Who’s afraid of the big bad wolf?

Make sure to read post 2 before  you start on this one.

Don’t get eaten alive by your competition. Developing a strong personal brand gives you the unreasonable advantage to stand out against your competition.

So who exactly might your competition be?

When you think of your personal brand your competitor is most likely invisible.

When you’re on a  job interview, delivering a sales pitch, or even talking to a potential intimate partner, you usually have no idea who your competition is. Just like in a game of poker

the player sees all the cards available and chooses the best cards to play. You can assert your authority and stand out of the deck with a strongly built personal brand.

Set a goal you want to accomplish with your personal brand then focus on delivering it in a clear and powerful way.

Your next step is to take a Position. Think of it as your angle of attack. Depending on how well it’s positioned and the clarity of your brand message, you’ll rarely fall short of appealing to your target

audience.

So Here’s How We Write a Positioning Statement To Define Our Position:

4 Quick and easy to learn elements of a Positioning Statement

1.Target Audience- who you are trying to appeal to? who is your message for?

2.Frame of Reference- how do you compare to your competitors? how are you different?

3.Point of Difference- what kind value are you bringing? what unique advantage do you have to offer?

4.Support- why should anyone believe you? what proof do you have to back up what you’re claiming?

HERE’s The Model:

To: (Your Target Audience)

I: (Point of Reference)

Who: (Point of Difference)

Because: (Support)

The Story:

Joey is a young stuntman who loves to work with fire stunts. His dream job is to work for Pyrotechnica, the biggest fire stunt

company in the world, so Joey writes his positioning statement to focus his brand in the right direction.

To: the hiring board of Pyrotechnica.

I: am a brilliant pyro stuntman who lives for over the top action, excitement, and safety in all my stunts.

Who: specializes in escaping exploding cars, jumping out of windows while caught on fire, and man on fire scenes.

Because: I’ve worked for 2 stunt companies over the last 4 years and successfully completed 300 hundred stunts, where 20 of them made it into independent action films.

So how are you going to Position your brand today to get the most out of it?

You’ll definitely want to check out my next post on this series. It’s a brand “You” world and you don’t want to miss out.

Part 2 to getting your personal brand through is completing an Audience and S.W.O.T Analysis

Let’s start off with your Audience Analysis. This consist of finding out who your audience is, where they live, how they communicate, their lifestyle and behaviors.

Think about the people who could benefit from your message and meet them where they hang out. If  your audience is college and high school students you might focus your marketing of your products and skills on facebook. If you’re looking for the professionals and job recruiters in your niche try networking a bit more on linked in. Either way it always pays to do thorough research of your audience.

What’s a S.W.O.T?

I know it sounds like a specialized police task force, but it’s actually one of the essential tools in giving your personal brand a jump start.

S.W.O.T stand for

Strengths- Your natural talents and skills: You can be great at networking and working well under pressure, or have impressive skills in composing music and designing websites. Most of us know are strengths because it’s what we usually get praise and attention for.

Weaknesses- These are the areas we can improve on. It might be presenting your brand in public, your temper, social skills, etc. Our weaknesses allow us the best opportunity for serious development and growth because, the slightest advancements in these areas strengthens our brands dramatically.

Opportunities- Some smart ass once said,” The chance of a lifetime exists in the lifetime of the opportunity.” Attending industry events, building your network of contacts and maximize the opportunities you already have available to you to reach the next step in your career.

Threats- These are the people who are gunning for the position you’re in or the position you’re trying to fill. Imagine sitting around a camp fire with 1 marshmallow and 10 other campers, and everyone around that campfire wants a smore. Depending on how hungry they are, it can be brutal situation. The stronger your brand, the less competition effects your share on available opportunities.

If you missed part 1 here’s the link and you better believe part 3 coming a week from now with some more great information.

face it…You’re not going to land your dream job or fall into a successful career by chance. Now is the time to start thinking of yourself as a business and approaching career in that aspect. All businesses require a plan of action to succeed and your personal brand is no different. Our celebrities like Denzel Washington, Lady Gaga, and even global bands like U2 have established personal marketing plans to hit brand growth targets. Most of us aren’t born celebrities but a strategized personal marketing plan can essentially turn us into one in our career fields.

So STEP#1  in bringing your personal brand into action is completing a situational analysis.

The slogan from the horrible boost mobile campaign describes it best. It’s simply,  “Where you ats?”

