Brand Yourself Solid

I have to admit that I’m somewhat turned off by websites that have people’s pictures plastered all over them. Coaches seem to be especially bad about this. When I get to one of these sites, and am suddenly faced with a stiff, ugly photo of a not very attractive looking person who seems to take him/herself very seriously, I always wonder: Why?!? Why would you want to put your ugly mug out there? On everything???

We had the good fortune to land an interview with Michael Port, author of Book Yourself Solid this week. It was a great conversation that we’ll talk about in detail in our May newsletter which comes out one week from today. [If you want a copy, you gotta subscribe.] One of the burning questions we had for Michael was about building a personal brand.

Not that Michael Port is unpleasant to look at--he used to be an actor on the soaps (Guiding Light, All My Children, Sex in the City) but if you’ve looked at the Book Yourself Solid website, you’ve probably noticed that Port’s picture is everywhere. It’s on the book cover; it’s on every page of the website. When I receive his promo materials by mail, I got a double dose (he’s on the front cover twice: him holding the book cover). But I wonder, why brand the guy?

When I founded Zugunruhe, I was very intentional that I was creating a company, not a vehicle for self-promotion. The company is not me; I have never had a “personal” branding effort in the sense of branding Tara Robinson. The branding effort is about the company. That’s one of the reasons I named the company Zugunruhe. It’s a weird word, with no predefined meaning (in English, that is). Weird company names are often associated with highly successful endeavors. Google. Amazon. Apple. Caterpillar. Yahoo.

Yeah, so very few people know how to pronounce Zugunruhe (it’s zoog un roo  ee, emphasis on the zoog). I  kind of doubt people knew how to pronounce  Xerox when they first came on the scene either. Zugunruhe means “migratory restlessness.” It’s the feeling and behavior birds have before taking off on migration. Nice metaphor for change. Practically every single person that hears it says the same thing, “Cool!” Everybody “gets” it, immediately, with little explanation. Often, I hand people my business card with no preamble and no explanation of the name. Almost every time, they look at the name, make a stab at pronouncing it and then ask, what’s the word? Great conversation starter.

In other words, Zugunruhe creates curiosity, interest, and a little confusion. Is that a good thing? What do you think?

Should the brand be the company or the people?