It used to be that higher levels of education, certifications or other career credentials, were the key to higher roles and higher compensation. I believe those days are disappearing and that career credentials no longer matter as much. If true, what does make a difference? Simple. Demonstrating your expertise. Specifically, demonstrating your expertise online, which is the topic of this episode. Build your own brand, Personal Brand, Digital Brand, Personal Branding, Career, CareerKred, Self-awareness

Build Your Own Brand podcast

Why career credentials no longer matter - BYOB26

I’m in Omaha, Nebraska this week to attend the very first Clifton Strengths Summit. The Summit is being hosted by Gallup, the company that brings you StrengthsFinder. So for the next two days, I’m going to be hanging with fellow Strengths enthusiasts and geeking out about our Strengths. As I was flying here today, I started thinking about my objectives for the conference. And yes, you should have objectives or goals of some type when you attend a conference. You may recall Madalyn Sklar gave us some great reasons why you need objectives when attending conferences. If you don’t remember, head on back into the archives and check it out. For the next three days, I have identified three objectives I want to meet while I’m here and I thought I would share them with you on today’s show. OH, in case you are wondering, I’m recording this from my hotel room using my iPhone which is why the audio is not quite up to my normal standards. And while it would have been easy for me to just skip this show this week, considering I’m at the conference and my main computer died on me, I thought doing it this way would serve as a great reminder that you really don't need any fancy equipment to produce content. You CAN make due with what you have. Which is exactly what I’m doing with today’s show. So here you go, my 3 reasons why you should attend conferences. With the DICE framework, attending conferences falls into the E or the Engage step. But you probably already guessed that didn’t you. Before I started this journey, I never went to a conference that wasn’t directly related to my day job. In fact, I had never paid to go to a conference myself. Now I go to at least two a year. Conferences are just a great way to force yourself to get out there and push the boundaries of your comfort zone. If it’s true that growth takes place just outside of our comfort zone, then I think we all need to be uncomfortable at times in to stimulate our grow both personally and professionally. Conferences can do both in spades.

How attending conferences helps to build your brand - BYOB25

Who do you think about when I say the science guy? Who comes to mind when I say Daily Vlog? Did someone’s name immediately pop up in your mind? Why did you come up with their name? Is it because you hear their name often? Or is it because when you google a specific topic, their name surfaces to the top. Maybe it’s because you follow them on social media, read their blog or their books. Whatever the reason, I think you’ll agree their names came to you quickly because you regard them as an expert in whatever the topic or niche you follow. Here’s another set of questions for you. Who do you think about when I say, electrical engineer? Don’t follow electrical engineers, no worries, let’s try CPAs or real estate agents. No? How about human resources? Do any names and/or faces come to your mind? Let’s go deeper. What if I said name a product manager, project manager, talent acquisition specialist, SEO specialist or recruiter? I’m guessing you drew a blank for a few of those, didn’t you? If you did that’s ok, maybe project management is not your thing. However, when it comes to one specific topic you are personally passionate about, I bet you know who all of the “players” are in the space. Chances are you’ve also noticed that the top individuals in this space seem to get all of the opportunities. Whether it be speaking gigs, promotions, etc. Why is that do you think? Well, that’s exactly what I want to talk to you about on today’s show. How your brand, specifically your digital brand, in the eyes of others can lead to additional opportunities and compensation for you. Build your own brand, Personal Brand, Digital Brand, Personal Branding, Career, CareerKred, Self-awareness

Tie your brand to your compensation - BYOB24

I’m guessing by now, you’re about all Discovered out. As you know last month on the BYOB show, all of the episodes were dedicated to helping you with the Define step of the DICE process. Specifically, how to Define your brand, through self-reflection in order to uncover your natural preferences, your strengths, and in essence who you are at your core. If you’ve taken any of the assessments and you’ve been using that pesky worksheet I recommended you to download at the end of every episode, then you are now very close to discovering what makes YOU, YOU. If you haven’t downloaded the worksheet yet or you're new to the show today, first welcome, second, head over to ryanrhoten.com/selfaware and grab your copy of the worksheet for yourself. You’re going to need for today’s show. Why? Well because on today’s show I’m going to walk you through how to create something, I’m asked about often: Your personal brand statement. Build your own brand, Personal Brand, Digital Brand, Personal Branding, Career, CareerKred, Self-awareness

