. So regardless if they won the contest or not, they all “won” a gift.

Being able to utilize my creative vibe to the max is why I love marketing and what i do.

…jenn olivencia

Excuse me...you want me to tweet? (jenn olivencia)

“So every day you each need to write a blog twice a day and Twitter about anything and everything and our products. It doesn’t matter if it’s about a delicious turkey sandwich you ate or if you gave 10cents to a panhandler, ALWAYS include to one of our product lines in your blogs. Just make sure that we are blogging/tweeting daily”. That was new responsibility given to my boss and I by the Director of Sales. Sheeeesh….really?! Another thing to add on my never ending list of responsiblities. Grrrrrr…..

At first I was bitter about the whole idea. Why am I blogging for work when I don’t even do it for personal satisfaction? Ugh! I despised the whole idea of (what I considered to be) a mindless marketing “tool.” I mean, I never even tweeted before, let alone felt compelled to disclose my daily life activities with 4000 strangers. Seriously, do they really care whether or not I use mayo on my sugar free bread? Or that I got into an argument in the checkout line at Kings because the woman in front of me demanded that the cashier honored her 9 expired coupons? Well, lo and behold after time, my tweet-infused-blogs seemed to be getting quite an audience! For some reason people seemed to really enjoy reading about my weekend memoirs of NYC roof-top party hopping, my love for building human pyramids in Central Park and having our reserved table in the Hamptons given to Russell Simmons and his entourage. Hey, maybe blogging wasn’t so bad after all - I was getting followers little by little. And it also doesn’t hurt to know that many of our distributors enjoyed my Twitter tweets and blogs so much that they placed orders on our products based on the “ideas” I somehow inspired them with. Plus my blogging endeavors start to build more traffic to our website, which increased every month by 45-60%. Awesome!  :takes a bow:

So what is the lesson I learned from forced blogging? Answer: brand awareness. I repeat: brand awareness. Even if I was “selling” my weekend escapades, I was really selling the brand of my company. Thus, learning the importance of blogging. Which leads me to say…

It totally makes sense for our class to have a blog because how will we learn or be introduced to the foundations of social media if we aren’t using social media? Reading isn’t enough. Putting our learning into constant action is the key to understanding the benefits of this medium called “social media”. I would like to learn more ways on how to take advantage of using this channel for brand awareness; in addition to getting to know a variety of other great marketing-idea-filled web sites.

A friend of mine, Ravi Yande, is an award-winning journalist. I’m going to follow his blog http://theravireport.wordpress.com/ with gusto because he writes with such vivacity and I feel I will get great sense of how to write with such intriguing style.

Jenn Olivencia

Clarifying Unit #2

Class,

Some of you have reached out expressing confusion about the unit #2 homework.

Please do the reading and blog about the six steps to develop a social media strategy to build a personal brand. If you are having trouble finding Bulldog Reporter Social Media 2.0, please let me know and I will send you the PDF.

I did not provide you with a case study in class, so it is not possible for you to actually blog about it! My apologies if I have created any confusion.

We will have class on Monday night. Come prepared for a full session.

In addition to a discussion about setting up a social media strategy, we will have a guest speaker, Alison Davis, president of Davis & Company. She will discuss the importance of employees in a social media strategy.

Please call or email with questions.

Perri

First of many...

It took me a while to finally start blogging for this class!

Besides being sick for the longest time, I could not figure out how to make myself an author. Obviously i got it working and now i'm excited to blog!

I think it's really cool for a class to have their own blog especially a class about social media. I use social media everyday for personal use and I've used it professionally so it's pretty cool to now use it for education.

I follow a few blogs that are made by celebrities, mostly the Kardashians. What i really want to know is if they actually write their own or if they have someone doing it for them. Here's their links: http://khloekardashian.celebuzz.com/ http://officialkourtneyk.celebuzz.com/ http://kimkardashian.celebuzz.com/blog/

I'm really looking forward to seeing if i like blogging or not and maybe i can start my own!

Looking forward to a fun class this semester :)

-Emily

@Keanuniversity Social Media Class is Full of Awesome Bloggers

I am really proud of the first postings on "Monday Night Media Mix" @keanuniversity.

The class has done a fabulous job on their postings ... and clearly is a) reading the material; b) listening to me in class (that makes me feel good - so thank you).

As an avid social media user, I have many followers on LinkedIn and Twitter. Each week, I will take one entry and post it to my LinkedIn status and Tweet about it.

This week, I posted/tweeted about Dia's post about http://www.ratemyprofessor.com/.

Follow me @pjkrichman on Twitter or Perri Richman on LinkedIn. Retweet or repost from LinkedIn ... this will increase your personal brand, make you more searchable and demonstrate how you are supporting your social media colleagues.

http://keansocialmedia.blogspot.com/

Cheers to the First

Hey guys,

So like many of you guys, I as well am new to blogging, still trying to get the hang of it.
I think it makes sense for our class to have a blog because it is a social media class. Social media has a huge impact on everyday life and everything we do.

I honestly had no idea what social media was really about and how much of a deal it really is. I feel we could all learn more about whats going on in the world with everyone's different opinions.

