Over the past few weeks, I have been asked several times what I mean by the phrase at the end of my tag line for my blog… “Adventure Capitalist”. The frequency of this requests as my blog readership grows is increasing proportionally. So I have decided to make my definition of the term the topic of tonight’s blog post in an attempt to head off any future queries at the pass.

As I sat down to formulate this post, I decided to see what the all knowing Google had to say about my tag line. Curious to see if I am as original as I perceive in the use of this phrase.

According to the top three responses (search string: ‘Adventure Capitalist’ definition), who where all in alignment with each other… my perspective of the term is not even close to its generally accepted use. According to investorwords.com it means:

An entrepreneur who helps other entrepreneurs financially, and often plays an active role in the company’s operations (such as by occupying a seat on the board of directors).

I am sitting here typing this sort aghast with my tag lines more formal definition. How I personally use the term, could not be farther from its generally accepted meaning.

To give you a little background about where my mind was when I first coined my version of the phrase. It was January 2009 and I was in month 7 of a walk-about around this planet (England, Germany, France, America, Mexico and Canada). Although I was still working a full time job, I was doing it from no fixed address via the internet and my cell phone. To add a bit more color to my mindset of the moment, I had just finished reading “Vagabonding” by Rolf Potts, and was half way through reading “The Four Hour Work Week: Escape 9-5, Live Anywhere and Join The New Rich”, by Tim Ferris for the second time. Both books, like my lifestyle of the moment put a premium on time and mobility as the criteria for living a successful life.

The accepted definition of the word adventure is ( thefreedictionary.com ):

1. An undertaking or enterprise of a hazardous nature.
2. An undertaking of a questionable nature, especially one involving intervention in another state’s affairs.
3. An unusual or exciting experience: an adventure in dining.
4. Participation in hazardous or exciting experiences: the love of adventure.
5. A financial speculation or business venture.

The accepted definition of the word capitalist is ( thefreedictionary.com ):

1. A supporter of capitalism.
2. An investor of capital in business, especially one having a major financial interest in an important enterprise.
3. A person of great wealth.

I merged the 2nd definition of adventure — An unusual or exciting experience, and the 1st of capitalist –- A supporter of capitalism. I thought my version was text book. I was traveling around the world, living an adventure while being a firm supporter of capitalism, earning more money than 99% of all Canadians.

Although I am a little disturbed by the accepted meaning of the phrase, I am not thwarted by it. In the shadow of the largest financial calamity and the toughest job market since the great depression, I propose my definition of “Adventure Capitalist” as an alternative for the term. My spin putting less emphasis on money being the currency of capitalism but the ability to live a life with the time to participate in many great adventures.

photo credit: GViciano

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(re-post from my Facebook account — March 1st, 2010) After watching Canada win the gold in a sports bar last night with a few friends, when I was walking home… I felt alive, happy, to put to just one word “serene”. Indeed, the Olympics and hockey specifically (within Canada) has a way of slowing you down, of waking you up, of pulling you up out of your daily routines and seeing life in a new way. This new way of looking at the world need not end when the big game is over.

Here are 3 important life lessons that were reinforced last night by watching the big game that can be used to enrich the life you lead everyday.

Lesson 1) Time = Wealth

The most important lesson watching the game last night surrounded by a few hundred people is that your time is all you really own in life. And the more you do things with people, the more you realize that your most extravagant possessions can’t match the satisfaction you get from finding new experiences, meeting new people. “Value” is a word we often hear in day-to-day life, but new experiences with people like screaming at a TV screen with 300 other people has a way of teaching us that value is not pegged to a cash amount, that the best experiences in life can be had for the price of showing up.

Scientific studies have shown ( http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/02/090207150518.htm ) that new experiences (and the memories they produce) are more likely to produce long-term happiness than new things. Since new experiences aren’t exclusive to the Olympics; spend less time working on things you don’t enjoy and buying things you don’t need; spend more time embracing the kinds of activities (learning new skills, meeting new people, spending time with friends and family) that make you feel alive and part of the world.

