I was contacted by a Web programmer the other day and, while at first blush, I was very impressed with his skills and portfolio; I was instantly turned off by the fact that he constantly referred to himself in the third person and as a plural.  Statements like “We have the most economical pricing…” and “Our clients have seen exponential return…” made me feel like I was being pitched by an account rep from some global conglomerate.

As the conversation continued I asked some simple (revealing) questions. “Who does the actual programming of your sites?” and  (amazingly enough) “Where are your offices?” came back with the answers me and my basement, respectively.

Insert Scooby-Doo “WTH” sound here…

So, within the first two minutes of our conversation, this poor guy went from impressive designer/developer to liar.  If he was willing to deceive me about the size of his “company,” what else was he willing to lie about? Sure, he (eventually) told the truth about being independent and working from his basement, but the perception that really stuck with me was the disconnect from “outward” portrayal and “actual” existence.

My advice to independent contractors struggling to position yourselves in this big, bustling world:  Keep the basic rules of TRUE Branding in mind at all times.

Be Truthful
Be Relevant
Be Unique
Be Engaging

Simple!

“Truthful” is the base criteria because it’s the most important.  If you have to make up statistics or create personae to make yourself feel/seem bigger, you’ve already failed.  If you’re an independent, tell your prospects.  If you outsource work to “partners,” make it clear. 

As a contractor, I would much rather work with a single, honest, independent genius than a million sub-par liars.

Don’t try to be (or even imply) something you’re not. And if you’ve gained enough weight to be considered “plural” then you need to call Jenny Craig.

Just food for thought…

Keep Cooking!
Andrew B. Clark
The Brand Chef

Now, THAT’s truly social.

Seeing my adoration of social media, a friend of mine posted this article from The Eastern Echo on my Facebook wall.  I assume she did it to rib me a little for what looks like backlash against social media outlets like Facebook, MySpace and especially Twitter for not having more robust security options. But the writer of The Echo brings up some pretty solid points.

The Echo writes:

…like any responsible organization, Facebook finally updated its privacy settings a few years ago after users encountered plenty of embarrassing situations. You can now control which of your friends are able to see those great pictures of you passed out on the bathroom floor with genitals scrawled on your face.

But the truth is, Big Brother isn’t watching anymore, he’s tweeting.
Twitter, too, has security options that can allow users to select who can see their tweets. Unfortunately, people just don’t seem to know about them — or even worse, they don’t care.

They go on to say:

So should we all delete our Twitter accounts?

In my opinion, that would be the easy way out. …

But we can’t continue blaming every new social networking site for our blatant misuse of its technology. The answer isn’t to stop using the Internet, it’s to start using it more responsibly.

And parents? Don’t blame the Internet every time your kid is caught sending naked pictures of themselves to their friends. It’s not Twitter, it’s you.

Sweeeeeet!

So, here’s my take (as written on The Eastern Echo’s article post):

It’s not Facebook’s, MySpace’s, or Twitter’s fault that the “victims” of such horrible, depraved mismanagement of mental scruples are eventually caught.  Social media is exactly that…  SOCIAL.  If you stand up at your next cocktail party and announce that you’re getting breast implants… well…  it’s out there and the repercussions are yours to deal with.  Similarly, you can’t charge Twitter (et al) with keeping idiots form incriminating themselves or filtering content to our children.

It’s simply a matter of ethics. How long has it been since an Ethics 101 course was over-booked?  Can we blame parenting?  Sure, but don’t forget all of the lackadaisical marketing executives, most media outlets and virtually all of Hollywood.

The future of communication is going to be driven through social media. Heck, I even found this article through a friend of mine on Facebook.  So, technically, it’s my responsibility, as a marketer and as a role model for following generations to participate in social media with ethical, reasonable candor.  It’s my responsibility to educate and to foster those values.

Long lost are the days of plopping the kids in front of the boob-tube and call it babysitting.  Because the boob-tube has been replaced with YouTube and we KNOW what can be found there.

There are a lot of unethical, unreasonable people out there.  There always has been.  But we can’t expect the social media developers to protect us.  That’s our job.

Posted and disseminated…

Food for thought.

Keep Cooking (reasonably ethical conversations?)
Andrew B. Clark
The Brand Chef