Monkeys that we are, Jonathan offers us banana.

There is a recent effort by my ‘great’ country- Nigeria to rebrand the country. This effort was geared to towards attracting tourists into the country. It is easier to slap a label on something and hope that its uglier characteristics will go away. I saw the effort as putting “lipstick on a bulldog” !! This is not the purpose of this article. Let me reserve that for another day!

Have you ever had the feeling that people who know you or should know you very well just don’t get you? That they don’t quite understand who you really are and what they can rely on you to do for them? There seems to be a gap between perception and reality, between the real you and the you other people see and interact with. At work, at home, and even in your community, in life generally.

What do Richard Branson, Barack Obama, Donald Trump, Oprah Winfrey and even in our land – the great kongi, Prof Wole Soyinka all have in common? They have each built powerful personal brands that have propelled them to the top of their businesses, their careers, and their lives. How did they do it? Like other successful personal branders, they took the time to define, communicate, and protect their brands.

It is almost 14 years since Tom Peters, the American management guru, published a manifesto titled “The brand called you”. In the age of the individual, you have to be your own brand he proclaimed” It is time for me and you to take a lesson from the big brands.

The concept of building a personal brand and executing a marketing strategy to promote it to a specific audience is a foreign concept. Branding and marketing oneself in the same way as global brands like Coca Cola, Google, Apple, Nike do is a significantly daunting paradigm shift for most professionals. Successful global brands match their core competencies, or what they do best, with their target customers’ value and expect, and they do this better than the competition.

Your personal brand is the compelling value that you deliver- by the way of your experience, background, demonstrated results, relevance and expertise- that meets or exceeds the expectations of the employer or client you seek to influence.

In an interview conducted by The Strategist about building success personal brand in today’s economic environment, how to brand yourself in the digital age and what we can learn from iconic products like Coca-Cola. Jerry Wilson, senior vice president of The Coca-Cola Company and president of the Global McDonald s Division opined that “Branding is as important as ever, as long as people understand what that means. It’s not a self-promotion campaign or some dress-for-success kind of idea. It’s really who you are deep inside, what passions you have and how you can lead your most successful life. The thing about a successful brand is it’s a discipline of both science and art.

Today, in many fields, candidate search and talent acquisition take place online. A friend narrated to me how a friend of his got a job in Microsoft UAE via LinkedIn , a social networking site. Hiring managers are reviewing online profiles and content published on professional and industry-related social media websites and blogs to seek out highly qualified candidates. I have had several calls from strange hiring managers asking me some questions about my online details.

The first step in developing your personal brand is identifying your niche or area of specialization by determining what you do best, how this differentiates you from your competitors.

The next step is demonstrating subject-matter expertise by harnessing the power of your experience, background, formal networks, specialized knowledge, and specific accomplishments to tell your professional story.

Using the right tools to communicate your brand is very important. You can use a combination of traditional and online tools to do this effectively. More importantly, each should reflect your personal brand and speak the language of value for your respective audience.

Building and promoting your personal brand is the most significant decision you can make in managing your career as an employee, as a consultant and as an individual. Your personal brand will distinctively tell your professional story to prospective employers and clients, allowing you to communicate your value, relevance, expertise, and competitive advantage.

There is a recent effort by my ‘great’ country- Nigeria to rebrand the country. This effort was geared to towards attracting tourists into the country. It is easier to slap a label on something and hope that its uglier characteristics will go away. I saw the effort as putting “lipstick on a bulldog” !! This is not the purpose of this article. Let me reserve that for another day!

Have you ever had the feeling that people who know you or should know you very well just don’t get you? That they don’t quite understand who you really are and what they can rely on you to do for them? There seems to be a gap between perception and reality, between the real you and the you other people see and interact with. At work, at home, and even in your community, in life generally.

What do Richard Branson, Barack Obama, Donald Trump, Oprah Winfrey and even in our land – the great kongi, Prof Wole Soyinka all have in common? They have each built powerful personal brands that have propelled them to the top of their businesses, their careers, and their lives. How did they do it? Like other successful personal branders, they took the time to define, communicate, and protect their brands.

It is almost 14 years since Tom Peters, the American management guru, published a manifesto titled “The brand called you”. In the age of the individual, you have to be your own brand he proclaimed” It is time for me and you to take a lesson from the big brands.

The concept of building a personal brand and executing a marketing strategy to promote it to a specific audience is a foreign concept. Branding and marketing oneself in the same way as global brands like Coca Cola, Google, Apple, Nike do is a significantly daunting paradigm shift for most professionals. Successful global brands match their core competencies, or what they do best, with their target customers’ value and expect, and they do this better than the competition.

Your personal brand is the compelling value that you deliver- by the way of your experience, background, demonstrated results, relevance and expertise- that meets or exceeds the expectations of the employer or client you seek to influence.