Lesson 2) Be Where You Are

A great thing about a hockey game is that it forces you into the moment. When you’re celebrating a goal there’s a giddy thrill in being exactly where you are and allowing things to happen. In an age when electronic communications enable us to be permanently connected to (and distracted by) the virtual world, there’s a narcotic thrill in throwing yourself into a single place, a single moment. When you get lost in an event, you get to embrace the privilege of witnessing life as it happens before your eyes. This attitude need not be confined to one hockey game.

At home, how often do you really need to check your email or your Twitter feed? When you get online, are you there for a reason, or are you simply killing time? Even at home, there are sublime rewards to be had for unplugging from online distractions and embracing the world before your eyes.

Lesson 3) Life with out expectations

Hockey is typically structured in to 3 neat 20 minute periods. But this game went into sudden death overtime. It reminded me the world does not always fit into a set of expectations. Going into overtime the game propelled itself into elongated moments of nail biting nervousness about the unknown climax to the game. It was in these final moments that the game became the most memorable. When you live your life free of expectations, that your life will be the most memorable.

That said, there’s no reason why you should confine this sort of freedom and happiness to the big game. In refusing to set limits (expectations) for what is possible on any given day, you open yourself up to an entire new world of possibility.

Naturally, this list is just a sampling of how one exhilarating gold medal moment can remind you of what is important in your life. What have I missed? What has any Olympic moment taught you about how to live your life for the better?
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photo credit: Stoichiometry ( http://www.flickr.com/photos/11324320@N08/3329931806/ )

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Over the last few days, I’ve been trying to figure out how to better utilize Facebook as a blogger. To be more specific, I wanted to focus on what Facebook could offer me as far as:

1. Getting traffic to my blog
2. Interacting and building relationships with my target audience
3. Helping to establishing myself as an authority

These three things are all important aspects of becoming a successful blogger, as you probably already know.

I tried to look for posts from the big time bloggers specifically about Facebook and how one could utilize it for their blog, and if it was even worth it. What I did find had no definite answers, so I figured I’d just do it myself, see what happens, and report my findings back here for you.

The following is a compilation of my research, which I hope many of you can use as a primer if you’re at all interested in using Facebook for something useful from a personal branding perspective other than just re-connecting to your old high school friends, or showing off Farmville achievements. Which I will admit I do a lot of on my personal page.

Why Facebook?

Before I get into the actionable, how-to type stuff, it’s important to understand why Facebook should be paid attention to in the first place. Here are some astonishing statistics:

• There are over 400 million active users (125 million from the USA alone!)
• It has an Alexa ranking of 2, just behind Google.
• On average, people spend 55 minutes a day on Facebook. (Average time spent on any given website: 10 seconds)

Personal Profiles vs. Groups vs. Pages

There are three basic ways to connect and engage with people on Facebook:

1. Your Personal Profile
2. A Group; or
3. A Page

Your personal profile is basically your primary account, where you can interact with friends and family. You may wish to just use your personal profile to advance your blog (which many people do), but knowing that you’re going to have to talk about whatever niche your blog is about from time to time, understand that this may end up annoying your friends and family who really just want to see pictures of you passed out in Vegas. For this reason, you may want to consider creating a Group or a Page for your blog, to keep things quasi-separate.

Mashable has a fantastic post about the differences between a Facebook Group and a Facebook Page, so I won’t repeat what they outline, but their bottom line is:

“Groups are great for organizing on a personal level and for smaller scale interaction around a cause. Pages are better for brands, businesses, bands, movies, or celebrities who want to interact with their fans or customers without having them connected to a personal account, and have a need to exceed Facebook’s 5,000 friend cap.”

Because of this, I have started creating a Page for this blog. It works JUST like a personal profile, so it was easy for me to get used to, but it has many more features to help you integrate my blog and my brand (more on that in tomorrow’s post).

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I have not bought a news paper in years. Occasionally when visiting my 74 year old Mother, I will read parts of hers out of nostalgia, but for the most part I am ready for the day the last news paper is printed. Let’s face it, that day is getting closer all the time. I think we’ll all survive, as one experience replaces another.

As long as we have a vehicle for receiving our news, does the format really matter? I don’t think so. What really concerns me is all the other things we use newspapers for. What will happen when we no longer have stacks of papers around?

That’s the question raised by The Onion in it’s recent news report parody hitting on the hot button issues surrounding the death of newspapers.

