After the Brand Reinvention Summit (Oct 1-3) where I met so many fascinating people from so many distant and far flung places, it took a few days for me to come back to earth! I’ve heard from so many of you, and of course, I couldn’t have done it without the great support of the wonderful line up of nine speakers! If you weren’t around, check out this link to see the great roster of speakers: http://blahtozingsummit.com
PS I called the Summit site ‘blah to zing’ because one of my favorite clients in Washington DC told me one day, in her Southern drawl, that I had taken her biz ‘ from blah to zing!’ She also called me the ‘Zing Girl.” Of course, I believe you have to have fun with your brand so the blahtozingsummit.com became the domain name.
So right on the heels of the Brand Summit, I am excited to be kick starting a new pilot group coaching program called What’s Your Zing?” It’s an intensive three-week program starting November 2nd, where we’ll meet up every week for two 90-minute phone (conference call) sessions. We’re going to look at what makes your brand tick. Hold your breath! We’re going to turn your brand into a ‘passion brand’ so you can engage, intrigue and inspire your target audience. If you’re interested, get in touch with me (van@zingyourbrand.com) or go to http://blahtozingsummit.com/3options.
PS If you’re not allowing your potential target audience to see you, find you and then line up to work with you, then your brand is not serving you well. In about an hour from now, I’m putting together my first video about What’s Zing, Anyway? I’ll talk about why it’s so important today, and how it’s going to transform your biz!
Here’s a line up of the remarkable business thought leaders and creative visionaries who are speaking at the Brand Reinvention Summit starting today – hurrah – and I’m including some highlights from the interviews.
FYI The common theme that kept coming up, over and over again? If you want to reinvent your brand, you start with getting your head around who you are, what you’re offering and why you’re doing it. It’s more important to recognize that before you can even start investing in your brand or business. It certainly helps when it comes to making meaningful connections with the people in your business – and your life!”
SIMON SINEK: Why do you do what you do? Simon wakes up everyday to inspire people to do the things that inspire them. A big picture thinker and author of Start With Why, Simon leads the way, particularly when it comes to inspiring action.
ANITA CAMPBELL loves small business: “This is the best time ever for small business owners in the USA.” Anita’s advice? She encourages small business owners to be more spontaneous in their brands, let their true selves come through, and connect more personally with others – more often.
KAIRA ROUDA, Author of Real You Incorporated: 8 Essentials for Women Entrepreneurs, talks about “This is the decade of the entrepreneur and there’s never been a more level playing field, so get out there and put the REAL YOU back in your business.”
LIZ TAYLOR: A creative visionary with a specialty in bringing more creativity into the workplace, Liz is emphatic about one thing: “Business today needs creative thinking like never before. It’s a new paradigm shift going on and it’s certainly going to take a lot of left brain people out of their comfort zone!”
NICK MORGAN, PH.D: Author of Trust Me: Four Steps to Authenticity and Charisma, talks about how everyone has two conversations going on simultaneously. “The first is verbal. It’s what you’re saying. The second is non-verbal and it’s the clues your body language is giving out — whether you know it or not. It’s important to be paying attention to both.”
NINA L. KAUFMAN, ESQ: Right upfront in the interview, Nina said she was probably going to be the one wet blanket on the speaker roster because as an attorney, it’s her job, after all, to keep entrepreneurs and brand agent/provocateurs out of trouble. And that’s exactly why I wanted Nina on the speaker roster!
MELANI WARD talks about how to tap into your “Irresistibility Factor” so you attract more clients and make a splash in your industry. What’s more, Melani knows how to determine what’s in store for you and your business so you can market it and ride the wave.
DIANNE LEGRO helps people focus on being present when speaking in public. After all, she knows the kind of fear people have before getting up and speaking. She offers creative and surprising ways to deal with every kind of fear imaginable!
KIM DEYOUNG, the “Get-It-Done Girl,” talks about using her right brain more in her business: “By nature, I am totally left brain, but ever since I allowed the right side of my brain to run my business, it’s taken off!”
I’ve had my ear to the phone for over nine hours (not consecutively) and I’m loving it! Nothing quite like interviewing a top line up of speakers for my first online Brand Reinvention Summit, and half the fun is, of course, digging deep and finding out some clues about the speakers’ way of thinking that is going to bring up surprising insights for all the interested people who are signing up for the Summit – and my thanks for signing up and spreading the word:)
Here’s the link if you haven’t already signed up! Go to http://BlahToZingSummit.com
So after all the interviews, a common theme started to emerge, and even though each speaker comes from a different area of expertise, mindset, talent pool – it was still uncanny to spot the pattern that kept coming up.
