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Google Your Name to Secure Your Brand Integrity

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Google Your Name?

GoogledYou need to google your name and find out what comes up in the search!

I was listening to one of my favorite podcasts The Voice of Job Seekers, with Mark Anthony Dyson, a couple of weeks ago. Mark was interviewing Susan Joyce, who is the founder of job-hunt.org and WorkCoachCafe.com. The episode was Defensive Googling and The Obsolete 40-Hour Work Week. Susan was on for the 1st half of the episode.

It was all about why you should google your name.

Is it not vanity or ego to google your name?

Before a recruiter reaches out to you, they will almost always google your name. They want to know something about you. What have you published? Is there anything negative about you on the Internet?

Maybe there is nothing about you on the Internet. What does that say about you?

I was raised as a baby boomer to be private. Bragging about yourself and bringing attention to yourself was considered vain. In this day and age, if you want to stay relevant, you need to be found and found for things that you want to be found for.

If a recruiter finds nothing about you, they may assume that you are not online at all or you are hiding something.

The Proper Way to Google Your Name

If you enter your name in Google or Bing or any of the other search engines in a plain Jane browser window, your search results will be skewed because it remembers who you are and where you have been on the Internet.

You need to open a private window and what it is called depends on the browser you use.

  • Chrome calls this an incognito window
  • Safari and Firefox call this a private window
  • Internet Exploder or .. uh err.. Internet Explorer calls this … I do not know what they call this because I have not used IE for years.

Before I started Career Pivot when I would google my name in a Chrome incognito window my name would not appear until page 3 or 4. Now, when I google my name, it is the first 3 entries on Page 1.

Why?

Back in 2010, I was nearly invisible on the Internet.

Are you invisible on the Internet?

I have a common name

Wait! I have a very common name. What do I do?

It depends on whether the person is someone who is reputable or is infamous. Either way, you need to work on getting your name higher in the rankings.

Do you have a personal website? If not, you probably should at least get your own URL. I own marc-miller.me which should direct you to Careerpivot.com.

How Often Should I Check?

The advice Susan Joyce gave in the podcast is weekly when you are in an active job search.

I say daily but that is pretty tedious. What you can do, however, is set up a Google Alert.

You can set up the ‘alert’ to deliver a report each time it finds the search string. Or it can send you a digest. You can specify whether to send you the digest daily or weekly and specify the time of day the digest should be delivered.

I have multiple searches set up:

  • Marc Miller
  • Career Pivot
  • CareerPivot
  • Repurpose Your Career

Whenever a bootleg copy of my book “Repurpose Your Career” appears on a download website I get notified. If someone refers to a career pivot I get notified.

Whenever my name “Marc Miller” appears in a press release or an article I will be notified. There are a lot more Marc Miller’s in high places than I thought and I now know whenever a Marc Miller gets a DWI or DUI ticket.

Why should I care?

Your personal brand is primarily based on what is found online. You need to stay on top of what is being said about you and what is being said about people with your same name.

You will be pre-judged based on what people find about you online. 

Yeah I know that is not fair. Well … get over it. The only way to manage what is found about you is to be vigilant about what is being written.

Should something bad actually happen like you get a DWI or DUI, there are ways to get the search entry to get buried but that is a whole different post.

Are you going to Google Your Name today?

Are You Your Authentic Self or an Actor at Work? [Updated]

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Authentic Self?authentic self

To quote Dr. Phil

Are you living a life that is more in tune with your “authentic” self (who you were created to be) or your “fictional” self (who the world has told you to be)?

Gee, I never thought I would write a post where I would quote Dr. Phil!

Are you who you appear to be? Let me explain.

Many of us who have worked for 20 or more years have changed our behaviors there to fit in, to be a more attractive employee, to get paid more, to be more valuable … We have morphed our behaviors to fit in.

I am a certified Birkman consultant.  The Birkman assessment will tell you in nine different behaviors both how you appear and how you want to be treated. We are usually treated the way we behave. When the way we behave is markedly different than the way we want to be treated, issues arise.