Situational Analysis is one of those terms that really defines itself. Keeping it simple, it’s identifying where you currently are in your career or life. If you’re living at your moms house and a full time student, or if you’ve just started an internship at a new company, it’s important you document where you are in life so you can analyze any progress. And don’t worry this a personal assessment, no one gets to see it unless you share. A situational analysis also includes your networks of friends and business professional, personal finances, and any other resources you can use to enhance your career including your brand influence. Without a plan you’re sitting in a boat without a paddle…… unless it’s a motor boat, but you get the point.

DO THESE! Write it Down and Stop Procrastinating!….It’s the situational analysis break down

mission statement – What is driving you to want to succeed in your career/life? Do you want to be well known expert in your field, get a promotion to a management position, or start your own business? And how do those dreams fit into your long-term goals? Our mission statement is important because, it reminds us why we’re on our chosen path.

Vision Statement- Where are you aiming to be in the next 10 years? Do you want to attain celebrity status in your field and/or be financially independent?

Projected Annual Compensation- How much money are you making in your field now? What benefits are included like healthcare, stock options, or paid vacations? Think about how much money you’d like to get paid in the next 2-3 years, but keep it realistic.

Personal Brand Cycle- How will your brand grow as you grow in life? It’s important to understand your brand has a life of its own, just like you, your brand has it’s own life cycle.

Childhood/Introduction: You first introduce your brand as an infant in your field. It is something that is looking forward to growth and needs more resources at this point then at any other point in the growth process. Typically, people won’t immediately understand who you are, or what your purpose is or if they can even trust your brand for credible information.

Puberty/Growth: Your brand gains momentum as you begin to receive recognition for your work in your field. As your commitment to your passion grows so does your knowledge and skills in your niche. You are becoming a person who can provide great value in your niche area, and people are beginning to refer their friends and colleagues to you as a credible source of information and/or services. This is the point where you will begin to face your first real competition.

Adulthood/Maturity: You are the man or woman. You are clearly recognized by the leaders in your career field as an equal. You can spend most of your time working with clients, doing public speeches or simply maintaining your current status by continuing the actions that brought you to success. Not everyone is going to become a public speaker or host seminars. At the maturity level if you’re a musician this can mean opening acts, and if you’re an artist this can mean an expose. At any degree, at this point you should be known as a person who is able to deliver quality goods/services.

Senior/Decline: You’re ready to pass the torch. You’ve set goals in life and reached them, you now have new goals. These new goals can humanitarian efforts, spending more time with your family, or starting a new conquest in an entirely new field. At this point you feel you have nothing left to prove in your niche and possibly settle into a mentoring position.

This is PART 1 of my 5 PART series on Personal Marketing. It’s all about getting your life where you want it to be. Drop by next week for PART 2!

As if I need to sit here and type an article on the importance of differentiating yourself from your competition. I would hate to write a post on common sense or a summary of regurgitated material from over 20 blogs, but why not? If people still aren’t getting it, there’s room enough for at least my take on it.

As a business, company, or website, personal branding is your numero uno asset. For the sake of keeping you inside the online realm, let’s say you have a website you’ve just launched. Before you even start the promotion, make sure you have a recognizable visual logo and company name. Personal branding starts on day one and stops when your business is dead. Think of how popular Coca- Cola is already and  their advertising budget increases every year in maintaing that company image.

Penny pinching on your brand image is not the way to go. Think professional, think paying for services like graphic and web design and ditching the free and low end stuff. The bottom line is you want to impress your future clients with an image. Invest in yourself, spend countless amounts of money making you and your company image seem flawless. At the end of the day if your business isn’t communicating quality and trust to your clients, you’ve already lost to your competition.

3 key points to remember when dealing with your personal brand: keep it consistent, targeted, and memorable.

Time and time again I run into business owners and I ask them  ” How’s business doing?”  And the response will be an “not to bad” or “could be better”  and my next question is always “So what are you doing as far as personal branding?” And I get the long pause, followed by the awkward silence. In my opinion a majority of the time it’s the small things that kill our businesses, or at least  the things we think that are small.

Thanks for reading

College students make money online, but it requires a strong work ethic. When I was in my second year in college, I remember how short the money was. I had a part time job, I was a freelancer, I was about a million things, anything to make an extra buck. My problem was I had a ton of short term investments like my job, and odd gigs I would do. Those paid my immediate bills and entertainment costs, but what about next month or next year for that fact. I simply never thought that far ahead, and most college students don’t.

