Connections 2014 and Authenticity in Social Media (#J360)

First off, I want to take the time to mention that Connections 2014, hosted by Sales Force ExactTarget Marketing Cloud, was a blast!

The keynote speakers, award winning author/blogger John Green and actress/author Mindy Kaling, were absolutely amazing and extremely informative. Along with the speakers, there were several interesting digital marketing companies (one of my favorites was Skymosity, a weather based marketing company). Such a great networking opportunity for all of the students who attended. Even the goodies the companies gave out for visiting their booth were fantastic!

 

Now, to the core of what I learned concerning social media practices. The two aforementioned speakers above were immensely informative when it came to self-branding practices. Both Green and Kaling hit hard on one specific aspect of their branding, and that was the concept of being “authentic.”  Simply, as the word implies, the two drove the point home that being yourself is the best way you can brand yourself. Mindy had mentioned that she has never forced herself to tweet, or forced her self to unwillingly make up a post on her social media handles. To her, when if you have to force yourself to post something, that’s not being authentic or true self-branding. John discussed his humble, nerdy, humorous beginnings, and in being true to his audience and communicating one-on-one with his core fans, he branded himself as someone who payed attention to his fans’ wants and needs.

In the long run, what I took away from both of these speakers is that to be successful in marketing yourself, you need to be true to yourself.