You Are an Actor

When we go to work we become actors, we play a role. We are supposed to behave in a certain way at work to fit in. We take on these roles and many times we become quite good at them. In fact, sometimes we start believing that we are the actor and forget who we really are.

You may want to check out my post What Persona(Role) Have You Performed in your Career?

So what happens when we take on a role that is counter to who we really are? I have done this throughout my career and I can tell you it usually results in burnout and exhaustion.

Let me give you some examples.

Closet Introvert

My MBTI score is ENTJ. The E is for extrovert, or I behave like an extrovert. I can work a room at a networking event like a pro. I am an excellent presenter. The issue is, I am a closet introvert. When I finish a presentation or leave a networking event, I am exhausted. I am very good at behaving like an extrovert, but it exhausts me.

I have learned that, if I am going to teach a class all day, I need to spend the evening alone or with only a few close friends. I am not an extrovert. I really want to be left alone!

The interesting part of this story is I convinced myself I was an extrovert. When I went off to teach high school math I seduced myself that I could stand up in front of a classroom 30-35 hours a week and teach. I tell this story on the podcast episode From High-Tech Training to High School Teacher, and Why I Left. [Podcast].

Most people do not know that about me. I know I am not the only one who masks his authentic self in this way!

For More: 3 Signs You Are a Closet Introvert and What to Do!

Stealth Competitor

A stealth competitor is someone who appears to be all for the common good. They are very nice people. However, they feel if they do good work, it should be noticed and they should be rewarded.

The kicker is they never ask to be rewarded.

Unfortunately, this is very common in the western world. Many of us were trained by our parents and society that if we do good work, it will be noticed and we will get rewarded. We do not need to ask. 

This is very common with women in the professional world. Remember back to 2014 when CEO of Microsoft, Satya Nadella, spoke at a Women’s Conference and said:

“It’s not really about asking for a raise, but knowing and having faith that the system will give you the right raise,” 

He also said that not asking for a pay raise created good karma.

Ain’t that a bunch of horse manure?

Stealth competitors rarely feel they are valued at work. Why might you ask? No one knows how to reward them or what makes them feel valued.

Sound familiar? Stealth competitors are very common in certain work environments!

By the way, there is a very good book written on this topic – Know Your Value by Mia Brzezinski.

For More: Stealth Competitor? Wonder Why You Do Not Get Rewarded?

Structured Anarchist

I have had quite a few clients who are structured anarchists. They appear to be very orderly. They function well in a rules-oriented environment. You can spot them because when they dress, every piece of clothing is in place. If they have hair, every follicle is in its proper place. When they speak they are very precise in the language they use. They appear extremely orderly and love rules.

The issue is they have to create all of the rules!

These individuals want to create the rules or at least be able to change the rules. They are great at creating order out of chaos. If they enter a new environment they need the freedom to change the rules to their suit!

Problems arise when they have fixed all of the problems and now the boss wants them to run things or as I like to say, “start turning the crank.” They get very bored and after a year moves on.

These individuals commonly have been placed in environments where things are predictable when what they really want is a problem to fix. The problem is no one knows that. I have worked with several of these individuals to ask for problems to solve.

Sound familiar? There are a lot of you out there!

For More: Can Can Tim Repurpose His Career? Part 2 of 4 [Podcast] (Tim is a structured anarchist)

What Role are You Playing

In each of these cases, the way people behave does not show their authentic self. They are playing a role.

They often are not perceived for who they are but for how they behave. Therefore, are not treated the way they want to be treated.

I can honestly say that in my 22 years at IBM I became an actor. I became someone who I was not. I was a REALLY good actor and I was very well compensated. On the other hand, it was very unhealthy for me in the long term to play these roles.

What role are you playing? Do you even know you are an actor?

Marc Miller  

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Rebranding Your Personal Brand—It is Time?

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Rebranding

Wikipedia defines rebranding as:

Rebranding is a marketing strategy in which a new name, term, symbol, design, or combination thereof is created for an established brand with the intention of developing a new, differentiated identity in the minds of consumers, investors, competitors, and other stakeholders.