There are some ways to make a quick buck online which I’ll disclose, but the pure genius comes from planning for the future. Doing something once and having it work for you consistently…. if you could only imagine the possibilities? Simply, college students can make money online using a long term investment of a niche website. If you could create 1 website a month for a specific niche and set it up with google pay per click ads, you could earn a decent amount of cash residually. Of course it isn’t magic but with the proper marketing techniques you can build financial assets that’ll produce some hefty payouts.

For those more interested in finding out how college students make money online instantly and don’t care about the future pay offs try out these sites.

1.StudentOfFortune.com is a student-to-student question-based tutoring service. One student posts a question with an amount they’d be willing to pay for an answered question, the other students answers the question and earns the money, it’s that easy.

2. The Class Connection is a website where they are paying up to $100 for your class notes.

3. Barefoot Student is a cool website that’s kind of like craigslist. It allows you to post your services in your college town and local households can hire you for those services, that range from childcare to a throwing out the trash.

I listed 3 ways for college students to make money online short term. But, the key to growing consistent residual income is to have short term and long term investments. I know you’re thinking college is your long term investment, but you’ll need all the extra money and free time you can get before you get your degree.

8 Steps To Building a Long Term Online Investment

Step 1) Find a Niche

Step 2) Do Keyword Research

Step 3) Buy a Domain

Step 4) Buy Hosting

Step 5) Setup a Blog

Step 6) Post Relevant Content

Step 7) Add Google Adsense

Step Promote Your Blog

While there’s more depth into this process, rest assure it is only 8 basic steps. Building one of these sites every month with your short term investment money will be a cinch. If you’re doing it the right way you’ll be making consistent residual income, and if not you can still hold on to your websites and in 6 months  re-sell them and make a reasonable income.

Be sure to stay tuned to my blog. I’ll be posting a tutorial series on building a niche site, which you can use to build your personal brand and your monthly income. The tutorial is coming soon, and is something you definitely don’t want to miss.

People just hate being sold too. I want you just for a second to imagine walking up to someone close you, who you haven’t seen in years and telling them your a sales person. I want you to imagine the look on their face, the exact look of them trying hard not to cringe. You can laugh because it is funny, and is completely true.

So Why Do We Hate Sales People?

It’s very close to the same reason why most of us hate mosquitos. Most of us have been programmed since we were kids to stay away from them. We group them with the kind of people who make you do things you don’t want to. Which by definition would equate to evil influence or “Satan” for short. Even the most sales resistant of us will lose our edge around people who are great at selling, at some point. You put your guard down for a second and next thing you know you wind up with an $800.00 tea kettle set in your  bachelor pad.

The Solution

Don’t sell people, refer them. Refer people to useful products and/or services. You don’t have to convince someone to get something they need. So if making money off of commissions is how you want to make a living, simply refer people to great products. First, find the products that make your life worth while. Second, ditch the old book on sales, it’s out dated, and doesn’t work. And third, commit yourself to referring a product or service you feel have great value.

Don’t Forget to Grow Your Network

Network daily, meet new people, and start new conversations. Don’t be the first to tell someone what you do, let them ask you. Show off how good you feel, and excited you are to be doing what you’re doing. These are character traits of success. People see this and they will be searching through your profiles, and browsing your websites, in an attempt to find out what you’re into.

Last But Not Least

You don’t have to learn how to sell. If you can think back, we’ve been selling since we were kids, convincing our parents to buy us stuff, convincing our teachers to let us make up exams, convincing our girlfriends to….. (lost thought). So how persuasive were you back then? and why was it so effective? My message to you is stop spamming the world, and start learning how to be a more effective “You”.

I want your feed back on this. What was the worst sales experience you’ve ever had? Why was it so bad?

Thanks for reading,

Hey this is City Sylvester and I love using Amazon.com to fill my pockets with an extra $100 to $200 per month.  It’s not that hard once you get a grasp of it and put in the work, but essentially if you’re doing this on a consistent basis you will start seeing checks in the mail. When I first started doing this I made virtually no money online. I was determined to win against all odds, and invested serious time and patience to learn some of the skills I’m going to show you today.

I want to put emphasis on something people just like you are doing right now to make money online. Watch the video and tell me what you think. Thanks for visiting.

Part 1

Part 2

If you have any questions, leave me a comment.

Don’t Forget To Follow Me on Twitter… Thanks For Watching!