Positive personal impact is one of the keys to career and life success that I discuss in Straight Talk for Success and 42 Rules to Jumpstart Your Professional Success. If you want to create positive personal impact you need to do three things. 1) Develop and nurture your unique personal brand. 2) Be impeccable in your presentation of self – in person and on line. 3) Know and follow the basic rules of etiquette.
Do you use Twitter? It has become an important part of many people’s on line presence. Last Wednesday (June 10, 2009), USA Today did a big article called “What Would Shakespeare Tweet?” In part it said…
“There is no doubt that social media networks are fantastic communication machines. They allow people to feel connected to a virtual community, make new friends and keep old ones, learn things they didn’t know. The encourage people to write more (that can’t be bad) and write well concisely (which is hard, trust us.) They are a new form of entertainment (and marketing) than can occupy people for hours in any given day. ‘Great blogging is great writing, and it turns out great Twittering is great writing – it’s the haiku form of blogging’ says Debbie Weil, a consultant on social media and author of The Corporate Blogging Book.”
But many people complain about Twitter, saying it is just a bunch of dumb, narcissistic updates like, “Got up, had breakfast;” or “Went to the store;” or “Watching the NBA Finals;” etc. etc. etc. And they’re right.
Don’t tweet stupid stuff like that. It won’t help you reinforce your personal brand, and it will not help you create an impeccable presentation of self on line. Tweet substance. You’d be surprised how much substance you can cram into 140 characters. Yesterday, I did the following tweet: “Career Common Sense: Admit your mistakes. You’ll gain a reputation as an honest person” – not real deep, but — in my opinion at least — some solid common sense advice on personal branding.
I tweet regularly. You can follow me @BudBilanich. I do two types of tweets every day. I let people know that I have posted a new blog, and I offer career success advice. For example, last week one of my career success advice tweets read: “Career Common Sense: Work hard at building relationships with all kinds of people.”
It was retweeted by at least five people. Retweets are great; they help me build my Common Sense Guy personal brand. They also help me identify the type of advice that most people find helpful. I repeat my Tweets three or four times a day. Twitter moves fast. By repeating my tweets at different times of the day, I am increasing the likelihood that more of my followers will see my tweets.
I got the idea for regular Career Common Sense tweets and for repeating my tweets several times during the day from Stephanie Frank, who is an absolute genius when it comes to social media and on line marketing. If you have a Twitter account, you should follow her @Stephanie Frank. You’ll love her “Daily Do It” tweets. I retweeted her June 11Daily Do It tweet; “Daily Do It: Passion for your life shows, no matter what the circumstances. Be passionate today.”
The common sense point here is clear. Successful people create positive personal impact. Your on line presence can help you create positive personal impact – but only if you pay attention. Twitter is a great way to build your personal brand. If you blog, set up your blog posts to go directly to twitter. You can also use Twitter to offer short bits of helpful advice that will help you become better known and build your brand. For example, my “Career Common Sense” tweets are career success advice in 140 characters or less. You can do the same in your area of expertise. If you do so, you will build your brand and become better known as an expert in your field.
That’s my take on how to use Twitter to create positive personal impact and to build your personal brand. What’s yours? Please leave a comment sharing your thoughts with us. As always, thanks for reading.
Bud
PS: Please follow me on twitter — @BudBilanich.
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