Mario Sanchez Carrion: Register a domain with your name. Start Now.

Photo by Mario Sanchez Carrion

I met Mario when he left complimentary comments in Dan Schwabel's blog entry about Nombray. We had some conversations, and I became interested in his personal story, and his perspective on developing a personal brand on the web. Here are the highlights, with my favorite quotes in orange.

Why are you putting yourself out there?

I've always had a passion for writing and also for branding and marketing. When I learned how easy it was to set up a Wordpress blog I immediately jumped at opportunity and started writing about marketing and branding. I did it entirely out of passion, writing at nights and weekends since I still hold a pretty demanding corporate job. Now, a little more than a year later, my blogging experience has opened my eyes to the unbelievable power of the Internet and social media to build powerful personal and small business brands, gain influence and assert ourselves as experts.

What has most surprised you about being so visible on the web?

I am still a long way from being very visible. However, one thing that surprised me is how, even with a relatively small blog and in a matter of months, you can put together a list of high quality contacts that a few years ago would have taken decades to build. Also, I am amazed at how approachable the big names on the web really are. For example, my blog was added to Alltop in their first week, when there were only a handful of blogs in just five or six different categories. I was so surprised that I looked up Guy Kawasaki's email and sent him a thank you note. The next day, I got a reply from him, in his trademark sense of humor, thanking me for an Alltop banner I had placed on my sidebar.

What is the single most valuable web channel for getting in front of the people you care about?

Definitely a blog. A blog can help you establish your brand more than your presence in any social network. I think social networks are useful as "outposts" to drive traffic to your blog. Also, at the beginning, I got a lot of traffic from Stumbleupon and that helped my blog gain traction. Other than that, I've had very good experiences with LinkedIn and now I'm getting more involved with Twitter. The value of Twitter increases with your network. People like Chris Brogan, Guy Kawasaki, or Gary Vaynerchuk, who have thousands of followers, can throw a question out there and in a matter of seconds have the insights of a huge bunch of smart people delivered to their DM Inboxes. Pretty powerful…

What piece of information about your brand, that you don't have, would you most like to have?

I would like to be able to define a more narrow niche. Since I started writing mainly to follow my passion, I approached blogging more like and art or a hobby than a business. Some of the things I write may appeal to corporate employees, others to entrepreneurs, others to social media types, etc. I think I need to narrow down my focus, most likely around personal branding, and blog with a more specific audience in mind.

What would you recommend to someone who is just starting out?

I would recommend them to start a blog about something they really care about. Get familiar with the medium. Then, visit other blogs and leave good comments. Start building your social media profiles and link them to your blog. Reach out to everybody you meet and ask their permission to add them to your network. Also, very important: register a domain with your name. But my number one recommendation is this: start now.

Comments

[Acai Optimum]

Thanks Chris for the excellent post. Very educational!