|
John Bertrand The Brand
Posted by admin in Personal Branding, Uncategorized on July 21st, 2009
Anyone who was around ten years old or older in 1983 knows who John Bertrand is. Along with the crew of Australia II he stopped the nation whilst we watched or listened to his magnificent efforts in winning the Americas Cup. The first time the cup had been taken away from the Americans in over 100 years.
It was a mammoth effort, and ever since, the John Bertrand name (Personal Brand) has been associated with sailing. I’m sure over the years sponsors have paid John mega dollars for him to be associated with their products and brand.
But some smart fellow has the use of the John Bertrand brand for a few dollars each year, not the thousands of dollars conventional sponsors would pay.
He did this by registering the domain name JohnBertrand.com and put up a website at www.johnbertrand.com but the clever part is the website sells sailing equipment.
I’m obviously assuming that the person who owns the domain is not the famous John Bertrand, I have no way of knowing, but the website doesn’t look classy enough to be owned by the John Bertrand, also a whois domain search shows it’s registered to someone in the U.S.
I also assume the owner of the website is making money from the John Bertrand brand because it’s been online several years.
Be aware, the owner of the domain may also be called John Bertram and just got lucky, there’s no law that I am aware of stops this kind of marketing, it’s a case of first come first served with domain registration.
So the moral of this story is to register your domain name if it’s still available because it would be a crying shame to win an Americas Cup and have someone else profit from your great deeds.
Hitting the Right Note With Personal Branding
Posted by John in Entertainers, Personal Brands on July 21st, 2009
Shelley Harland is a singer who travels the world promoting her music and providing entertainment to thousands.
Her personal brand website is shelleyharland.com and the first thing that happens when you visit her site is that you hear tracks from her most recent album Wonder.
This makes very good sense as singing is what she does for a living. She has a mailing list that people can join and a link to iTunes which is also very appropriate for a singer.
Irrespective of where she goes with her music she will always be known as Shelley Harland and therefore her personal brand will develop with her fame.
One of the distinct advantages of personal branding is that your name is a constant. People who meet you can easily find you online by typing your name into Google.
Do this at Google for Shelley Harland and you’ll find that her personal branding website is number one.
If you have not registered your name as a domain you can do so very easily by clicking here.
President Barack Obama Shows the Way in Personal Branding.
Posted by John in Personal Branding on July 19th, 2009
President Obama is without question the leader in personal branding.
His BarackObama.Com website is an outstanding example of personal branding in action.
It played a crucial role in getting him to the White House and it continues to support his Presidency.
Have you registered your name as a personal branding domain?
Have you registered the names of your children and grandchildren as personal domains for their future?
Check here to see if those names are available.
Who’s Talking About Who
Posted by admin in Branding Tools on July 17th, 2009
There are millions of web pages, discussion forums, blogs and chat rooms on the Internet and any one of them could be in the middle of holding a discussion about you and you may never know. Well there is a way to keep you aware of when your name is mentioned on the net and that is to make use of a free service called Google Alerts.
Google is in the business of trolling the web and indexing all the content it finds, it’s spiders are visiting millions of web pages every day indexing new content.
You can create a Google Alert based on your name ( or any other phrase ) and Google will send you an email as soon as their spiders spot your name on any web page.
This is a great tool to use if you are in the business of creating a personal brand. Hopefully the alerts will make you aware when good things are being written about you but if the situation ever arises where someone is questioning your good name you’ll be made aware of it fairly quickly via a Google Alert.
Alerts are simple to setup, you can do so here
Alerts can also be useful for getting someones attention, anyone who is establishing a brand on the web probably has a Google Alert setup. So if you want to grab their attention just write something about them on your website, they’ll be alerted to what you have written. Just make sure you only say nice things.
Maggie Beer
Posted by John in Personal Branding on July 17th, 2009
Maggie Beer has established a powerful personal brand through her cooking, writing and television appearances.
Her products are sold under her name and her brand is growing in popularity and has enormous creditability.
Unfortunately when Maggie created her website she didn’t provide any opportunity for visitors to engage publicly with her or initiate a conversation.
I would love to see Maggie set up a blog because I have no doubt that many people would like to stay informed about the many interesting things she is doing. A blog RSS feed makes this very easy as every time Maggie provided an update her subscribers could read it in a Reader such as Google.
She does have a food club that people can join.
Socialising