How Will The End Of Print Journalism Affect Old Loons Who Hoard Newspapers?

This clip leaves a lot of unanswered questions, namely:

• What will crazy old loons stack in their houses when newspapers are gone?
• Are newspapers more ’stackable’ than computer printouts?
• What will people cover the floor with while painting?
• What will kindergarten teachers use now to make piñatas?

You gotta love The Onion.

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photo credit: .faramarz

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I have been spending a lot of time reading the posts over at the “Personal Branding Blog”. Yesterday Peter Kistler wrote a post (Controlling Your Google Results: The Art and Science of the Personal Press Release ) about personal press releases.

I took it up as my personal challenge produce my own for paulmacp.com. First thing I did, following his model, I constructed my press release.

Paul MacPherson launched paulmacp.com

paulmacp.com Gives Free Advice to Gen-X On How To Establish Thier Own Online Personal Brand

Toronto, ON March 2010 - In the most competitive job market since the Great Depresion, aspiring author,
writter, blogger and self professed adventure capatlist, Paul MacPherson has launched a website filed
with advice to help Gen-X build their own personal brand at www.paulmacp.com. The site went live today.

"I wanted to demonstrate through down to earth advice and examples how Gen-Xers can build their own
brands online," MacPherson said. The site will be a central part of his personal mission to help fellow
Gen-Xers harness the power of the internet to propell their careers forward.

"As a perspective author, with my first book due out in June, I know I will be searched online, and I
know my Google results din't accurately represent me." MacPherson said. "So I set out to change that,
and realized other Gen-Xers could benefit from what I have learned." You can see what he has learned
at paulmacp.com.

###

About Paul MacPherson:

Paul MacPherson is no stranger on the internet running various successful web properties in the past.
He has over eight years experience on the internet and twenty years experience working within the high
tech community in various post and pre-sales technical roles.

Contact:

email: paul@paulmacp.com
Website: www.paulmacp.com
Twitter: www.twitter.com/paulmacp
Facebook: www.facebook.com/paulmacp
LinkedIn: ca.linkedin.com/in/paulmacp

Then I was off to the submit to the “free” press release sites he referenced:

1. http://www.1888pressrelease.com
2. http://free-press-release.com
3. http://www.pr.com
4. http://www.pr-inside.com
5. http://www.prlog.org

The reality is other than prlog.org, they are not completely free, to receive the benefits I desired. Except for prlog.org, you cannot include “hot text links” back to your website. But I don’t want to label the exercise time intensive or expensive ether. With an effective “personal marketing budget of $100 USD, I have utilized four of these services. 1 for free and 3 for a fee (www.pr.com, free-press-release.com,  www.1888pressrelease.com). I completely ignored pr-inside.com, after 5 minutes, I found their interface just too frustrating to continue.

In retrospect, setting aside $100 per month as personal marketing budget seems like a pittance for the dividends it may reward for my personal brand and professional reach.

At the time of this writing my prlog.org release had been released with one free “hot text link” (click here to view — prlog.org)

Over the coming days, weeks I will track the SEO benefits of these 4 press releases and do an update to this post sometime in April.

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I started pondering the importance of spelling when it comes to brand recognition because of my new domain name: paulmacp. I firmly believe that having a domain name that is short and easy to remember is helpful in establishing and identity a personal brand.

It is an easy contraction of my proper name Paul MacPherson. I thought about paulmac for a minute but the dot com domain was not available. I have been experimenting with dot net domains, and people just intuitively think dot com, and opted for the additional P and registered paulmacp.com. As an added bonus, except for YouTube and Delicious paulmacp was also available for use as a consistent social networking id (twitter.com/paulmacp, facebook.com/paulmacp, ca.linkedin.com/in/paulmacp, etc.), I had to use paulymacp for them.

Meanwhile, my CMS of choice, WordPress is often incorrectly written as two separate words: Word Press. In fact, if I recall correctly they even had a small forum post addressing the proper spelling and clarification, rightly advocating consistency in brand executions. People were confused, defended their right to misspell based on SEO, and wondered if management was being a little too uptight. However, there’s a reason why brand evangelists exist: even when it’s clearly written out what rules the brand must follow, many many people find a way to fudge it up.

