Four Simple and Powerful Words

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Are You Using The Right Words For Your Brand?

Are you using the right words to build your personal brand in your resume, marketing materials, and social media updates?

Often, there’s a disconnect, or gap, between the words used in resumes, marketing materials, & day-to-day social marketing, and the personal brand an individual is trying to build.

Personal brand building is impossible if you’re not using the right words!

To make sure that you’re using the right words, I’d like to share a free online tool you can use to visually display the contents of your resume, marketing materials, and social media marketing articles and updates.

Wordle.net is a free online software application that creates word clouds, like the example shown, that you can use to make sure you’re using the right words to build your personal brand.

The idea behind word clouds is very simple: the more frequently a word appears in a resume, one sheet, or blog post, the larger the word appears!

Thus, at a glance, you can see if the words you’re using are in alignment with your personal brand and the idea you’re trying to communicate in your resume, blog post, or other marketing project.

Word clouds permit you to do, in seconds, what would otherwise take a lot of tedious time.

There are several ways you can generate a Wordle word cloud.

Start by selecting the Create tab from the menu at the top of Wordle.net’s home page. Then, choose from among 3 options:

Copy & Paste. The easiest way to create a word cloud of the words used in a resume, one sheet, or blog post is to simply copy and paste the text into the text box found on Wordle.net’s Create page.Enter a URL. Another option is to simply enter the URL of any blog, or blog post, that has an Atom or RSS feed.Del.icio.us tags. You can also enter a del.icio.us user’s name to create a word cloud of their tags.

What I like best about word clouds created with Wordle.net is their immediacy; they instantly appear after you press Go or Submit.

More important, you don’t have to “study” the word clouds to know whether or not you’re using the right words to build your personal brand. The words are either there, or they’re not there!

On the other hand, there are some lessons you can draw from comparing word clouds of different blog posts and marketing projects. For example:

Noticeable contrast. When you look at a word cloud, the key ideas should appear noticeably larger than the supporting words.  The hierarchy of ideas should be obvious. You should be immediately able to pick out the main points. When most of words used appear the same size on a word cloud, however, it may be a sign that your page lacks a clear focus or structure.Alignment. The largest words in a word cloud, or series of word clouds, should support your personal brand. If you print out word clouds for the Pages of your WordPress blog, for example, each word cloud should emphasize the key words you want associated with your personal brand. Likewise, if you create word clouds of your blog posts, or newsletters, for the previous month, the majority should emphasize your key personal branding terms.

The easiest way to work with Wordle.net is to immediately print each word cloud. The best way to do this is to use 3-hole paper, so you can save your word clouds in a 3-ring binder.

The reason to immediately print each Wordle.net word cloud is  because you cannot save them to your hard drive or to a private folder online. The only way you can save your Wordle word clouds is save them in Wordle.net’s public folder. This may, or may not, be appropriate.

Bear in mind that, once posted, you cannot return and search for your previously-created word clouds. Nor can you delete a Wordle graphic.

But, remember, we’re talking about a free, no registration, online software application!

Workaround, if you regularly work with a screen capture program, like TechSmith’s Camtasia, of course, you can easily create and save as many word clouds as desired on your computer.

With little effort and no cost, Wordle.net lets you see–at a glance–whether or not the words you’re using in your resume, marketing materials, and social media updates are the right ones to build your personal brand. Do you use Wordle.net, or a similar resource, to check the words you’re using to build your brand? Share your experiences, as comments, below.

Author:

Roger C. Parker is an author, book coach, designer, consultant who works with authors, marketers, & business professionals to achieve success with brand-building books & practical marketing strategy. He helps create successful marketing materials that look great & get results, and can turn any complex marketing or writing task into baby steps. Visit his blog to learn more or ask a question.

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Four Words

Obituary. Cemetery. Crematory. Funeral.

Four words. Four words I have never liked. Not fond of. Wish other words could be used.

I get it.

I have dealt with all of the above words. With family members. With close friends. With clients. With professional colleagues.

Up close and personal.

Not afraid of saying the words.

Not afraid of talking about the words.

Not afraid of dealing with the words.

That said, I just don’t like the sound of the four previously-stated words.

Never have.

Never will.

With the death of Steve Jobs, I was once again reminded of how much I do not like those four words.

This word, though – eulogy – seems to me to be a bit more palatable.

In one of my favorite career reads – In Transition From the Harvard Business School Club of New York’s Career Management Seminar – there is an exercise that invites the reader to write an essay about “My Eulogy: How I Want to Be Remembered.”