In an interview conducted by The Strategist about building success personal brand in today’s economic environment, how to brand yourself in the digital age and what we can learn from iconic products like Coca-Cola. Jerry Wilson, senior vice president of The Coca-Cola Company and president of the Global McDonald s Division opined that “Branding is as important as ever, as long as people understand what that means. It’s not a self-promotion campaign or some dress-for-success kind of idea. It’s really who you are deep inside, what passions you have and how you can lead your most successful life. The thing about a successful brand is it’s a discipline of both science and art.

Today, in many fields, candidate search and talent acquisition take place online. A friend narrated to me how a friend of his got a job in Microsoft UAE via LinkedIn , a social networking site. Hiring managers are reviewing online profiles and content published on professional and industry-related social media websites and blogs to seek out highly qualified candidates. I have had several calls from strange hiring managers asking me some questions about my online details.

The first step in developing your personal brand is identifying your niche or area of specialization by determining what you do best, how this differentiates you from your competitors.

The next step is demonstrating subject-matter expertise by harnessing the power of your experience, background, formal networks, specialized knowledge, and specific accomplishments to tell your professional story.

Using the right tools to communicate your brand is very important. You can use a combination of traditional and online tools to do this effectively. More importantly, each should reflect your personal brand and speak the language of value for your respective audience.

Building and promoting your personal brand is the most significant decision you can make in managing your career as an employee, as a consultant and as an individual. Your personal brand will distinctively tell your professional story to prospective employers and clients, allowing you to communicate your value, relevance, expertise, and competitive advantage.

 

Are you a brand? This was a question someone asked me during my university days. I answered yes I am a brand. He asked further, what type of brand are you? Then, I became blank. I didn’t know the importance of this question  until when I started working and attending seminars on personal development. I have always been so interested in the topic BRANDING.

The idea of a person as brand has been popular among celebrities for decades, but it is only more recently that the idea of defining oneself as a saleable product has taken off among the general population.

The notion is usually traced back to one of my all time role model, Tom Peters in his Fast Company article, titled “The brand called you”, in which he wrote: “You are very much a brand as Nike, Coke, Pepsi, or the Body Shop”, and that “when you are promoting brand YOU, everything you do and everything you choose not to do communicates the value and character of the brand”

What is Personal Brand?

Peter Montoya defines Personal Branding as the process by which individuals and entrepreneurs differentiate themselves and stand out from a crowd by identifying and articulating their unique value proposition, whether professional or personal, and then leverage it across platforms with a consistent message and image to achieve specific goal. In this way, individual enhance their recognition as experts in their field, establish reputation and credibility, advance their careers and build self-confidence

Personal brand building starts with one major premise: self discovery. It is about unearthing what is true to you. As a brand, you are your own free agent: you have the freedom to create the career path that links your talents and interests with the right position.

How to build personal brand.

v     Take Stock of yourself: when you build your personal brand, you are in essence creating a pulpit for who you are and what makes you unique that adds value to others. Remember, you first have to buy into yourself if you want others to recognize the time value of your brand. You need to define who you are, not until when you know who you are that you will be able to place value on yourself.

v     Find your true purpose: Finding our purpose in life is not an easy task. It took me over 10 years for me to really discover my true purpose. In trying to discover my purpose, I read so many books on self discovery, attended seminars, bought articles online and I even hired a personal development coach for this purpose. Ever since I discovered my purpose, I have never been the same person again. You may not go through this process that I passed through but definitely it is not going to be a day process all the same. Dr Bill Morton asked almost 3,000 people what their purpose in life was, and an astounding 94% admitted, “we have absolutely no idea”. The good thing is that the moment you discover your true purpose, eternal joy keeps on radiating in you.

v     Know your strengths and weaknesses: It is very good to know what your strengths and weaknesses are but too many people try to work around their weaknesses. The Chinese philosopher Lao Tzu said, He who knows himself is wise. It is strength to know your weaknesses but your personal brand will be more authentic when you hone in on your strengths.

v     What do you stand for: In building personal brand you must stand for something. There must be something unique about you. In the business parlance, this is known as your Value Proposition or your Unique Selling Point (USP). What is that thing that differentiates you from another person? In reality, when you build a personal brand you are selling yourself and your core values and people buy valuables from people they value.

v     Be on a mission: A well written mission statement is a sure-fire way to keep your personal brand on track. But it is not enough to have a mission statement. You must really be on a mission.

Lastly, it is up to us to protect and value our uniqueness and offer it as a gift to the rest of humanity

Myself and my wife tried setting up a business venture sometime ago but the business turned out to be a total failure.Why this venture actually failed was because we couldn’t devote alot of time to it which the venture required.This doesn’t mean we are failures.

1. We learnt the lesson of determination and also we learnt that for any venture you want to go into, you must take a deep research into it.

One of the key defining factors for successful entrepreneurs is the ability—or rather, determination—to not view failure as failure. Rather than taking setbacks personally or becoming discouraged by them, successful entrepreneurs seize them as an opportunity to learn—and to apply that lesson to their next attempt. Indeed, many venture capitalists and other investors in entrepreneurial ventures won’t provide funds to anyone who hasn’t had at least one failed business.