ReBrandingI am going to define personal rebranding as:

The process of creating a new, updated personal brand that is related to your previous personal brand.

There are times when a personal brand needs a facelift—often by taking past experiences and relating them to the current world we live in.

Rebranding in the Corporate World

Companies need to update their image from time to time. A classical example is Apple. When Apple was named Apple Computer, their logo looked like this:

apple_computer_logo

When Apple Computer rebranded itself as Apple, they changed their logo to:

apple_logo

Apple had transformed from a computer manufacturing company to a consumer electronics company. They needed a new brand logo, but notice that the new logo still resembled the old.

This is not a new brand, but a rebrand.

For More: What is a Personal Brand? – Guest Post

Rebranding – Your New Personal Brand

My favorite definition of a personal brand is as follows:

“Your brand is what people say about you when you’re not in the room” – Jeff Bezos, Founder of Amazon

Sometimes we just need to move on from our jobs, industries, or professions. We need to translate our talents and skills into a new arena.

I recently went through a rebranding process with a client, and I want to use his story as an example.

Jim retired early from a company that made sensors for the transportation industry. This is a very niche industry that, while it is stable, only has room in it for a few players.

After aa while he decided that retirement was boring. He decided to go back to work in a sales or business development position. He did not want to return to the transportation industry.

In his previous life as a business development and product manager, Jim had grown his sensor products from zero to $20M in revenue over a 4-7 years. He had a pretty decent track record, so we just had to figure out the best way to translate this experience to a new industry.

For More:Talents versus Skills – Do you know the difference?

Translating Experience

As it turned out, that translation was pretty easy (might have been easy for me because of my technology experience).

The sensors he worked with did the following:

  • Communicated data over a network to a central controller
  • Generated alerts when error occurred
  • Updated software via the network
  • Monitored sensors from the central controller

My first thought was that this sounded a lot like the latest trend of Internet of Things (IoT). After doing some research, we found a subset of IoT called Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT). IIoT mapped very closely to what Jim had worked on previously.

Rebranding Statement

We came up with the brand statement of:

I was doing IoT before it was called IoT!

His LinkedIn profile has IoT and IIoT everywhere it makes sense and it tells the story on how what he did for the last 10 years of his career maps directly to IoT.

When Jim went to networking events, he felt comfortable telling people, “I was doing IoT before it was called IoT!” He felt comfortable saying this because it was true.

This rebranding process landed Jim a contract business development position with an IoT technology startup. We will use this position to develop some street cred in the IoT and IIoT space.

The rebranding or mapping of his talents and skills directly into this new space made it clear he had the expertise.

For More: Changing Industries to Smart Grid

Conclusion

This was a fairly easy translation of Jim’s experience from one industry into another. It is not always this easy.

You will likely need to get help from someone who works in your target industry. Between your expertise in your previous industry and the expertise from the person who is helping you, you can develop your own rebranding statement.

Have you gone through a rebranding process? Please tell us your story in the comment section below.

Marc Miller  

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Brand New You Show – Personal Branding [Guest Post]

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Brand New You Show with Ryan Rhoten

Brand New YouToday we welcome to the BRAND New You show Marc Miller founder of career pivot.com.

Note from Marc: This is a condensed version of the interview I gave to Ryan Rhoten for the Brand New You show. The recording can be accessed below.

Career Pivot was selected as one of the top 100 career websites and has been featured on Forbes.com, CBS money watch, and US News and World report.

Marc is a career design specialist who helps baby boomers design a strategy of manageable pivots in order to help them move towards a career they can grow with and be fulfilled with for decades.

No stranger to career pivots himself, Marc has personally made 6 of them including stints at IBM, two successful start-ups in Austin TX, teaching math in an inner-city high school and even working for a local non-profit.

He is the author of Repurpose your career – A practical guide for Baby boomers. In the book, Marc provides a roadmap for boomers who are looking to find a career they can grow into and that meets their needs.

In His latest book which is called Personal Branding for baby boomers – Marc answers personal branding questions such as What is it, how to manage it and why it’s no longer an option.