I love this particular exercise in the book and I love it because it reminds me of how to live a life. It reminds me of Stephen Covey’s “Begin With the End In Mind.” It reminds me of how precious this day is and how I wish to live it with intention and purpose and mindfulness and gusto while I am here and while I can. And while I can do so with friends, family, clients, colleagues. And readers who by chance stumble upon this post.

Steve Jobs. Icon. Visionary. Ideas. Transformational. Genius. Change-maker of the world. Defining figure. Brilliant. Profound. Insanely great. A permanent dent in the universe. Legendary brand. Legend. Marvel.

I like these words.

Celebration of Life.

Memorial Gardens.

Remembrances.

Memories.

And words.

That last – forever.

“Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life. Don’t be trapped by dogma – which is living with the results of other people’s thinking. Don’t let the noise of other’s opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.” - Steve Jobs’ Stanford Commencement Address 

posted by: billiesucher

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Watch Your Words! 4 Kinds of People Who Are Reading What You Write & Why You Should Care

By Sean Weinberg

The Internet is pretty awesome. Between watching the latest Gaga video, broadcasting your opinion 140 characters at a time, and Googling how tall Napoleon actually was, the World Wide Web truly is an amazing tool.

The Internet is just as helpful in your job search. Gone are the days of pounding the pavement and mailing off unsolicited resume packets. Job seekers in the know use social networking, personal websites, and blogs to connect with influential people and communicate their way into a job.

While it might seem like a blank canvas ready for anything, your blog and online presence can actually do a lot of harm to your job search if you don’t watch what you say. Share something inappropriate or say the wrong thing and you could burn bridges permanently.

While it might seem like a great idea to jet out a NSFW joke or rant about someone in particular online, consider who is reading what you have to say:

Your next boss

When you want to learn about something new, what do you do? Google it, of course. Well, potential employers are doing the exact same thing. With HR budgets shrinking and the importance of a professional online presence growing, more and more employers are turning to search engines to get a good idea of who you are.

Current and future networking contacts

Today, over 75 percent of new hires come from a referral, not a job board posting. That said, your networking contacts are more important than ever. Thanks to social networking, many of your networking contacts know more about your online self than who you are in person.

Your competitors

Today’s job market is competitive. While there may be a couple of candidates for a position a few years ago, nowadays, there are dozens. Your competitors are going to absorb the good content you put online and use bad content against you.

Your personal contacts

Last, but not least, your personal circle of contacts is reading what you have to say online. It might be a great release to rant about someone in your life, but you never know if that individual might end up reading your content.

Why should you care?

Everyday, all kinds of people view and read your blog, profiles, and website. The Internet might seem like a vast space, but when you burn a bridge, it can get pretty tiny. When in doubt, save it for later review -- you never know when it could cost you an awesome job.

What do you think? How important do you consider the content you put online? Have you ever made a mistake that came back to haunt you?

Sean Weinberg is the COO and co-founder of RezScore, a free web application that reads, analyzes, and grades resumes – instantly. Also the founder of Freedom Resumes, Sean has dedicated his career to helping job seekers write the best possible resumes. You can connect with Sean and the RezScore team on Facebook and Twitter.

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Résumés: Words and Worth

When I was writing Happy About the Career Alphabet, I wrote that particular book in a tweet-style format. Each and every one of the 805 entries in the book complies with Twitter’s 140 characters with spaces. There were times when I thought it would be easier not to do the book than to verify, re-verify, check, check and double-check 805 tweets, putting them in the ‘Twitter box’ and then rewriting again and again to ensure preservation of the essence of the tweet.

When the book was finished, I was ecstatic and grateful that I had persevered. Patience. Endurance. Tenacity. And word count. And Twitter. And thinking tweet. Writing that book made me more mindful of how to better serve clients. Whether I am teaching someone how to write a résumé, or partnering with them to build it, what I learned from writing a tweet-style book is that each and every word (and character) counts, matters and is of importance. Brevity works. Less is more. 

If you are writing your résumé on your own, here’s something to consider. How about considering the number of words contained in your résumé document and the dollar value each represents? If you read Career Hub routinely, perhaps you read the post on The Unemployment Line where I did a little calculation. Today, however, I have been thinking about the number of words on a résumé and return on investment (ROI). So here’s my next mathematical calculation… 

I performed a word count of three two-page résumés I had completed for three different clients: 

Résumé 1: 824 words

Résumé 2: 559 words

Résumé 3: 785 words

Average words per résumé (WPR): 722+. For calculation purposes for this post, I used 720 WPR. Let’s say that you are a job seeker, seeking a job that will pay you $55,000.00. How much will each word you put on your résumé matter, if you are measuring it in terms of the green stuff? 