A rose by any other name would smell as sweet

Is that a bad thing? For the brand owners, it does hurt us in a way. Web wise, it lessens the our SEO web juice when people inconsistently try to search for different terms. It divides the search results. In another, it will convey the wrong idea to a new audience. Visually, it is also inconsistent.

Is this the way we need to also address the reality of brand spelling and recognition? That, as long as people still identify you and still understand who you are, that it doesn’t matter as much if Coca-Cola needs that hyphen in between, or if it helps SEO, fine, let’s spell EE as “Expression Engine?”

At the end of the day, as long as you’re still recognized, and you yourself are consistent then even if others mistake it, as long as they know you exist in some form, is it okay? In my opinion, yes. However, I think it is always right to correct others when you do have the chance, and not to cry over the spilt milk if others still don’t follow suit.

Brand Nazi or Brand Savant?

What is your stance on naming? Are you more strict or are you more fluid? If strict, how do you enforce your naming? If loose, where do you let it go?

photo credit: tristanf

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I believe you are in charge of… “Brand You”.

Social media, including sites like Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and Brazen Careerist, can help you connect with people who can assist you with growing “Brand You”, broadening your personal and professional reach. However, it works both ways. Social media when used the wrong way can backfire and tarnish “Brand You”. It’s important to be careful and consider what you shouldn’t do, as well as what you should do to perpetuate “Brand You”.

There are many approaches taken these days to having an online presence. The most popular one taken by Gen-X is not to have one, taking a reactive “please remove” or “avoidance strategy” (no content is better than bad content) to showing up on a Google search.

If we’ve learned anything from Mark Zuckerberg, it is that Gen-Y has accepted the end of privacy on the web. Gen-Y wants their network, or fans, to know what they are doing at all times. They get excited at comments because it shows that people care about them and what they have to say. People like me who are members of Gen-X have not embraced this perspective as readily as our Gen-Y counterparts. I think most Gen-Y would say this is out of our own insecurities or need for control.

The fact of the matter is we are always competing for the mind share of a perspective employer or customer, Gen-X needs to get with the program. In the age of the all knowing Google you will be searched and compared to who you are competing against. Think hypothetically for a moment if 3 people are competing for the mind share of a perspective buyer (be it employer or customer), and they can’t find your online presence, but can find the online personal brand of your competition?!? Chances are you will not be the beneficiary of this transaction.

The only way to be really be in control of “Brand You” in the age of Social Networking is to have your own deliberate and promoted presence on the Web. Ensuring you are in control of what perspective buyers of “Brand You” are going to see, because you ensured your own content is first, second and third in Google’s search results.

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photo credit: -Delphine – Very very busy with my work.

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I read a post from Dan Schawbel entitled Fake It Till You Make It? .

To quote the meet of his post:

The old saying is that you need to “fake it before you make it.” Do you believe this is even possible in the social media world? Between online and offline connections, don’t you think that people will end up revealing the real brand you anyways? First impressions, and how people are perceived in general, have changed so much in the past few years, that it’s harder to promote yourself as a confident person, when someone might video you or greet you in a public situation. If we’ve learned anything from Mark Zuckerberg, and Gen-Y, it’s that most people have acceptable the end of privacy on the web. People want their network, or fans, to know what they are doing at all times. We get excited at comments because it shows that people care about them and what they have to say. Not everyone has revealed their true identity though, out of fear, and certain insecurities.

The web is a harsh place and you will be judged and ridiculed, whether you like it or not. There are three major concepts you should understand, including paying dues, making it, and faking it till you make it

I think what the gen-Y mantra highlights is a desire to cut corners. I think it is fine if an artist or writer tells himself his work is important, that is an authentic depiction of who he feels he is. But too many people have “faked it till they made it” and that I feel is the reason the world economy is in the place it is.

It seems to me too many Gen-Y’s have faked it and made it, but never bothered to learn how to do the job. So many of the problems that I feel can be associated with today’s financial / economic crisis can be linked to Dan’s final example in his post:

You have to appear rich to mentally convince the customer that what you’re selling them will make them rich as well. Is this honest? No, but when you’re first starting out, it might be the only way to brand yourself in certain fields.

