When I was invited to speak at Showit United in Phoenix, Arizona, it was easy to say YES.

This conference attracts some of the hard-working, smartest, and nice people around.  This is the type of conference that encourages hugging (yes, hugging), and facilitates real relationships between attendees.

I was asked to speak about building a brand on social media.

This is (obviously) a part of my business I'm passionate about (me and Branding got matching BFF tattoos in 2006), so it was an honor to connect with so many hustling business owners.

JD and I were fortunate enough to bring our videographer along (thanks, Mar!), so he captured a sneak peek of the entire event.

The foundation of the presentation started with Seth Godin‘s definition of a brand:

“the set of expectations, memories, stories and relationships that, taken together, account for a consumer's decision to choose one product or service over another. …But your brand is a story, a set of emotions and expectations and a stand-in for how we think and feel about what you do.”

Because I'm slow and simple, I boiled this glorious definition to just one word:  EXPERIENCE.

A brand is an experience you create for a customer, it's what they say about you when you walk out of the room.

So if we can agree on this (that a brand is an experience, how someone feels about your business), what is the easiest, fastest, most cost-effective way to build a brand?

• SOCIAL MEDIA

 

Social media provides ways to connect with people in real time, on a device they hold in their hands.  I view social media as the number one tool to make a customer (actual or prospective) feel positively about your business far before making a purchase.

Friends…this. is. powerful.

You now have the ability to build those “expectations, memories, stories, and relationships” that my best friend** Seth Godin refers to…all by way of social media.

This video explains it more in depth (if you'd like to skip straight to the teaching you can find it at 2:30)…

If you'd like to access the free Productivity Planner I mentioned on how I schedule my social media, feel free to download it >>HERE<<.

I hope this helps and I can't wait for you to start leveraging social media to build your brand TODAY.

Shine On,
j*

 

**Seth Godin really isn't my best friend…but I just pretend he is because one day he might call and invite me to lunch, so I need to be ready to fall into the BFF role as soon as possible.