$76.38 per résumé word

Further, for the sake of this exercise, let’s say that you are targeting a $150,000 job, what then will each résumé word be worth to you, based on 720 WPR?

 $208.33 per résumé word

Whether you are writing a résumé with 412 words or 892, each and every word matters – each and every character is important. Before you blast your résumé into cyberspace, drop it off to a recruiter, or submit it to a Hiring Manager, why not do a word count? Why not review each word, each line and each character to make sure it counts, to make sure it is conveying the most valuable, compelling message you can possibly deliver? In the long run, what might it be worth to you?   

cross-posted billiesucherblog

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Job Hunters: Are You A Winner With Your Words?

In three words I can sum up everything I've learned about life: it goes on. ~ Robert Frost

I like love words. Words build up. Words encourage. Words are powerful. Words bolster, motivate, inspire, and support. On the flip side, words tear down, discourage, destroy, belittle, devastate. Words can get you fired. Words can get you hired. Words comfort, console, compel, and convince. Words matter.

As a job hunter, I would invite you to carefully consider each and every word you use to speak about yourself and your brand, be it in a phone call, a text, a tweet, an e-mail or a face-to-face conversation. The words you choose are a direct reflection of the brand you represent as a job candidate, colleague, leader, partner, client, and friend.

Listed below are '11 words for 2011' conversations. Which, if any, of these words might you select for interactions with recruiters, hiring managers, network connections or your neighbor next door.

1. Imagine

2. No excuses

3. You deserve

4. You decide

5. I get it

6. Uncompromising integrity

7. Believe in better

8. Real-time

9. The simple truth

10. Let's get to work

11. If you remember one thing

If you would like to discover additional words to use in 2011, you can read more from Dr. Frank Luntz, the author of Win: The Principles That Take Your Business From Ordinary to Extraordinary.

Think twice before you speak, because your words and influence will plant the seed of either success or failure in the mind of another. #NapoleonHill

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Unsolicited Harsh Words for a Frustrated <b>Job Seeker</b>, from Rocky <b>...</b>

I am sorry for you personally that your job hunt is frustrating - however, I think some of your points defy logic and can lead you to the wrong place. I'll offer some (hopefully helpful) other ways to think about your observations. You wrote:

In my opinion, there exists a very large disconnect between the stock market and the jobs market. As a job seeker I can tell you what I am seeing, no jobs. - Frustrated Job Seeker

Stock prices represent the discounted future value of corporate profits. They are not a proxy for the unemployment rate; in fact, nothing could be further from the truth. If a company can produce the same profits with fewer employees, productivity and profits rise. And the stock price should rise too (ceteris paribus). This has been true since the industrial revolution, and it's true today. The challenge of a economy with a large number of displaced workers is to have those workers (a)accept lower real wages; (b) acquire new skills; and (c) avoid permanent unemployment. Additionally, in an economy with an increasing concentration of wealth and income (such as the USA has had for the past several years), this situation can be persist for a very long time. (This isn't an argument in favor of wealth redistribution, just an observation that structural unemployment isn't necessarily related to corporate profitability and stock prices.)

Those of us who cleaned toilets to pay our way through college always find it perplexing when people talk about graduates who cannot find jobs. It's a shame (and economic loss) if you're a PhD in computer science and forced to work as a cashier. But instead of blaming others, one needs to do what one needs to do — and in this regard, I highlight the shortage of workers in North Dakota . I'll happily mail you a Greyhound bus ticket to Fargo (gratis) if that would be of any help!

The stock market rise is just another Fed induced low rate driven bubble - Frustrated Job Seeker

Your comment ignores the way monetary policy is intended to work. The entire principle behind classical monetary policy is that by lowering the price of money and credit, people will be more inclined to spend, invest and borrow. Stefan and other gold standard bearers wince at this, and they have an intellectually consistent basis to do so. However, that's not the regime we have. We have a fiat currency and fractional banking system. And under this regime, the reaction of financial markets is (in part) a reflection of the incentives that the central banks are providing. And, combined with fiscal spending, monetary policy a potent stimulant to SHORT TERM demand and consumption. (Its effect on LONG TERM growth is a different discussion.)

It is true that the reaction of unemployment to the cycle has become more muted over the past 25 years in part because the percentage of US workers in direct manufacturing industries have declined. The days when Ford and GM and US Steel would layoff 100,000 factory workers during a recession — And then hire them back 15 months later — is long gone. The hiring/firing cycle for white collar workers is vastly different and much slower post-recession. When you read that the number of jobs created post-recession is the lowest since WWII, you should bear this structural change in mind. (Also, it's worth examining the structural unemployment rate in Germany over the past 25 years for some interesting contrasts.)