In a nutshell, the recurring theme suggests that before you even start investing in your business, or reinventing your brand, one of the first things you need to do is take stock of yourself! Yup. It all comes back to YOU – you are the brand champion of your business, brand guardian of your empire and the one person who needs to pay attention to your brand and your brand’s behavior. The best way to do that is look inside. Recognize yourself. If you recognize yourself, it will be easier for others to recognize you. That’s got to do with tapping into your Zing – your creative spark, energy and the passion that drives you. If it’s authentic, congruent and real, you’re on the way.
I’m going to talk about the various speakers later, give you some insider sound bites and gems of wisdom!
Finally, I am thrilled to announce the launch of my first, free online Brand Reinvention Summit! It’s happening Oct 1-2 and it’s an Interview Series designed specifically for struggling businesses who are looking to rethink, revitalize, and repackage their brands so they can get a leg up in today’s economy.
And because I have a habit of always daring anyone in business to take on the role of the Brand Agent/Provocateur AND because it’s one of the best ways to turn around your brand so your business can take off ⎯ big time – I decided to develop and produce a Brand Reinvention Summit that would bring huge value to entrepreneurs and small biz owners who were feeling frustrated, stuck with their brand and wanted a leg up!
Because I believe that, in this economy, it’s no longer enough to be the best at what you do. What’s more, if your brand is not showing up, standing out, or staking out your territory, you will not be fully visible, and your brand is not going to cut it. So that’s no good – not in this economy.
Over the course of two days, October 1−2, the Brand Reinvention Summit Interview Series is going to focus on how to take your brand from ordinary to extraordinary – “from blah to zing! I handpicked nine amazing biz thought leaders and creative visionaries to speak and provide their unique insights, inspiration, tips, and action steps to help you shake things up, change how you think about your business, and transform your bottom line.
Of course, I couldn’t resist throwing in my hat in the speaker ring so I’ll be talking about the Art of Zing and what that means! So there are 10 of us – and I am delighted and honored to be in such good company. My wonderful colleagues and Masters of Zing are all extraordinary talents – Simon Sinek, Anita Campbell, Kaira Rouda, Liz Taylor, Nick Morgan, Ph.D, Nina L. Kaufman, Esq., Melani Ward, Dianne Legro, and Kim DeYoung – so go to the Speaker page and find out more about who they are and what they’re going to be sharing…
Here’s the link: http://blahtozingsummit.com/speaker.html
So how do you do reinvent your biz right now? First, recognize yourself ⎯ your unique talent and creative spark ⎯ so others can recognize who you are. It’s that simple. It’s the best way to resonate with people, attract clients, capture attention, turn heads, and yes, impact your bottom line!
So one major benefit from signing up for this Summit? It’s going to be all about how to take risks, shift your mindset, get out of your comfort zone, get out of your own way – you get the idea. It’s all that kind of fun stuff!
The best part for me? It’s absolutely exhilarating to see what happens when people in business – particularly people with that individualistic entrepreneurial spirit and personality – recognize, for the first time, their real talent, gift, and expertise. You actually see them transform before your very eyes!
FYI Making this Summit happen has been one of the most exhilarating and challenging times for me, and a huge learning curve, for sure! I’ll share some of the behind-the-scenes scoop in another post:)
It’s true. I can’t believe it. But the fact is this: – I am, indeed, in the process of rebranding!
OK. Full Disclosure: The branding and design company I launched early last year, A New Brand Landscape & Co., is certainly not going away. No way. It’s just that as I was working with a few clients, a different kind of energy started to emerge. I called it – ZING – and it was resonating with everyone. So what did I do? I decided to give it a name and put it out there. Drum roll! So this is a sneak preview to launching my new biz. It’s called –
Zing Your Brand
Seriously. It’s all about the Art of Zing. It’s about how to tap into your own creative energy/core essence and find a way to articulate it so your target audience can ‘get’ who are, what you do – effortlessly. That’s the key word here: effortlessly. If people have to scratch their heads, think too hard or think too long, you’ve lost them.
It’s about having fun in your business. With your brand. With your business. Yup. It’s about taking on the role of ‘Master of Serious Play’ and really understanding that if you can be creative, expressive, expansive AND playful around what you do or what you offer your clients, then that kind of energy is going to be hugely client-attractive. It’s that simple!
It’s about taking on the role of Brand Agent/Provocateur in your biz and that’s when you really start to change your mindset about the way you think about your biz. If you’re curious and willing and keen, then think about signing up for The Brand ReInvention Summit I’m putting together and that’s kicking off October 1. It’s a free Interview Series, a digital package basically, that you can listen and learn from 10 top Masters of Inspiration!