How do you develop your Personal Brand Statement - BYOB23

Today, I’ll be covering the third and final assessment I recommend to help you more self-aware. In this episode, I'm going to cover the Stand Out assessment by Marcus Buckingham. Discovering your personal brand starts with an understanding your strengths and your inner talents. This is a key step in discovering who you are as a person and what you are good at doing. We’ve all experienced days where when we reach the end of the day, we’ve said out loud, “Wow. Today flew by”. Odds are on those days, you were working in your strengths. Those are the days when you StandOut. Wouldn’t it be nice if those days happened more often? It can if you understand what makes you StandOut. Build your own brand, Personal Brand, Digital Brand, Personal Branding, Career, CareerKred, Self-awareness

What is the StandOut Assessment - BYOB22

In this episode, we're taking another deep dive look into how you can become more self-aware. Today, I’m going to talk about one of my favorites. The one I recommend everyone take, Fascination Advantage® assessment. The Fascination Advantage® assessment gives you insights on how the world sees you. If you’re interested in taking the assessment, head over to Ryanrhoten.com/FAA, yes like the airline industry. I will get a small commission if you use that link, but it comes at no additional cost to you and using the link will ensure you take the correct assessment. Anyway, let’s dive into the world of fascination and discover how you fascinate. Build your own brand, Personal Brand, Digital Brand, Personal Branding, Career, CareerKred, Self-awareness

The Fascination Advantage Assessment - BYOB21

Over the next four episodes, we’ll be discussing a new assessment to help you become more self-aware.  If you feel stuck in your career, your job or you’re not sure what you want to do when you grow up, it's more than likely because you've never taken the time to define your brand. That's why today we’re going to cover one of the most talked about self-assessments out there, StrengthsFinder2.0. This process and the entire DICE process is defined in my book CareerKred. You can get your copy here:  ryanrhoten.com/book Build your own brand, Personal Brand, Digital Brand, Personal Branding, Career, CareerKred, Self-awareness

Why take the StrengthsFinder2.0 Assessment - BYOB20

Self-awareness is critical to building your brand. Without it you will not be able to fully build your brand. Self-awareness is what the Define step in the DICE process is all about. You cannot Define what you want to be known for, without becoming self-aware. Assessments are a great way to raise your level of self-awareness. Starting with this episode, I’m kicking off Discover month, and we’ll get started by tackling the one thing the Define step is all about becoming self-aware.   Build your own brand, Personal Brand, Digital Brand, Personal Branding, Career, CareerKred, Self-awareness

Self-awareness is critical to building your brand - BYOB19

Last week, I introduced the concept of the employability score. A score that would be used by employers to rank you against other job candidates. This score would be created by algorithms based solely on predetermined criteria about you found on the web. The show struck a chord with several of you listening so I wanted to expand on the concept of an employability score further today because whether we get to the point of having an employability score or not, I want you to start thinking about how your brand impacts your compensation.

Your Employability Score Pt 2 - BYOB18

What if the social resume was just the beginning? What if in addition, technology and big data began to play together nicely when it came to our careers? Imagine if using a technology like Blockchain, our career accomplishments, our college degrees, and other certifications were stored in the Blockchain. Each would be individually verifiable. In other words, there would be no need for a resume.  Expanding on that thought, what if your career accolades had a numerical value assigned to them. Each one worth a specified number of "points". Those points could then be added up to give you an employability score. Job descriptions would list the employability score required vs skills. Haven't met the minimum score for a position? You're out of luck. If you really think about it, it's not that far-fetched of an idea.