There are any number of people who eventually made it big who tried and failed first. More than a decade before releasing its iPhone to huge success, Apple introduced an early personal digital assistant (PDA), the Newton, which died a quick death. The founder of FedEx, Frederick W. Smith, got a “C” on a business paper outlining his idea when he submitted it to a professor at Yale. The now-ubiquitous Post-its failed all the market tests that 3M routinely uses to determine whether to release a product to market. Scratch the surface of most successful entrepreneurs, and you’ll find at least one significant “failure” that they’ve used to gain valuable experience.

I was discussing with a friend some hours ago and he was telling me how he has failed in his many attempts at starting some business ventures some years ago. This is someone who is doing excellently well today. I simply told him that if you hadn’t failed before, you wouldn’t have learnt a better way of succeeding in your present business and that you are an ASSET to me because I will tap from your many failures in improving on my clients business. YOU ARE ON YOUR PATH TO SUCCESS.

 

My Bright Idea!

“Ideas are the beginning points of all fortunes says Napoleon Hill.According to Wikipedia, an idea is just whatever is before the mind when one thinks . From the time immemorial so many new ideas are at first strange and horrible, though ultimately valuable that a very heavy responsibility rests upon those who would prevent their dissemination.If people have been prevented from executing their ideas, the world would not have developed to the stage where it is today. I believe every individual on earth has one form of idea or the other.It all depends on how the  idea can be molded and formed into meaningful thing.  What excites you about your business idea? If you have two or three ideas, what do you like best about each one? Where did the idea come from? How has it evolved since you started the process of turning the idea into a business? By looking at how you initially got the inspiration for your business, you can take the next step towards determining how you might get others excited about your business also. That’s the start of taking an idea and turning it into a plan, which becomes a successful business. It will also be useful to have a record of what initially inspired you to refer to from time-to-time, especially as your business grows.

MY “BRIGHT IDEA”Use this space I provided to record your initial business idea(s). This will become a starting point for defining your business concept and why it can be competitive in the marketplace. It will also be useful as you prepare your marketing materials and write your “Elevator Pitch”

What is your business idea?

How did you come up with it?

What excites you about it?

if you need more help on how to fine tune your idea(s) you can send a mail to adedoyin.adebayo@inselconsulting.net

If you want to change the world, change your story

I had always thought of making a difference in everything that I do.We’re all facing the need to change the story. Whether you’re an individual or institution, the status quo is feeling less comfortable.

Yet letting people decide for themselves is one of the great secrets of true influence. Other methods of influence – persuasion, bribery or charismatic appeals are PUSH strategies.

Story is a PULL strategy – if it’s good enough people – of their own free will – come to the conclusion they can trust you and the message you bring through your business.

The six steps of storytelling revealed

1. Who I am

Give them a taste of who you are and why they can trust you. We filter every word through a  believability index based on our judgements of a person so self disclosure is key.

Theory is if I trust you enough to show me my flaws you can trust me enough to show me yours.

Great leaders use the power of a story of a personal flaw to great effect to build their reputation and that of their business.

2. Why am I here

Your reasons for wanting to influence may combine selfish reasons but if you acknowledge them upfront people will be more accepting.

People need to know ‘what’s in it for them’ but also ‘what’s in it for you’. Be genuine.

3. Vision Story

If you’ve satisfied 1 & 2 then they’re ready to listen to what you think is in it for them so you need to paint a moving picture of benefits

Take time to find a story of your vision in a way that connects – a story that they see. A story that weaves all the pieces together – especially the struggles and frustrations- so that they can make sense of it.

4. Teaching stories

By telling a teaching story it can help us make sense of new skills in meaningful ways.

For example showing your client how they can improve their sales by 40% by using your product or service by giving a successful case study of a similar client, is more useful then telling them why they’re not getting the sales results they want.

5. Values in motion

Best way to show someone is by example, the second best way is to tell a story with an example
For example as a new Sales Manager holding their first team meeting they could tell a story about the time they made a major mistake that nearly cost the company dearly.

Because they owned up to it straight away they earned the trust of the client instead who doubled their order. This story clearly shows the integrity the sales manager and allows their team to know what to expect of them

6. I know what you are thinking stories

When you tell a person a story that makes people wonder if you’re reading their minds they love it.
If you’ve done your homework on the customer group and who you need to influence it’s relatively easy to identify their potential objections to your message.

If you name their objections first you’re that much closer to disarming them. You can call them out upfront on why they may want to discredit you and can neutralize concerns without any direct confrontation.

Tell your story

Storytelling is the most valuable skill you can develop to help you influence others and as a result your business.

It is your birthright to be a good storyteller. In a sense your life is a story and you are already telling that one perfectly. So now weave that into your business and why it matters.