How will you present yourself?

You will want to ensure that you present a consistent version of yourself, so try to avoid, recording videos straight after getting up in the morning before your shower. Remember, this is going out TO THE WORLD! So, before you press record ensure you putting across a version of yourself that you’re happy being seen by anyone that you’re trying to impress.

What’s in your background?

Remember to think about what your environment is saying about you. Does your background include a grubby dressing gown hanging on the back of a door, or a dirty pile of washing stacking up on the floor? Eugh! Think about what’s behind you.

What kit are you using?

The kit you use will make a huge difference to the quality of your video. Now, you don’t have to go and spend a huge amount on your video kit, but essentials you need to think about are the audio and visual quality. People will be a lot less forgiving with rubbish audio quality – if they can’t hear you they certainly won’t be watching you! So do some dry runs to listen to your kit.

Where are you looking?

This will depend a lot on the kit you’re using. If you’re using your webcam, then you need to be careful that you don’t record your video by watching the video of you on the screen. If you’re doing that, you’re not looking at the camera and it just looks a bit weird, like you’re cross-eyed. This is never a good look.

If you’ve got a free-standing camera on a tripod, great! This will make it much easier to look straight at the camera. Unless, you’re reading some notes off camera. If you’ve not managed to get hold of some auto-cues then make sure that any notes you’re using are behind the camera so that it still looks like you’re speaking to camera.

Are you using notes?

If you’re using notes, what ever you do, DO NOT READ THEM OUT! Did you get that? DO NOT READ THEM OUT! This is not only intensely irritating to listen to, but it definitely does not help you to convey your expertise. People who know what they’re talking about don’t need to read their notes. They might need prompts, to keep them on track, but that is it. If you need to read your notes word for word, then you need to question why you’re doing this.

Have you practiced?

Before launching into video blogs, put aside half a day of just faffing with your kit and getting comfortable with it. Get comfortable talking to camera and watching how you look. Look out for any weird on camera habits you may have [hair flicking, looking sideways, eye twitching, licking your lips, etc).

Have you heard yourself speak?

One of my main challenges with videoing myself was to slow down my pace of speech. I talk waaaaay too fast. So, one thing I’ve had to learn is to SLOW down. And the only way I’ve done that is by practicing. Some may say that I still do, but believe me, at least you don’t get out of breathe just by listening to me now! Listen to what you’re saying and how you’re saying it. You might have to cut out your colourful language (if appropriate) or stop saying “uh” and “you know” every other sentence. Ask a friend who’ll be honest to give you some feedback.

Are you aiming for recording your video in one take?

This is ambitious, so you’ll need to think about how long you want to speak for and what points you want to get across. Waffling does not score high points here. Sometimes, you’ll be able to pull it off in the first take, other times you’ll be there all afternoon!

Do you have an editing suite?

If you’ve decided that a one-take shoot is too much, then you’re going to have to edit. Make sure you have some good editing software to help you do a good job. Some cameras come with their own easy-use software, but watch out because these can be very limited in their scope. On the other hand you don’t want to get caught up using professional software, because you could waste a lot of time faffing.

1-2-3 Action!

It can be too easy when you’re recording yourself to talk to yourself in your head and count yourself in, usually while getting your words straight in your head and staring out the window. Then when you reach three: you flick your hair while taking a deep breathe while simultaneously turning your head toward the camera. Then you deliver your perfect video, finish off and quickly walk toward the camera, happy that you’ve done a good job. UH-OH! Your video is a nightmare to edit!

Before you decide to start recording make sure that you’re looking at the video for a few seconds. Then at the end, stay looking at the camera for a few more. This ensure that you have sufficient footage to edit your video without cutting it too short.

If you’ve got any more tips that you’d like to share, feel free to post them in the comments below.

I want to share a great post that I’ve read on Michael Margolis’ website, Get Storied.

Michael is someone who is challenging the perception of what personal branding is by calling time on all the personal branding BS out there. He argues that the crux of your personal brand is the story you choose to share with people. After all, it is through your story that you are more likely to engage and be more memorable. Great business brands are built on stories and so are we. I am a bug fan of his work and so I’m uber delighted that he’s taken the time to write this piece. It’s one that I’ve been meaning to write for a while.

Every good brand needs a mission. And the same goes for us. If you can figure out what your mission is, then you’re doing a lot better than most. But the clever bit is articulating it, and doing so in such a way that you encourage others to join you and support you. But the thing about missions is that they’re not always articulated very well. And that’s what this post is all about.

It’s a well written post that I’m not going to attempt to take snippets from so all I’d like to do is to encourage you to pop along to his site and read it for yourself.

Read the post here  Stop Trying to Change The World: Find a Better Mission.

If you want to find out more about using storytelling in the context of your personal brand you might want to check these posts out.

Personal Branding: What’s your story?

Personal Branding: “And, what do you do?”

What story are you telling yourself?

Here is an interview I did recently with Hung Lee aka Wise Man Say.

Some of the things we talk about include

• Brand Creation vs Brand Discovery
• Brand Values = inflexibility? Or does it allow for inconsistency in life?
• Brands get ossified as they mature – harder to change as you go on – implications for young people?
• Transparency of social media – effect on personal brands
• Language – and the need to do better. Bring in your ‘personal capital’

I came across this wonderful blog piece that really got me thinking. And crying.