Your Employability Score - BYOB17

What if resumes became obsolete? I know that sounds crazy but I think very soon the traditional tools of recruitment, resume and cover letters will be replaced with a social resume. If this happens your career and your livelihood may all come down to two things: 1 - How visible you are online 2 - Your social resume Do you know what your online profile says about you? Build your own brand, Personal Brand, Digital Brand, Personal Branding, Career, CareerKred, Self-awareness

Your Social Resume - BYOB16

We each get 168 hours every week but it's what we do with those hours that make a difference in our ability to move closer to what we want to be known for. If you’re going to stand out from all of the noise, you need to be productive during those limited hours. You need to learn how to repurpose your content. Build your own brand, Personal Brand, Digital Brand, Personal Branding, Career, CareerKred, Self-awareness

Repurpose Your Content - BYOB15

Create is the third step in the DICE process. For our purposes, create means to evolve from one’sown thoughts or imagination, as a work of art or an invention. On today’s show, I’m going to cover the 3 most commonly used types of content you need to be creating in order to become known for what you know. Content takes the form of audio, video and/or the text you publish on your website or another platform in order to share your knowledge, thought leadership and expertise. In the words of Jane Anderson, from the Jane Anderson, Brand YouShow, you publish content so we can become known for what we know. Your content will largely be composed of things such as posts, videos, presentations (think SlideShare), images, podcasts, eBooks, white papers, etc. If you’ve ever read an article on the web, watched a video or read a downloaded eBook, you 've consumed content. We consume content every day. It’s content that drives the internet and its content we use to become known for what we know. Do you know what your online profile says about you? Find out by taking my Online Brand Assessment. Discover your score and the ways you can start to improve your score today!

Creating content with the Content Pyramid - BYOB14

This past week a listener emailed me the following question about how to overcome negative search results. “I have an arrest record that still flashes online. It was years ago, I’ve moved on and created a new life helping others but still even 10+ years later, the news article will surface. How do you combat news organizations who, with one article can effectively ruin years of work?" First, thank you for your question, and second, this is a tough position to be in for sure. The answer to the question is simple but fixing it will not easy and to be honest, it’s not guaranteed to fix it forever. I’ll explain why as we go along. At a high level, there are two parts to this puzzle. One you can control. One you cannot.

Overcoming Negative Search Results - BYOB13

One question I ask in my online brand assessment quiz is what are you struggling with the most right now. Most people leave this blank, but for those of you who have left a comment, thank you, by the way, I keep track of the responses in a google spreadsheet. If you haven’t taken the assessment yet just head over to ryanrhoten.com and sign up on any of the orange boxes. You’ll immediately be sent a confirmation email and once you’ve confirmed you want to take the assessment, you’ll be taken directly to the start page. One of the top responses that has been surging lately is confusion over the differences between LinkedIn’s new Social Selling Index and the online brand assessment you can take on my site. The differences are pretty big and that’s what I’m going to talk about with you today.

Building your Brand and LinkedIn's Social Selling Index BYOB12

Building your personal brand is important to your career. This is especially true when it comes to our brand's online. In our digital-first world, our first interaction with others say, hiring managers and recruiters, will happen online. This is means what they find becomes their perception, good or bad. Because of this, it's entirely possible that your personal brand online is costing you opportunities and it shouldn't be that way. The trouble is, you're not sure where to start. The good news is this podcast will get you moving in the right direction. Originally released as a subset of my main podcast, The BRAND New You Show, this podcast The Build Your Own Brand Show, has taken on a life of its own. Why? Because it's that important. Personal branding, digital branding and building your personal brand are all very important steps in boosting your career credibility. Enjoy the podcast. If you decide you want to go deeper, pick up a copy of my book CareerKred where the concepts explained in this show go deeper. You can grab your copy at http://ryanrhoten.com/book

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