Practicing personal PR and branding is one thing that professional communicators shouldn’t have to go to a boot camp to learn, right? But although your PR experience level may be high, there’s a myriad of ways put yourself out there, and make your personal brand resonate in a new way.
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Just ask Larry Thomas. For most of his career, Thomas promoted the brands of companies PR Newswire and Medialink (now Synaptic Digital). But a few years back he found himself on the business sidelines, waiting for a noncompete clause to expire. “It became obvious that I had to build out my personal brand,” says Thomas. “I had always focused on supporting the businesses I worked for,” says Thomas. “But I needed to think of myself as a brand.”
So he became more familiar with and active on Facebook, Twitter and other platforms. As he listened to and joined conversations online, it became clear to Thomas that his passion and knowledge of video—which he’d honed while at Medialink, was strong.
LINKED UP
So he started a Video Marketing and Public Relations group on LinkedIn which helped him to establish relationships with peers. “I really used that as a way to build up my brand and my profile in the industry,” says Thomas. The group currently numbers nearly 600 people from 20 different companies.
Thomas leveraged those relationships cultivated online and his passion for video to start his own production company, Latergy (www.latergy.com) in October 2009.
Thanks to the economy, many PR pros are in the same boat as Thomas—trying to promote themselves to get back in the PR game. Yet others build their personal brands to become influencers, which will help their businesses as well.
BEST BLOGGERS
Passion appears to be a recurring theme among successful personal PR/branding practitioners. Thanks to a passion for communicating PR best practices to a rabid audience, Deirdre Breakenridge has forged a strong personal brand, which supports her own marcom company, Mango! Her blog, PR 2.0 Strategies (deirdrebreakenridge.com), debuted in 2007 as a way to vet content for a book she was launching in 2008. Since then it’s grown exponentially from a blog about a book into a chronicle of trends in PR and social media.
“People have so many questions about PR, so I have no shortage of content,” she says. “If you’re listening in a community, and you’re presenting it with resources and helpful information, you will become a credible source,” explains Breakenridge.
Another blogger who has built up strong PR cred is Sarah Evans. Owner of PR consultancy Sevans Strategies, her PRSarahEvans blog is right up there with Breakenridge in popularity (see the chart to find out where they both stand among top PR bloggers).
“When I started the blog three years ago, I wanted to practice what I was preaching,” she says. “It’s really an outlet for myself—I’m a passion blogger.”
TWEET SOMETHINGS
Yet blogging isn’t Evans’ primary communications platform. Twitter (@PRSarahEvans) is her vehicle of choice—followers number close to 53,000. “Lots of brands are targeting online influencers, but I’ve found that when I target my own network of followers, it’s a great conversation starter,” she says. Her numerous tweets often start with a topic around food, wine or cinema, yet they drive the Sarah Evans PR brand, which in the last several months has garnered plenty of attention: She was featured in Forbes ’ “14 Power Women to Follow on Twitter” and in Entrepreneur’s “Top 10 Hot Startups of 2010.”
HUMAN TOUCH
For Alan Weinkrantz, the image—in still photography and video form—is his personal PR platform of choice. Weinkrantz, a PR consultant to the technology sector, likes to show a human side with a personal Flickr page. “When I’m traveling, I think of myself as a photojournalist,” he says. It’s showing the human side that Weinkrantz believes helps build personal brands.
Weinkrantz also has more than 300 videos posted on YouTube. “Four years ago the thought my having my own videos on YouTube would have been absurd,” he muses.
GOING OFFLINE
Successful personal PR practitioners parlay their online activities into the real world. Evans has numerous speaking gigs; Thomas writes byliners for PR publications and frequents events; and Breakenridge often parlays social networking into live meetings.
“As people get to know you online, you build up peer-to-peer relationships, and they always move into the cup of coffee stage,” she says.
Here are some personal PR/branding tips from the experts:
• Breakenridge: The Deirdre you meet in person is who you get on the blog, and that’s the way it should be.
• Thomas: Apply the same storytelling skills that you would with regular brands.
• Evans: Find out what people out there want, and give it to them.
One caveat: Weinkrantz warns against too much self-promotion, particularly if you work at a large communications agency or organization (see Mike McDougall’s Tip Sheet on page 8 on balancing personal and work brands). PRN
CONTACT:
Larry Thomas, [email protected]; Deirdre Breckenridge, [email protected]; Sarah Evans, [email protected]; Alan Weinkrantz, [email protected].