There's a few blogs that I actually follow, www.perezhilton.com and www.failblog.com. I'm a girl so of course I love good gossip, especially about celebrities. He's also very funny.

I also enjoy a good laugh which is why I always follow FAIL BLOG, I love seeing all the stupid things that go on in the world, and the stuff people attempt to do which go bad.

Jennifer Campos

camposj1@kean.edu

Ehem...THE..First Post

Yes, a class blog is perfect for a Social Media class. There is no better way to learn about something than to attack it hands on. Instead of just reading about it, we're actually practicing it which is different from most other classes.

The blog I've chosen to follow is RapRadar.com. It's a music blog that focuses on urban mainstream and underground music. It updates hourly with news and songs about some of the most popular artists from past and present.

How could I delete this?

-Majid

Starting Something New

Hopefully I started this correctly. If not I will get better as we go along.

Class was very interesting and the idea of getting involved in the social media sounds great. It's a chance for one to get more involved and work with others towards reaching a goal, no matter what it is.

From our discussion about which blogs to follow I'm still undecided on what specifically I would like to focus on. I do like news updates as well as celebrity gossip so my decision will most likely be one of these categories.

In reading some of our author’s pieces I found a couple interesting blogs. One which I have already considered following was CNN.com which was mentioned and being that I do like to know what is going on around me I will definitely stay tuned.

Also, if anyone out there has any suggestions on what good blogs are out there that have to do with news, cooking or gossip, don’t hesitate to let me know!

I look forward to a great learning experience and maybe even establishing a personal brand for myself.

Blogger Newbie

As with my other classmates, this is my first attempt at posting.  I am excited to learn about all the different social medial avenues and how they can help in both my personal life and in my career.  I currently only have a Facebook account but because of this class I have just created my own blog, have joined LinkedIn, and will be creating a Twitter account in the coming days.

Having a class blog will be extremely helpful because it will allow the students to learn from each other, help us to make new friends and/or network, and gives us a place to share ideas.

In my leisure, I like to work out, keep up on the latest fashion trends, keep abreast of world news, and play games like scrabble or crossword puzzles.  So I will be following blogs such as Gawker.com, Scabbleboards.blogspot.com, and This Just In - CNN.com.

See you next Monday.

New to Blogging

Hey Guys! I have no clue how to do anything on here, but I'm trying.

It definitely makes sense for our class to have a blog because if we're going to be following them, why not have one? It's something we can all have in common and it will help us all become aware of the different types of social media out there.

I would like to get used to using as many different blogs I can. I don't follow many on a regular basis, but I've seen PostSecret before. I would also like to start following some news blogs because I don't have much time to watch the news anymore. If I can't see it on my phone, I don't see it at all.

I'm not good at this stuff, so bear with me. I definitely want to make the most out of this class!
Steph Cozad

Bad Publicity Is Not Just Publicity ...

“old as hell and mean as hell!”

“This teacher was by far the worst teacher I ever had.”

“DO NOT TAKE HIM!!!!”

The atrocious comments you just had the pleasure of reading were in fact ratings for three randomly selected teachers on the (in)famous website, RateMyProfessor.com. The issue with these comments isn’t the comment itself, but the fact that I can almost guarantee that any self-respecting student would never – EVER – take any of these professors after reading the rest of the comments.

At least I sure wouldn’t.

Now it’s not to say that these sources are even remotely legitimate or credible; they’re just peers that may have failed the class and hold a bitter grudge against a human being just doing their job.

Let’s look at the scope of this: the more people that rely on these ratings, less people enroll in the class, less classes of the subject are needed, more funding gets cut for that department, and now this individual can be out of a job.

Perhaps that’s a bit much. Maybe it’s not that serious, maybe it is. But the saying “bad publicity is still publicity” isn’t all its perked up to be.

In the real world, this is just a small-scale version of what would happen if, say a popular gossip site, created a potentially viral report based entirely on speculation of an important CEO (cough, cough – Steve Job’s “death”). The story could be completely falsified, but once word gets out, you better believe the company’s investors are going to start calling.

So what exactly does this have to do with the Monday Night Media Mix? We’re creating our own publicity.

In marketing, it's not about us learning the technical terms, it's about bringing our ideas to life. So how better to learn about social media than to become part of it?

Aside from the obvious perks of being able to promote our own class through our awesome blogs to allow for healthy and open discussion, we’re also able to channel our creativity, and what’s marketing without creativity?

Without creativity, we wouldn’t have the breathtaking and powerful movement that is Postsecret, the blog I intend to follow throughout the course of this class. I have been a religious fan (since high school!) of Frank Warren’s project, in which anonymous people submit their dark, lighthearted, agonizing, and humorous secrets every week.

Like the mission of this blog is to allow for open communication, Postsecret not only allows the world to share what they cannot say out loud, but it also resonates with each reader as it often says what we may be too afraid to share. For me, it’s more than just a blog, it’s therapy.

http://keansocialmedia.blogspot.com

First Time Blogger. Right Here!

