Book Review: Known, The Handbook for Building and Unleashing Your Personal Brand in the Digital Age

All of the personal branding gurus out there are leaving out an important piece of the puzzle.

Yes, you should try to discover your life’s passion. But what’s next?

According to Mark W. Schaefer, consultant, speaker, and author of Known, the missing piece is applying your passion in service of a long-term goal.

For example, talking about my obsession with cupcakes is not going to help my personal brand unless I’m opening a bakery.

Mark is a masterful teacher, and he uses extensive interviews with successful people to give the reader actionable advice. He pulls back the curtain on regular people who found the right niche, built an engaged audience, and then patiently activated that audience to achieve a goal.

He’s the right person to talk about this subject, since he left the corporate world and started over as a consultant, using blogging as his calling card to become known in a new professional niche. His blog, grow, is now one of the top marketing blogs in the world.

My favorite thing about this book is that it’s written in Mark’s inimitable voice, as if you’re old friends. It’s not a stuffy, by-the-numbers business book.

Each person interviewed brings a new insight to the story, whether it’s the “grandpa who shoots things on YouTube,” or the blogging pediatrician. You’ll just have to read the book to meet these interesting characters.

There is also a separate workbook that takes the lessons from the book and provides a step-by-step walkthrough of the process to become “known.” Each question or prompt will provoke deeper thought and encourage you to put some meat on the bones of your professional plan.

I’d recommend this book to anyone who is struggling to be heard and recognized above the din. You’ll find inspiration and solid ideas in one entertaining package.

 

 

Disclosure: I consider Mark a friend, but he did not request this review or send me a free book (what’s up with that?). I forked out my own hard-earned dollars to purchase it, and these are my unvarnished opinions.

 

Author’s Bio: Rosemary O’Neill is an insightful spirit who works for Social Strata — makers of the Hoop.la community platform. Check out the Social Strata blog. You can find Rosemary on Google+ and on Twitter as @rhogroupee

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Book Review: Known, The Handbook for Building and Unleashing Your Personal Brand in the Digital Age

Making the Most of Personal Finances as a Professional Blogger

Being a professional blogger has its advantages and disadvantages. On the Pros side, we’ve got Freedom of schedule, working for yourself, endless opportunities to expand into new online territory, few necessary business expenses. On the Cons side, it’s challenging to make a lot of money in your first years of blogging, it’s hard to have consistent income sources that last, and there is always someone out there threatening to take over your audience. Considering all of the financial challenges inherent in blogging, it’s important for the professional blogger to be a master of personal finance. If you know how to make the most of your money, the ups and downs of blogging won’t make a difference to your life, savings, and investment.

Most people who have trouble with money, regardless of profession, do so because they don’t keep an adequate handle on their finances. Money slips away unnoticed. One look at https://www.canaryclaims.co.uk shows how everyday financial fraud can steal thousands from unsuspecting bank accounts, before the owners even notice. Other people can’t keep track of their own spending, only learning the extent of their splurging after a bounced check or denied debit card payment.

The best way to settle these problems is to budget. Everybody knows that a budget is important, but few of us actually practice it. Not everyone is able to work up the energy required to manage a careful spreadsheet, taking stock of every expenditure. We’ll never deny that having a spreadsheet or similar tool is a great resource for people who are wired that way, there are other ways to get the same benefit of rigorous budgeting, without all of the bookwork.

One of the best habits of people who are in charge of their finances is to pay their bills and their savings before making any other expenditures. It’s incredible what a difference this makes. As soon as you get paid, pay your electric bills, your internet, your credit card, your water bill, your rent or mortgage, and your savings. Pay yourself first. Once these are covered, it doesn’t matter nearly as much how you use the rest of your money. Your basics are covered.

If you have debt, it’s important that you be vigilant in getting rid of it. Until it is gone, your savings goals aren’t going to be as meaningful or powerful. Start by committing a specific amount of money each week to the killing of your debt. It can help to give yourself some tangible rewards and reminders, like a calendar on the wall complete with a sticker for every time you meet your goal.

Finally, make a habit of living well beneath your means. Even if your income starts out small and inconsistent, if you can learn to make it work, you will have great living skills that will enable you to save a lot of money when you start making more money from blogging. All of these habits work for internet professionals of all varieties. Make them work for you and you’ll be glad you did.

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Making the Most of Personal Finances as a Professional Blogger

How to Get a Business Loan with no Personal Guarantee

Borrowing a certain amount of money is one of the main options for the entrepreneurs to get funds for their businesses. For this purpose, entrepreneurs are usually asked to personally guarantee the amount borrowed from the financial institutions. A personal guarantee asks you to pay off the loan even when you are financially unstable. It’s highly unlikely to get a business loan without any personal guarantee if your business has just started.

Banks and other financial institutions are not concerned with how successful you have been in the past with other ventures. The major drawback of signing a personal guarantee for the loan is that you might lose personal assets if the business goes bankrupt. You tend to risk losing all your savings. This is where you need experts like Terry Sandvold to provide you wealth management and insurance advice. They examine your personal financial circumstances to decide the proper mutual funds, stocks, ETF’s or bonds that would perfectly benefit your portfolio.

Here are some guidelines on how to get a business loan with no personal guarantee:

Establish a Stable Credit History

The first thing you need to do is to set up an appropriate business structure so to give a stable look to credit bureaus. For instance, getting the required licenses, tax numbers, so on and so forth. Secondly, open an account in the name of your business with an institution that won’t hesitate to report your credit history to the firms with a major financial player in the global society. You need to clear your past bills or debt if any and improve your credit score before you apply for an unsecured personal loan. Although, it is time consuming, but this must be done at the initial stages to establish a rapport. You can also consider rate shopping i.e apply for multiple loans in order to choose from the best interest rate while your credit score remains unaffected.

Suppliers Play a Role

Suppliers are the best bet for the newly established businesses to get loans with no personal guarantee. They are comparatively easier to deal with than the financial institutions and they are always more inclined toward trading with new customers. There are generally two types of suppliers; peer-to-peer and direct. The former uses other investors to fund your loan which means your loan may be originating from multiple individual investors located around the world. The approval for your application would be easy, but it comes with a drawback i.e. the interest rate is very high. The latter on the other hand, is an online supplier that lends the loan from their company’s capital just like a bank. Unlike local banks, they provide flexibility. You must trade with your suppliers for a certain period of time and pay instantly on the delivery, in order to build a healthy relationship with them. You need to protect yourself from discreditable lenders. Some of the renowned suppliers that may provide business loans without personal guarantee are Funding Circle, Kabbage, Prosper, Street Shares, On Deck and Dealstruck.

Look for Smaller Banks

Major players in the banking industry or other financial bodies follow an approach of take it or leave it, once the borrower does not agree on providing a personal guarantee for the repayment of the debt. Conversely, there’s always a room for negotiation when it comes to smaller banks. You should also take into consideration if they are willing to let go off personal guarantees for the loan you apply for.

Try Opting Credit Unions

Unlike banks, credit unions are non-profit organizations that pass their earning on to the members of their organization. They often operate on a small scale and are more open to negotiate for an unsecured business loan. Big banks have strict lending procedures and because credit union is a non-profit setup, you have better chances of convincing them.

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How to Get a Business Loan with no Personal Guarantee