In fact, I recorded the interview with my first speaker, Simon Sinek, last week and it was a fascinating 50-minute talk about what he does and about his book START WITH WHY.
Simon’s teachings are helping more and more people around the world learn to become more effective, more efficient and more inspiring by discovering how to start everything they say and do with WHY. What’s more, Simon believes that if we inspire people to do the things that inspire them, one day, we will stand shoulder to shoulder and together, change the world.
I was inspired and I hope you will, too. More later about the joys of rebranding!
I’ve been in the world of branding since I was seven. We were living in Maracaibo, Venezuela, and my older sister and I formed a Club of kids in the neighborhood and of course, guess who came up with the name and designed the logo? I remember taking it all so seriously! I still take branding seriously but now I am absolutely sure that it’s more important to have fun with your brand. That’s why a client once nicknamed me ‘Master of Serious Play’ – but more about that another time!
Getting back to the Sneak Preview! Right now, we’re putting the finishing touches on The Brand REinvention Summit which is coming up end Sept/early Oct. It’s an Interview Series that you will be able to listen online and learn about what happens when you take on the role of the Brand Agent/Provocateur in your business: You can revitalize, redirect and repackage your brand – and take it from ‘Blah to Zing!’
The good news? That means more visibility, more credibility and of course, impacting your bottom line. Serious stuff right now.
So I am excited because we have a fab line up of speakers – all of whom, of course, are top Brand Agents/Provocateurs themselves. What’s more, they’re part of an amazing tribe of people, so to speak, who are thinking and doing things differently in their business.
They’re all going to address the topic of ‘how to take on the role of Quintessential Brand Agent/Provocateur’ to revitalize, re-energize and repackage your brand – and hurrah, here’s our first eight speakers and their topics:
• Kaira Rouda
Topic: Putting the Real You in Your Business | How to Discover and Love your Personal Brand and Bring it to Market as your Unique Competitive Advantage
www.kairarouda.com
• Anita Campbell
Topic: Brand Personality: How to See your Future Online and Build a Community of Meaningful Fans
www.smallbiztrends.com
• Liz Taylor (Oxford, UK)
Topic: Brand Creativity: Why Your Right Brain is the More Provocative Side
www.wow-at-work.com
• Nick Morgan, Ph.D
Topic: The Art of Rethinking Communication: Daring to be Charismatic, Clear and Authentic to Turn Around your Business Today
www.publicwords.com
• Nina L. Kaufman, Esq. NYC
Topic: Risky Business: How to Avoid Legal Problems as a Brand Agent/Provocateur
www.askthebusinesslawyer.com
• Melani Ward
Topic: Going with the Flow: The Non Woo-Woo Guide to Using Numerology and the Power of Numbers to Make a Splash in Your Business
www.MelaniWard.com
• Dianne Legro
Topic: Skyrocket your Influence and your Profits: A Quick-Start Guide to Crafting your Valuable Signature Speech and Speaking in Public
www.SpeakingSuccessInternational.com
• Kim deYoung
Topic: The Real Scoop | A Behind-the-Scenes Look at A Day in the Life of a True Brand Agent/Provocatuer
www.metromom.com
• Mary van de Wiel – aka Van
Topic: The Art of Zing | Why your Zing Factor Matters in Business More than Ever Before and How to Leverage Zing to Catapult your Brand. Big Time.
There’s more to come and I will posting a web page soon with heaps more information about topics, times and details! Hope you’ll sign up and join the conversation! If you’re looking for more info now, send me an email: van@zingyourbrand.com
later…
I’m always inspired in the mornings when Tom Peters’ daily blast pops up in my inbox! This morning, this is the question he asked, and he’s saying it’s the one query that must never be far from your consciousness:
“IS WHAT I’M UP TO REMARKABLY DIFFERENT?”
FYI Tom Peters became the loudest, and perhaps earliest, ‘guru voice’ on the need for employees to re-shape their careers around the idea of “brand you.” He wrote In Search Of Excellence in 1982 with Bob Waterman which helped American firms turn their attention to the basic drivers of all successful businesses: 1) people, 2) customers, 3) values-”culture” – the way we do things around here, and 4) action-execution, a perpetual self-renewing entrepreneurial spirit.
Full Disclosure: I happen to be a fan of the amazing Tom Peters became he was one of the first to address the importance of design as an extraordinary competitive advantage. Let’s face it, today – if your marketing is not design driven, then you’re not going to create the kind of impact you might be wanting.