Marc, Welcome to the brand new you show.

Recommended book(s) for the show

Since I believe that reading is a necessary part of becoming a BRAND New You, I ask all of my guests what non-fiction book are you either reading now or just recently finished.

Dustin is currently reading a book written by Greg McKeown called:

Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less (Affiliate link)

Summary from Amazon – The Way of the Essentialist isn’t about getting more done in less time. It’s about getting only the right things done.  It is not a time management strategy or a productivity technique. It is a systematic discipline for discerning what is absolutely essential, then eliminating everything that is not, so we can make the highest possible contribution towards the things that really matter.

CAREER PROGRESSION

Today Marc is a career design specialist, but this wasn’t always the case. He started his career out like many other baby boomers by becoming an employee and working for a corporation.

Using what was then the formula for career success Marc spent the first twenty plus years of his career working at IBM.

In Marc’s words he “wandered around” IBM for those years holding progressively successful roles with the company.

Marc’s career trajectory was on the rise until it was impacted by a major event which we discuss during the show.

After this event, Marc started to ask a lot of questions his position in life. These questions led him into his own career pivots and ultimately to founding Career Pivot.com.

Since founding Career Pivot Marc has written two books:

Repurpose your Career – A practical guide for baby boomers (affiliate link)

Personal Branding for Baby Boomers – What it is, How to manage it and Why it’s no longer optional (affiliate link)

CAREER PIVOT AND PERSONAL BRANDING FOR BABY BOOMERS

Marc looks at personal branding as being able to tell your story in an authentic way.  Not so long ago your personal brand was limited to your reputation within the “four walls” of the corporate office.

Today however with the internet and social media we compete with people from all over the world for the same positions. In these cases getting the next position or promotion comes down to your ability to help people answer this question:

“How do I know that you know your stuff?”

Some people see personal branding or telling your own story as self-promotion.  These folks were not raised to be self-promoters. Marc and I talk about a very simple philosophy he uses with his clients to get past this mental barrier.

Key Elements to building your Brand Story

When building your brand story Marc describes three key elements that make up every brand story. Each designed to help us tell our story in a compelling way.

Marc also discusses who should write our brand story and why it’s not who you think. We talk through the exact exercise Marc uses with his clients to help build their story.

We also discuss where to use your story once it’s written. Besides the obvious, I think you’ll be surprised at some of the creative places Marc tells us where we can use our brand story.

1 – Strong Opening

Marc compares the strong opening to reading the headline or opening paragraph in a newspaper or magazine article. It’s something that makes you want to read the rest.

What is your opening? How do you grab someone’s attention?

2 – Memorable label

It might help to think of a memorable label as a tagline or phrase that makes it easier for others to remember you. This usually comes from brainstorming and self-reflection.

Knowing your common career thread will help you develop your memorable label.

3 – Brand theme

Your brand theme is the over-arching premise that ties your brand together. Marc offers three potential brand themes for us to consider.

> Major Event: Is a single “thing” or event that shapes you and your career. This major event is easily recognized by us and others.

> Common Theme: The common theme is something that “weaves” its way through our careers and is not typically something we can see on our own. We usually need help from others to see it.

> Proof Points: Specific “points” that can be highlighted to quickly tell your brand story and show others who you are.

These are usually things that you have done repeatedly throughout your career.

The role of Blogging and Social Media in Personal Branding

Marc and I spend time discussing blogging and social media as well.  The benefits of blogging is something I’ve discussed many times both here on the blog and in other podcasts as well.

Marc talks about how blogging helps you demonstrate what you do and what you know. He gives some great examples of this from his clients.

Blogging also helps put our names “out there” which gets back to our earlier comments about self-promotion. This is where social media and blogging can work together in concert to help you get found.

Marc and I discuss how social media has completely changed the job search process. The way you find and get a job today is dramatically different than it was even five years ago.

Candidates should use social to be social and help others understand that they know their stuff. Use social to build real relationships like we discussed with David Fisher during our discussion on networking.