Fed policy has been a failure on the unemployment front, at this point doesn't it make more sense to raise rates a bit in hopes it signals the all clear, even at the risk of a short term adverse reaction in stocks? (stocks have already doubled from their lows, after all) - Frustrated Job Seeker

You can reasonably argue that the fed funds rate is currently too low. And you can further argue that QE2 is not a constructive idea. However, there needs to be a sound intellectual framework for deciding on the appropriate short rate. Why raise rates 25 basis points? Why not raise rates to 6%? Why not let the fed funds rate float and target money growth (ala Volker)? Or why not just have the fed funds rate set every month at CPI minus 25 basis points? There are endless papers on this subject - but no serious person suggests raising rates 25 bps to simply signal "confidence."

You point to the doubling of the S&P off it's low as meaningful. I suggest that it's not. What you fail to consider is that when the S&P was at its low, it was a reflection of the fact that the commercial paper market had frozen. The money market system was facing a run. And there was (to quote Mr. Rogan ), "No way out other than total financial collapse." That Mr. Rogan has been proven wrong (and the world has not ended yet), has not elicited any mea culpa from him — nor has he evidently learned anything about economics — but rather he's turned his perpetual malice toward Bernanke, Boehner and China. In sum, rather than showing any signs of optimism, he's an angry old man. In contrast, you are not an old man. You are still young. You are actively looking for work. And I encourage you to be optimistic — since enthusiasm and optimism are necessary ingredients for success. To summarize, don't let yourself become depressed. Don't let the stock market influence you. Just keep your chin up, be realistic, and things will eventually turn out fine. Oh, and if you need to clean toilets for a couple of years to make ends meet, that's not the end of the world either. It's what makes America great!

Ignoring the ad hominem part of Rocky's argument, it is absolutely clear that the Fed operates under the traditional monetarist assumptions that postulates that "by lowering the price of money and credit, people will be more inclined to spend, invest and borrow". My problem with Mr. Bernnake is that he treats this as an irrefutable law of nature. There is clear anecdotal evidence, as in the expressed opinions of multiple CEOs (the recently mentioned Mr. Zell in a different testimony being one of the recent cogent examples) that it is the uncertainty introduced by the various medllings of our government in the private sector that is keeping them from hiring more people and not the availability of credit, especially when large corporations are involved.

Furthermore it is unclear whether the entire reason for  Mr. Bernanke behavior is just his monetarist belief system or perhaps in part a desire to accommodate the government spending that is occurring independent of the monetarist concerns. His intentions may very well be totally pure, in that he sees himself as doing what's strictly necessary to save the country, I simply disagree with the actual role he is playing.

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Job Hunters: Are You A Winner With Your Words?

In three words I can sum up everything I've learned about life: it goes on. ~ Robert Frost

I like love words. Words build up. Words encourage. Words are powerful. Words bolster, motivate, inspire, and support. On the flip side, words tear down, discourage, destroy, belittle, devastate. Words can get you fired. Words can get you hired. Words comfort, console, compel, and convince. Words matter.

As a job hunter, I would invite you to carefully consider each and every word you use to speak about yourself and your brand, be it in a phone call, a text, a tweet, an e-mail or a face-to-face conversation. The words you choose are a direct reflection of the brand you represent as a job candidate, colleague, leader, partner, client, and friend.

Listed below are '11 words for 2011' conversations. Which, if any, of these words might you select for interactions with recruiters, hiring managers, network connections or your neighbor next door.

1. Imagine

2. No excuses

3. You deserve

4. You decide

5. I get it

6. Uncompromising integrity

7. Believe in better

8. Real-time

9. The simple truth

10. Let's get to work

11. If you remember one thing

If you would like to discover additional words to use in 2011, you can read more from Dr. Frank Luntz, the author of Win: The Principles That Take Your Business From Ordinary to Extraordinary.

Think twice before you speak, because your words and influence will plant the seed of either success or failure in the mind of another. #NapoleonHill

View the original article here

CBE One-Stop <b>Job Seeker</b> Blog: Land a job with the right words

Resume writing is a word game.
What words to avoid. What words to use. What words will catch an employer's eye. What words will cause your resume to end up in the circular file.
Many of us think we are using the perfect words in our resume, or in our LinkedIn profile, but that's not always true.
In the following article, read more about the good, the bad and the overused words that are found in many of our resumes and online profiles:

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