Nurse reveals the top 5 regrets people make on their deathbed

It reminded me of when I was losing my mum and the conversations we had about regrets. She was full of regrets. So many things she wanted to do. And once I had lost her, I wanted to make sure that I wouldn’t die with the same regrets as her. So this blog piece written by a nurse who worked with the dying is quite poignant for me.

She cites the top 5 regrets as being;

“I wish I’d had the courage to live a life true to myself, not the life others expected of me”

It doesn’t surprise me that this is top. The world is full of people who are not being true and it shows in the way that they behave and the illnesses they have. Do what you love and spend time with people you love. Anything less is simply not worth it. You only have one life and even then it is too short. Don’t let this be your regret. Take time to find out who you are and what you’re about and be brave to start the journey. It doesn’t mean it’s an easy one, but neither is dying with the regret that you never even bothered trying.

“I wish I didn’t work so hard”

Apparently this was top among the men. They spent so much time at work and not enough with their family. Sure they had the trappings of wealth, but it’s only late in life that you realise that none of that stuff matters. What matters is how much you mean to others, the love that you share with others and the magic moments you spend with them. That’s stuff that money can’t buy and that you can’t get back once time has lapsed.

“I wish I’d had the courage to express my feelings”

Repressed feelings are so damaging both for your spirit and your body. Many illnesses come from not expressing your true feelings. It might mean a difficult conversation or losing some people along the way, but isn’t that better than being a fake?

“I wish I had stayed in touch with my friends”

The busy-ness of life can so easily take over that staying in touch with friends falls behind over the years. But remember, these are the guys that give you laughter, support good times and magic moments. And without them you have no laughter, support, good times and magic moments.

“I wish that I had let myself be happier”

Near the end many realise that happiness is a choice and had they made the choice sooner, their life would have had more smiles and joy. Why wait until your deathbed to make this choice? Happiness isn’t something that you achieve when you acquire stuff, it’s a state of being. As with anything, the order of things is be-do-have, not have-do-be. Used to be someone who would utter the words “when I have that raise/that car/that house/whatever I’ll be happy”. Then I lost my mum and I resolved to work through all my crap so that I didn’t die with the same regrets as her.

You might be wondering what the link with personal branding is here. Well for me, it’s about authenticity and integrity. If you’re being true to yourself and doing something that you love, then you’ll be happy. By actively managing your personal brand, you’re more likely to be mindful of your actions and less likely to get carried away with the current of life. For me, proactively managing your personal brand means being authentic and true, it means being well balanced in how you spend your time to ensure you achieve what you want. And often, when we acknowledge our true selves, our ambitions become more meaningful and selfless. And so it follows, that many of these regrets should pass you by. Now, isn’t that something to aim for?

So, now that you’ve read this list of regrets, are there any that you’re guilty of? Leave a comment below.

There’s a misconception out there that for you to have a really strong personal brand, you need to dominate all the social networks, have a really strong web presence, have written at least 2 books etc etc. Well, don’t worry, because you might not need to do any of this.

Identifying what you need to do to build a strong brand always boils down to what you want and who your targeting. At its very simplest, the ONLY thing you ever need to do to have a strong brand is this;

Do what you you’re hired to do & do what you promise to do.

If this is the only thing you do consistently, then this is a great place to start. If I was to add one thing to this, it’s this.

Be very clear who your target market is and make sure they know about you.

If you’re clear about who needs to know about you then that will determine what strategy you use to communicate and engage with them. For some people this target group can be a very small group indeed.

Let me tell you about a friend of mine. She sells products to the UK retailers for a big US brand. For her, the people who need to know about how great she is are her employers and the key decision makers in the UK retailers that represent the market she’s in. After all, they are the people that will influence how successful she is in her career. Now as a result of consistently being great at her job, her counterparts at her competitors are also aware of how good she is – they’re losing sales to her brand!

Her target market is a very small select group of people, probably around 20 to 30 people. So for her, having an active Twitter or Linked In presence is unnecessary so she doesn’t bother. As is a blog and any public speaking engagements. She just needs to focus on doing a great job. And she is. How does she know this? Well, one of her competitors offered her a package that she couldn’t refuse. They had been courting her for many years, but as she’s happy where she is she told them that she would only move for A LOT more than she was on. And as she’s a mum, she would want a 4-day week. She never for a moment thought that they would offer her exactly what she wanted. So when faced with a package she couldn’t refuse, she took it and handed her notice in only to find that her current employer beat the competitor offer. So now without actually moving companies she’s earning around 30% MORE than before, and she’s working 20% less!

I love this story because it’s a great example of how you can achieve greatness in your life by keeping it very simple and focussed. If you’re good at what you do the results will speak for themselves and there will no need for you to broadcast yourself to the world.

So are you clear on WHO can influence your success? And are you engaging with them? Do you they know about you? More importantly, are you wasting time doing things that aren’t getting you anywhere?

Discover the answers to these questions in Quick & Easy Introduction to Personal Branding.