WRAP

Below are the best ways to get in touch with Marc and pick up a copy of his books.

Website: Career Pivot

Repurpose your Career – A practical guide for baby boomers (affiliate link)

Personal Branding for Baby Boomers – What it is, How to manage it and Why it’s no longer optional (affiliate link)

Marc leaves us with these final thoughts:

“Career reinvention is all about being introspective. It’s about knowing thyself.”

This post originally appeared on the Ryan Rhoten Brand New You Blog.

————————————————

Ryan RhotenThis post was written by Ryan Rhoten. Ryan is a personal branding coach who works with business professionals to build their personal brands both online and offline in order to grow their influence and impact their career. As the host of the BRAND New You Show podcast, Ryan interviews career coaches, recruiters and social media experts, in order to arm today’s job seeker with the latest tools and tactics required to become recognized in their field of expertise. The best way to reach Ryan is on Twitter @RyanRhoten

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3 Personal Branding Tips for Baby Boomer Job Seekers

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branding tipsBranding Tips

The concept of a personal brand is relatively new. In 2009, when we were in the middle of the great recession and the ideas for Career Pivot were germinating in my head, I picked up Dan Schawbel’s Book, Me 2.0: Build a Powerful Brand to Achieve Career Success. This was my introduction to the term personal branding.

The concept of a personal brand became clear when I read the following quote:

“Your brand is what people say about you when you’re not in the room” – Jeff Bezos, Founder of Amazon

We all have a brand…whether we like it or not.

Personal Brand for Baby BoomersLet me give you a few simple branding tips that come from my new book, Personal Branding for Baby Boomers – What It Is, How to Manage It, and Why It’s No Longer Optional.

Branding Tip #1 – Your LinkedIn Photograph

Your LinkedIn photo is absolutely critical. What does your current photograph say about you? If you are not sure, check out PhotoFeeler.com and get other people’s opinions about your current photograph.

I want you to consider three things about your photo:

  • Background – This is much more important than you think. Take a look at Jason Seiden’s article called, “What Profile Photo Works Best on LinkedIn: A Real-Life Experiment.”
  • Cropping your photograph – Headshot photographs are rectangular. Social media photographs are mostly square. Your headshot needs to be cropped. When you crop the photograph, does the background still convey the appropriate message? Check out my headshot and LinkedIn photograph from the book.
  • The color of your clothes – The color of your clothes has to be compatible with the background. If you are a guy, you may need to get help with this…like I did.

Branding Tip #2 – Your Brand Story

Your brand story tells the reader who you are—not what you have done. This should be written in 1st person. It is your story.

Who should write this story? NOT YOU!

In the book, I give you three methods for writing the story, but the actual writing should be done by someone other than you. It could be someone you hire, a friend, or a relative. I have had the best luck with adult daughters. They will brag on Mom or Dad with an insight few others have.

Your brand story should be placed in the summary section of your LinkedIn profile. The summary section is limited to 2,000 characters, therefore, this needs to be tightly edited and well written.

Branding Tip #3 – Rich Media Links

Each section of the LinkedIn profile allows you to upload content or link to content on the Internet. This is a great way to demonstrate what you know. This could include:

  • YouTube videos
  • Articles you’ve written
  • Work product
  • Product descriptions for items you’ve sold or serviced
  • Spreadsheets
  • PowerPoint presentations
  • LinkedIn Publisher posts
  • Links to personal websites

You should include anything that shows that you know your stuff.

If you are interested in more information on writing LinkedIn Publisher posts that work, read my recent Forbes article, Using LinkedIn Influencer To Build Your Personal Brand.

I recently had a client who included links to product descriptions of the multitude of sophisticated manufacturing machines he had sold within the previous 10 years. It was quite impressive. This was a major factor in him getting an interview for the job he was subsequently hired for.

If you follow these three branding tips, you will be on your way to creating a personal brand that people will remember.

Please watch the recording of the FlexJobs Webinar: Leveraging LinkedIn to Get Noticed by Employers.

This post originally appeared on Flexjobs.com

Marc Miller  

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