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“The Web has become our workplace, our water cooler, and our social mixer.” Doesn’t this quote of Chris Brogan hit the nail on the head? To my mind it definitely gets to the heart of Web 2.0. I came across this convincing quote in relation to personal branding – a topic that has been around for a while but that has become much more prevalent in recent years. In his ebook ‘Personal Branding for the Business Professional’ Brogan claims that the reason why personal branding has become more prevalent in recent years partly relates to how the web has become our workplace, our water cooler, and our social mixer. I agree with him. Nevertheless, I am convinced that it is very difficult to convey as much information online as in person.

Shaping the personal brand

An interesting example of how to create a digital identity is Brisbane IT-worker Hailey Turner, 20. She was among the top 50 vying for Tourism Queensland’s ‘Best Job in the World’ (read my recent posts one, two and three to get more information about the context). Apart from the demanded application video she travelled to seven cities in 12 days including Tokyo, London, Copenhagen, New York and Los Angeles to promote her application and the Islands of the Great Barrier Reef. Besides, she raised funds and sponsors and created a website where she uploaded videos, photos and blogs (source one, two, three). Everything Hailey Turner contributed to the Social Web shaped and contributed her personal brand: the pictures and videos she uploaded, the profile she defined on social networks like Facebook, the blog posts she published and the comments she shared on other blogs or the tweets she sent on twitter.

Authenticity and passion matter

Although Hailey Turner did not succeed to get the job in the end her personal brand gave her the ability to stand out in a sea of similar ‘products’ – her competitors. I think she succeeded in marketing herself as something different than the rest of the applicants in any case. According to Chris Brogan in some ways the difference on brands is what you deliver: “Doing something new is a great way to get people to be interested in what you do. (…) In a world full of people doing somewhat similar stuff the person who innovates is definitely ahead of the game.” That’s what Hailey Turner did with her journey, the funds and sponsors and her website.

Apart from that, there is another factor that strengthened Hailey Turner’s personal brand: the mixture of authenticity and passion she delivered in the contents she shared online. In my opinion, passion and authenticity are the two sides of the same coin: Because passion is hard to fake authenticity matters in building your personal brand online and it is very important to be yourself. Branding isn’t playing a role. With reference to Chris Brogan “a strong personal brand is a mix of reputation, trust, attention and execution. (…) Brands are complex and not especially one dimensional.” To my mind, the ‘brand’ Hailey Turner was colourful and interesting.

If you wish to find out more about personal branding I recommend reading ‘Personal Branding for the Business Professional’ by Chris Brogan and Brian Solis’ blog posts ‘The Socialization of Your Personal Brand’ part one, part two and part three.

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Golden seashore, blue ocean made of sparkling breakwater, warm sunbeams stroking your skin – finally, the tropical dream came true. Unfortunately, not for me but for the British charity fundraiser Ben Southall, 34: He was one of the 16 finalists who recently spend three days swimming, snorkeling, diving and lounging under the close scrutiny of Queensland Tourism officials. They psychometrically tested the candidates for the ‘Best Job in the World’, the ‘Islandreef Job’ (read my recent posts number one and number two about the competition to get more information and the latest press release published by Queensland Tourism). Ben Southall staved off competition from almost 35,000 worldwide applicants to secure the post and was awarded the $150,000 (£73,000) contract beginning July 1 to serve as the caretaker of a tropical Australian Island. He now has the chance to swim, explore and relax on Hamilton island, in the Great Barrier Reef, for six months while writing a blog to (source: The Guardian). If you like to read his blog click here.

A successful social media campaign and its imitators

The recruitment for the ‘Best Job in the World’ was part of Tourism Queensland’s Islands of the Great Barrier Reef Campaign. The cooperative marketing campaign aimed to highlight the Islands of the Great Barrier Reef and showcase Australia’s own unique Island experience, to the global market (source: press release published by Tourism Queensland). I think, I don’t need to tell you again that influential newspapers like The Guardian, The Mirror or BBC or German newspapers like Der Spiegel or Der Focus picked up the story once more among other media. According to Der Spiegel the marketing campaign exceeded all expectations of Tourism Queensland: Tourism director Anthony Hayes is of the opinion that there will be more bookings within the next 12 month at the end of the campaign. Probably the ranger casting will become an annual event? In anyway, there are already imitators of the campaign: According to Der Spiegel Taiwan thinks about starting a similar competition to promote its tourism.

‘The moral of the story’

What remains to say? As mentioned in earlier posts the ‘Islandreef Job’ competition was a striking campaign idea which was based on some remarkable PR and marketing decisions like the concept of the admirable independent blogger like you and me, the integration of the audience in the voting and the content-rich website (read my recent blog post) and supported by social media tools like Facebook, Twitter and Youtube (read my recent blog post). Doubtlessly, a short-term campaign success. Will it become a long-term success, too? Only time can tell.