Have you ever been hacked?

And then had to change hosting providers?

What a royal pain in the ass - and 24 hours later, I am only just starting to get my ‘life’ back in order.

The only upside to this, is that I must have developed a pretty pesky online profile for a hacker to want to inflict some harm on me?

Well, thanks to Media Temple, all is getting back to shape, and I want to apologise for the ‘MIA‘ status I had adopted over the last 24 hours!

(If you rely on your blog, website and sorts to help communicate your personal brand, then make sure you choose a good host provider…)

What else did I learn from this exercise - well;

• If you have a strong personal brand that is well communicated - then you will be open to more criticism and attack; so be prepared, but recognise the best way to deal with criticism is with dignity and grace!
• The SOCIAL aspect of your personal brand (your network, who you hang out with etc) is vital - not only are you judged by the people you associate with, but they will defend you and support you when you’re most in need; so choose carefully who you associate with,
• Be vigilant - Gary Vaynerchuk talks about ‘always be hustling’ and the need to hustle in business - well this includes staying on top of your online real estate, and the threats that exist,
• Know you business! - I do not want to be my own IT guy for the rest of my professional life; but right now my online presence is part of my core business.  Outsourcing my core business does not make sense; and I am thankful I have a good enough technical knowledge to deal with any minor catastrophe,
• Relax; recognise that losing your website for 24 hours is not the end of the world - the most important part of my personal brand is still ‘me’

That’s enough - now back to work and getting the rest of my websites working again!

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In developing a powerful and distinct personal brand, one of the three key elements is to make sure your brand is visible!  There are many ways to do this; network at relevant events, participate in forums, speak at volunteer organisations on your subject, write an ebook, develop a blog, stand for local council or government, and write reviews! Our friends over at Seeds of Growth recently wrote a post on a great little website called Loudervoice, which is effectively an online community for reviewing ANYTHING.  You can contribute reviews via a mobile phone, Twitter, and your reviews are posted to your blog (or twitter) automatically (with your permission of course).  I believe this is a great tool to develop your personal brand a little further, and to demonstrate your passion and expertise in a particular area.  As an example, I posted a review of Dan Schawbels Personal Branding Magazine - albeit a very brief and high level review to test the website, the experience was great!  Furthermore, Loudervoice can  also be considered another notch in your online social community.  Go and have a look, and review something you feel strongly about!