What’s more, if you’re in a period of reinventing your business, then this is the time to be doing things that are innovative, unexpected and remarkably different. OK. What does all that mean?
You can find out about how to transform your business when you sign up for the Brand Reinvention Summit that is scheduled for late Sept/early October. It’s an Interview Series and I’m excited to have such an impressive lineup of speakers. Each speaker has stepped up to the plate and turned their business into an innovative and remarkably different kind of business and we’re all going to be talking to this issue:
How to take on the role of Brand Agent/Provocateur in your business, think remarkably different, be innovative and do the unexpected so your business can get a leg up in this economy and go from ‘blah to zing!’ I’m posting details soon, so look forward to seeing you sign up and spreading the word!
Are you ready to dare to think differently about your business?! Dare to be fearless, provocative and get out of your comfort zone? That’s the kind of thinking you’ll be hearing from a very special line up of thought leaders who are speaking at my first Brand Re:Invention TeleSummit. Scheduled to be broadcast end Sept/early Oct, it’s going to be hugely engaging, provocative, lively and energizing Interview Series that is certainly going to challenge the way you do business! By the time you finish, you’re going to be seeing the world through a more authentic, bolder and more provocative lens!
So if you business isn’t doing what it should be doing, stay tuned. The Summit is all about “Taking your Bottom Line from Blah to Zing’ – and the best way to do it in this economy? Put on the hat of Brand Agent/Provocateur and see the world through a different lens – and you’re already on your way! More later. Stay tuned!
Thanks to the wonderful Frances Crespo who heads up the DC Chapter of Ladies Who Launch, I am speaking tonight to a great group of entrepreneurial women, and I’m addressing a hot topic: How to zing that brand of yours – even in this economy! There’s still time to register and for all you Washingtonians, I’d love to see you there. Maurisa Turner Potts, an accomplished marketing/PR consultant, is also going to be speaking about how branding is tied to your PR efforts so hey, still time to register! Here’s the link: http://tiny.cc/a4v59
What’s more, we’re choosing a couple of the participants to get on the ‘hot seat’ for a free Brand Audit! That means we’re hooking up a projector and we’ll be looking closely at their websites, in this instance, on the big screen. I’m going to walk them through the kind of clues and hidden messages that are right there – embedded in their sites – and then, translate that those messages into a more powerful message so their potential clients can easily ‘get’ who they are, what they offer in a bolder and more provocative way.
After all, if you’re not being provocative and getting people’s attention, it’s going to be that much harder for you to raise your visibility factor – and impact your bottom line. This is all about you, remember! Whether you’re a newbie or a veteran biz owner, this is about tapping into the true meaning of branding – and why it’s so powerful. OK. Look forward to seeing you tonight!
Right now, with so many job losses, projects being canceled and high levels of frustration, I’m seeing more and more people striking out on their own. That’s the good news! But it’s not quite enough to start your own business, even if you’re among the best at what you do. You have to create a strong, individual BRAND to make your business stand out from the crowd. What’s more, your brand has to reflect your passion, your unique creative spark and creativity to get noticed! (Or as I call it, you have to tap into your Zing and get it out there!) But how do you do it?
Whether you have an existing business in desperate need of attention or a new business that needs a kick-start, now is the time to think outside the box when it comes to giving your business a shot in the arm. You may not be in the mood to do this, right? In fact, it might be the last thing you feel like doing but guess what? It’s the one thing that is going to get your business to show up, stand out, make heads turn and impact your bottom line.
So I’ve been thinking about how to address this high level of frustration I’m coming across every week when I talk to clients and so here’s the big idea: Entrepreneurs and business owners need to create a bold and provocative brand, particularly in this economy, and they also need to know the importance of wearing the hat of Quintessential Brand Agent & Provocateur so their business can catapult to new levels.
So I’m planning a special TeleSummit in September designed to revitalize, redirect and repackage your brand so your business goes from Blah to Zing (in a nutshell!) and I have gathered together a terrific group of whip-smart thinkers, creative storytellers, innovative strategists and business futurists – and I have invited them to speak to one particular subject: How to help entrepreneurs and startup CEOs think differently about their business so they become the Quintessential Brand Agent & Provocateur – and turn their business around 180º!
OK. The Quintessential Brand Re:Invention Summit is happening in mid September and I’ll be keeping you posted re the dates in the next few weeks. In the meantime, I’ll be putting out more information and get in touch if you have any questions, topics or insights you’d like to see covered in the Brand Re:Invention TeleSummit. Watch this space!
