I consciously made the decision to disconnect myself from many of the vestiges of digital media for the past six months. I’m the type of person that might check her facebook status once every month, open both twitter and linkedin accounts but never posts anything, and has two struggling blogs to her credit. The thought of even finishing this simple post seems intimidating to me.
This winter break has been painfully eye-opening thanks to my brother. For the past year he has been tirelessly working on a startup company and though I knew startups take a lot of time and energy, I had no idea just how necessary it is to be digitally connected today. Over this break I’ve been schooled on the harmonious relationship between facebook, twitter, linkedin and other forms of social media. We also went over the importance of personal branding and even though I knew how important it is to represent yourself digitally, I severely underestimated the amount of true work it takes to build your brand.
He introduced me to Kristian Anderson, a brand strategist from Indianapolis. On his blog, Kristian talks about the importance of owning and developing your personal brand. He states that, “If you’re not branding yourself, you can be assured that others are doing it for you.” Ouch. Even if one opts not to take ownership of their brand, it’s being done whether they like it or not. As much as I’d like to assume that I have a brand, I know that’s not the case. Let’s just say I’ve got a bit of work to do on yoama.com in 2010…