Hi everyone,

Took a while to make myself an author, but i got it done! Yes, this is my first time blogging, but I see I'm not alone.
I've been told that i have to try, to learn, so what better way to learn about social media than taking role in an actual blog? Blogging about our experiences and giving feedback as we go along the semester will help us become "experts" in blogging and know more about the social media market. I'm sure we will have a good idea of how NOT to bore the audience, what kind impact social media has on us and others, which social media method is the most effective, etc. Because its all about social media now, I hope to get the most out of this class. I don't want to be clueless about what it is and what to do, and end up not being as successful as I hope I could be someday.

I don't blog. But i did used to follow from time to time PostSecret. People send postcards, revealing secrets they have NEVER told, but it is anonymous. Its kind of cool to see people telling their secrets; everybody needs to let out their secrets to someone from time to time. You feel more relieved.
I did some surfing around and found The Big Picture, news stories but with photographs. Thought it was informational and eye-catching to see pictures maximized to emphasize things that we wouldn't pay attention to if they were posted in small pixels, with long boring paragraphs. I will be following the big picture, and go back to checking up on PostSecret, and hopefully ill be able to bring the latest news and untold secrets to you guys.

PS. Before i forget, i found a website where you can download Brian Carroll's "Writing for Digital Media" for free.

Thought I'd share it with you. Here's the link.
http://ebookee.org/Brian-Carroll-quot-Writing-for-Digital-Media-quot-_1330125.html

That is all for now.
Millie A.

First Time Blogging

Hello! I was clueless as to how to do this, which i still kinda of am so i wrote the following in the comment to the Welcome to class post:


With the blogging assignments due in class, I feel it is very important to do so for the lack of knowledge on something that is so vital in the social media world. Take me for instance, if I ever wanted to enter the social media job market, I would need to know a lot more than I do know, which hopefully will happen with this class.

I do however, follow a blog called US weekly, which is an app on my iPhone. It gives articles about celebrities and what they have been up too but it also allows subscribers to comment on the articles and voice their opinion. Im a gossip junky, I know, I check it at least three times daily. 

In addition to the gossip websites, with this class I would really like to start following more news blogs. I don't typically watch the news, which is very bad, but it tends to scare me. Hopefully with the blogs my opinion will change.

Hopefully this works this time!!
Kayla Kaplan

New Pull for Kean University Social Media Class

A big thank you to those of you who posted to our class blog.

Please remember to go back to the blog and check for my comments – and other comments from your colleagues / classmates. I have provided comments to those who have posted.

Remember, there is no class next week – I have a business trip and will not be able to make it to class. Please do the assignments from unit #2, email or call me with questions … and blog away. I will be online and checking.

On Tuesday morning, I tweeted about our class and our blog (@keanuniversity). Since then, I have received inquiries from several professors and a volleyball coach from Kean. They are presenting our class with some opportunities

The Kean volleyball team has developed a Facebook page and wants advice on how to make it more meaningful.

I invited the coach to class in October to discuss his objectives. We will do a group exercise / presentation on what he can do to make it better. I know that he will look for volunteer/s to help him with the page … I will offer extra credit and it’s an opportunity to increase your experience.

A Communications professor has asked me to come and speak to his class about social media in business.

I suggested that we schedule some later in the semester and have some of you join me in making this presentation. Any volunteers? I will also offer extra credit and this is a good visibility opportunity for you.

The Kean Corporate Relations department (ala, the PR people for Kean) are interested in getting our class involved with a new news site called http://www.keanxchange.com/.

They want student contributors to the site … and they want to come to class and ask us to develop a plan for promoting this on campus.

We will have them to class when we discuss social media and PR in November. In the meantime, please let me know if you are interested in getting involved with Keanxchange … again, extra credit will be offered and another resume booster!

Perri

Lidia Yadlos

The significance in having a class blog is to give us first hand expierence using a blogging website.
This is a great opportunity to learn the works of this type of social media to ultimately create and brand
our own personal blogs.

I have never followed personal blogs but my girlfriend suggested this website since I am obsessed with
shoes. http://shoelust.us/  Ladies, you have got to check out this blog, the shoes are unreal!

Blog number 2!

Our blog is going to be important to this class so we could be informed about many different subjects of the present, past and possibly future.  I want to be able to open my eyes to the blogs from sports, electronics, celebrities, hell even fashion if it comes into our class blog.


The Blog I'm going to be following is http://espn.go.com/espn/blogs . I'm all about sports so with this being my blog I'll be following many different bloggers that will blog about all the sports available to man and woman!  


I want to bring everything from players that are recognized by all to some that are recognized by none and some of the actions that caused them to get put into blogs.  So be ready for blogs about athletes criminal mishaps and even possibly about some of the sport lockouts and my opinions on them. 

First Steps into the Blogging World

Hey everyone! Well considering this is a class about social media I feel that it only makes sense for our class to have a class blog.

I feel like it will help introduce our class to a type of social media that everyone may not be familiar with.

The blog I am going to follow is TMZ.com. I have followed this blog for a while and it is where I get all my celebrity gossip! I plan to continue to follow and comment on this blog.