Mike Abasov

“Trust Agents” is a bestselling book written by Chris Brogan and Julien Smith about social media, networking, and… well, building trust for success.

The book explains how the rules of branding has changed not only in terms of HOW you should brand, but also WHY. 

It mixes theory and interesting stories, and showcases with direct practical action plans that will get you on top of the new trends in personal and corporate marketing.

My favorite point in the book is about changing your perception of life and viewing it as a game. To some extent, this point is described by me in one of my latest posts. 

The authors also talk about building your network and leveraging your connections in a good, trustworthy way.

In my opinion, it is a great book for students, because it shows a lot of great timeless tools you didn’t know about before. It also makes you rethink you current activities and start planning your future career with better understanding of the cultural shifts that are happening right now.

This is not a hardcore tip but, for many people, not an obvious one either. Of course, you can go search for tags like “marketing” or “ubc,” or else, if you like. But the following idea I got from Twitter. Remember when you checked whom your followers follow to see if there were any cool folks out there? This is just like that.

So, what I do is I go to a tumblr post like, say, the latest video from Gary Vaynerchuk. Then I look for notes on the page. Here they are:

All these people use tumblr and like stuff that you like. Now go and check out their blogs! This way I’ve found many interesting people like, for example, Derek Jensen.

On another note, I’m collecting blogs of my readers/followers to read them and connect better. So leave a link to your blog in the comment section below!

Social media influence your business. No matter what industry you’re in.

It’s easy to say that “my business doesn’t need this,” but it’s not true anymore. Any brand, any product, any idea are now influenced by social media. To make a good example, lets look at things that don’t even need branding — commodities.

Commodities used to be unbranded for the longest time, but this changed too. Here are 2 examples.

1. Diamonds. A complete commodity on the wholesale level. But suddenly, the word spreads about blood diamonds, and our perception shifts. Suddenly, Canadian diamonds are better than African. Surprisingly, a commodity turns into a brand and generates more revenues than ever before. All through word of mouth communications, which in essence are social media.

2. Oil. You though you couldn’t care less where it comes from. But suddenly, the word “spill” rings the bell in a much different way than before. Influence from social media? Tremendous! BP failed big time on this particular arena.

So yes, in the world where even commodities can be greatly influenced by social media, you consumer (or B2B, or personal) brand is even more affected. And there is no more time left for hesitations.

As mentioned on Mashable, the new MySpace is trying to get out of the battle with Facebook and move towards entertainment, the area where the rival is minimally established. But here’s a problem. The new niche means new competitors like established Last.fm or brand new Ping.

So the question is, “Does MySpace have what it takes to win this market?” I think it does. At least, it has 3 particular advantages:

1. It is about free content. Not like monetized Ping. And it’s a lot about indie art too. If the company is able to hold on to indie musicians and filmmakers, it might win. But if it goes after big entertainment brands looking for big money, it will loose. After all, Apple has much stronger connections with recording labels.

2. It seams to have learned the lessons. The rebranding looks fresh, and I can see some ideas taken from many other successful projects (like badges from Foursquare). The fact that MySpace admits that it has lost to Facebook and adjusts its strategy deserves respect too.

3. It is pre-established. Unlike many newcomers to the market, MySpace has audience and has reputation. It has fans. The goal now is not to loose them but leverage their influence and grow.

Well, I can just wish good luck to the new MySpace (and r.i.p., the new Digg).

What do you think? Yay or nay to this rebranding?