These “masters of universe” (to make a reference to Bonfire of the Vanities) convinced too many people they could and should get rich, including themselves. But as the current state of the world economy shows, they never developed any real skills other than the ability to convince others they know what they are doing. It is unfortunate that this type of personality seems to have clustered within the financial industry (where the money is) where there maybe no one left who actually is not “faking it till they make it” anymore.

I would hate to have a doctor who was “faking it till they make it” . How about an engineer designing a bridge, let’s let him/her “faking it till they make it” after all self confidence is everything. How about the life guard at the neighborhood pool watching over your kids? Should they just need to look fit or maybe we should need to see them prove it through actual credentials?

Society seems to allow people in sales or soft services to “fake it till they make it” , but as we have learned through the devastation of all our retirement savings, this has done no one other than the faker any good.

We need more people to pay their dues and learn their job from seasoned professionals who pass on the experience and allow the young to mature and grow into authentic professionals. Gen-Y has an entitlement about them that is fundamental to this mantra they live by. “I think I can, so I can.” We may have let this generation Y read the “The little engine that could” one too many times.

photo credit: cambodia4kidsorg

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One of the key criteria for success within the social web is to start and sustain dialogue. Thus one of the most important parts of blogging, beyond creating great content and sharable headlines, is making sure that your blog is comment friendly and social. This means that visitors are able to have in-depth discussions through the comments with extra features. After commenting, they are easily able to share a blog post with others on their favorite social networks, such as Twitter, Facebook, Delicious and others. And finally, if they are interested in getting to know you better, they can easily find your social profiles.

Here are 3 fundemental ways to make your blog more social.

1. Sexy Bookmarks, is a WordPress plugin that allows visitors to easily share a blog post on a selection of the top social bookmarking and networking sites. Although the number of networks is much more limited compared to Sociable (only 18 to choose from), Sexy Bookmarks is much more graphically appealing. The icons are displayed at half their size, and when visitors hover over them, they pop up.  There is also a cute message above the icons that says Sharing is Sexy.

   Visit Sexy Bookmarks for more details.

2. TweetMeme is a button that encourages visitors to share blog posts on Twitter.   This button comes in two styles, both including a counter for the number of times a blog post is tweeted.  It can also be customized to use your @username in the retweet so you can see who is retweeting your article through your mentions / replies. The button can be added directly into the WordPress template theme, through the TweetMeme WordPress plugin, or directly in a post if you want to only push Twitter promotion on certain posts. Toptenz uses tweetmeme, so feel free to retweet this article for practice! Just click the button right above this paragraph to see how it works.

   Visit TweetMeme for more details.

3. DISQUSS Comment Management System: Is simple to install, but is one of the most powerful tools you can add to your blog to spark conversation if not debate within your blog. DISCUSS allows visitors to receive email notifications of new comments added to a post they have just commented on.  This will make the conversation on a blog post go beyond just one stop commenting by reminding visitors to come back and respond to new comments. DISCUSS also allows visitors to edit their own comments after submitting them.  Visitors can feel comfortable that their comment is not finalized as soon as they submit it, in case they made a typo.  The bonus for you is that you will not have to deal with a lot of requests to edit comments after the fact. Threaded Comments is also a feature in WordPress 2.7 and above which allows visitors to reply directly to other comments, encouraging more in-depth discussions and making it easier for you to reply to your commenter’s as well.

   Visit DISQUSS Comment Management System for more details.

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photo credit: cursedthing

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Amongst my colleges and friends one of the questions I always get asked is… how do I know which social media sites to use?

There is no single, magic or easy answer to that question. It all depends on your goals, your resources and your industry. There is no one silver bullet.

However, there’s nothing wrong with a little cheat sheet to help you determine which sites are best for:

• Customer communication
• Brand exposure
• Driving traffic to your site
• SEO

Which is why the cheat sheet created by CMO.com is so handy. They released a handy landscape that takes a snapshot of the social media landscape designed as a quick heads up of the playing field. It’s not the be all, it does not cover all the places, spaces and platforms – but it is a great start.  It ranks the most popular/used social media sites (from the biggies like Facebook and Digg to the less talked about Reddit and del.icio.us) as good, okay or bad for the four goals above.

You can download a much bigger, easier to read PDF version of it by clicking here.

Related posts:

1. Thoughts About Miss Use of Social Media