Business from the inside out

Personal Branding Articles

The Art of Your Business

Creating a business is just as abstract as creating a painting, and while you can go to a million painting classes and learn a thousand difference techniques, what will end up on the canvas depends on you. Knowing how to do something doesn’t makes it...

“Better” Than You

It’s an endless quest to be good enough in another person’s eyes. Not facing our own thoughts and feelings, we measure our self using the eyes of another. Unable to acknowledge it’s really our own perception of self that we use as the measure—not...

Attached to Who We Are

Have you noticed — when you are living for the moment — you’re not attached to some fixed idea of who you are? In those moments of presence, you are you — you are nobody. There is no attachment to any idea of who you are. In those moments, you experience...

More Complex Than A Story Can Tell

In whatever shape it may take, whenever I hear a story, I find myself wondering how it is serving the person who is telling it. I understand what’s being presented is not the whole story, and perhaps, it’s not even half. It’s the version of the story...

What Being an Innerpreneur Means to Me (And Only Me)

What Being an Innerpreneur Means to Me (And Only Me)

InnerpreneurWord

[tweetmeme] I’ve said it before and I’m sure I’ll say it again, I did not make the word Innerpreneur up. I was only drawn to it once upon a time ago (early 2007) when I was starting my business.

I saw the book Karma Queens, Geek Gods and Innerpreneurs in the bookstore and despite the fact that I had little interest in the book’s overall themes, I bought it. I was compelled by the term, Innerpreneur, and intrigued by the people it described.

It spoke to me. I connected with it. I didn’t totally understand what being an Innerpreneur meant but I found truth in it.

What Being an Innerpreneur Means to Me (And Only Me)

What Being an Innerpreneur Means to Me (And Only Me)

InnerpreneurWord

[tweetmeme] I’ve said it before and I’m sure I’ll say it again, I did not make the word Innerpreneur up. I was only drawn to it once upon a time ago (early 2007) when I was starting my business.

I saw the book Karma Queens, Geek Gods and Innerpreneurs in the bookstore and despite the fact that I had little interest in the book’s overall themes, I bought it. I was compelled by the term, Innerpreneur, and intrigued by the people it described.

It spoke to me. I connected with it. I didn’t totally understand what being an Innerpreneur meant but I found truth in it.

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One Thing I Think I Know About Personal Branding

One Thing I Think I Know About Personal Branding

NoMessage

There is no demand for my message.

Personal branding isn’t about packaging myself up into a pretty box and showing only the good and glowing. The whole me, not my tidy little message, is what people want and will see, whether I attempt to control it or not.

Establishing a message for myself, deciding on a pretense, trying to make you think what I want you to think about me, is not of benefit to me.

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exploring brand Me

exploring brand Me

exploring brand me

I’m excited to announce that I’ve created something for You! exploring brand Me. It’s a fun and probing personal branding exercise supporting you in discovering and communicating the essence of You and Your Brand.

I love using this simple and effective awareness tool with my branding clients, and it occurred to me that it would be valuable as workbook for you to experience. I hope you find the exploration expanding!

made with love,

TJSignature

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The Pirates Knew the Value of Meaningful Branding

The Pirates Knew the Value of Meaningful Branding

Pirates

I like to think about pirates when I think about branding.

Branding is an abstract concept and I find hard to understand or explain. So when I’m thinking about branding, I think about pirates.

As I see it, pirates are one of the oldest and most effective brands.

Just imagine that you were sailing on a big, wooden ship in the middle of some cold, lonely waterway and you saw a ship appear in the distance. As it heads towards you, you see that it flies a flag… and as it gets even closer to you, you see what’s on the flag… GULP… a skull and crossbones. Seeing this logo, you immediately form an idea of what kind of experience is in store for you, courtesy of the pirate brand.

The pirates also had a brand promise – YOU ARE F*$KED – and they consistently delivered on it, client experience after client experience.

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What the Heck is Strategic Communication?

What the Heck is Strategic Communication?

Do You Know the Difference between Marketing? vs. Advertising? vs. Branding? vs. Public Relations?

I often find it very hard to clearly differentiate the various forms of strategic communications that a person, a business and/or a brand can use.

A while back I shared an analogy explaining the differences between marketing, advertising and public relations. Today, I’ve expanded on the analogy with visual comics.

Getting a Date Using Strategic Communication

What the heck is Marketing

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What Tune Does Your Business Sing?

What Tune Does Your Business Sing?

frequency

Think of your web presence as a radio signal. It is constantly sending out a frequency.

The frequency is determined by your online content — the words, images and feelings you express online.

And like a radio signal, people gravitate towards and listen to frequencies that they connect with. Frequencies that share their worldviews, interests, needs and desires. People tend to listen to frequencies that are similar to their own.

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