When was the last time you hired someone based solely on their credentials?
There is so much more involved in choosing someone to help you with just about any service. The primary factor - how your personalities work together.
Tell them a story
Your bio can tell someone much more about you than where you went to school and what you’ve accomplished in your career. You can tell them who you are, how you got to where you are and why you do what you do. Tell them the story of you.
Share what you’re comfortable sharing
People start to get nervous when I ask them to open up online. Don’t feel that just because I’m suggesting you share more personal information that you have to share things you don’t feel comfortable with. You can share a lot in very simple information, but once you step away from being formal people feel you’ve let them have a glimpse of the real you. It’s mostly just about letting your voice shine through in what you’re saying.
Let’s talk about me
I thought it was time to follow my own advice, so I’ve recently updated my bio.
Here is my short and more traditional bio:
Lara has spent over ten years working in online, web and social media communications. She has worked in various roles that include creating corporate web content at the University of Ottawa, successfully launching an online clothing store called Apples’n’Oranges.
Lara has helped numerous companies with their social media endeavours through a variety of workshops, one-on-one coaching and the creation of social media strategies.
It tells you what I’ve done but it doesn’t convey any of my personality. I want you to read about me and get a sense of who I am. I want you to feel like I’m friendly and easy to talk to. I also want you to think I know what I’m doing, and that I love what I’m doing. Here is how I tried to convey all of that:
I first logged in to a social web site and had an online interaction as a twelve year old in the late eighties. It wasn’t called social media then, but I loved it just as much then as I do now, and I’ve loved keeping up with all the changes and new tools and mediums over the years. Social interactions online have the incredible power to create relationships that can turn into so much more than a casual online conversation. I’ve created relationships with clients, I’ve made many friends, and I even met both my business partner and my husband online!
Public relations and communications fit into my love of relationships and communicating beautifully and I have spent more than ten years working in online, web and social media communications. I’ve created content for corporate Websites, built online businesses, and created online communities.
My focus now is to help businesses learn how to use social media to promote themselves by making social media less complicated and more manageable. Through coaching, workshops and building strategies, I help clients understand why the tools are important, which ones make the most sense for them and empowering them to use those tools confidently.
Working to help people understand how to turn the power of relationship building online into amazing business and personal connections for themselves is a passion. The relationships I get to build with clients and then cultivate online is one of the biggest rewards.
It’s much longer now but I hope conveyed what I intended. What do you think?
Leave me a comment and let me know what you think of this kind of bio and if you have, or will write one.