The speaking world is competitive, and speakers need to cut through the noise and dominate a brand position, especially in their own marketplace. I discuss how to do that with my guest, Marti Konstant.
As a workplace futurist and inventor of the term career Agility, Marti is a keynote speaker, an AI trainer, and designer for speakers and authors. With a background in design, technology marketing, and business, she has a keen instinct for emerging trends.
Immobilized at 12, she was given a second chance to move at 15. She has not stopped since. She is a runner and mountain hiker across several continents.
She currently serves as Immediate Past President of the National Speakers Association of Illinois.
A dominating brand position is important to understand and embrace because everyone should have a niche space that they want to own. If you try to own something like “leadership development”, it’s not realistic. That marketplace is saturated. But if you have an aspect of the market that is unique to yourself, you can work to own it.
Getting Started and Moving Towards Your Dominating Brand Position
In the time when “careering” was “a thing” in the marketplace Marti tested it to find out how many people would engage with her unique take on the topic, “Career Agility”. The research was step one for her. She did the research and designed a presentation to share. Over 500 people downloaded it which made her realize that her idea had legs and she had coined a new phrase in the marketplace.
After initial research and creating your initial materials it’s time to claim that space. One of the greatest things to do is create a foundation article. In Marti’s case it was answering questions such as what is career agility? What is an agile career and what does it look like? You can ask similar questions that are related to your space. So, if you create that article and post it in a place that is heavily indexed, like LinkedIn articles or LinkedIn newsletters, that would be a place to start. Create an article, “What is (your desired market dominating space)?”
The Case for Wanting People to Use and Share Your Topic
In Marti’s case, she actually wanted people to use her definition of Career Agility rather than hoard it all for herself. In 2012 she came up with an answer to the question “What is an Agile Career?” According to Marti it’s a self-reflected, incremental career path guided by response to change, evolving job roles and designed to optimize creativity, growth, and happiness. Now that definition comes up on the first page of Google results when you search for the term “Agile Career”. Marti’s seen it mentioned in corporate presentations and at conferences. When she’s lucky enough the presenter(s) reference Marti’s name along with her definition. Her dominating brand position grows.
Why is it good to have your idea broadly used? So that people remember you and associate you with your definition. Then, in Marti’s case, when they have a presentation or training on the future of work and how that affects how their employees manage their careers, they’re going to think of Marti. And then her personal brand continues to grow in the marketplace.
How to Further Spread the Gospel of Your Idea
There are a lot of different things you can do to spread the word about your idea. You can write a book like Marti did. Hers is called “Activate Your Agile Career”. Another thing you can do is create a model that you share broadly and liberally. The illustration of your process can be put out there for all to further share with their networks.
Another way to own and dominate a brand position is to make yourself broadly known with journalists and the media at large. There are journalists that have approached Marti to interview her on the topic of career agility. Then it shows up even more in search results, and in Marti’s case major publications like Forbes. That’s especially important in the context of AI today because AI is taking up the top third of most search pages now. AI loves the big media outlets. You can make it fall in love with your content.
We also dive into topics including:
- How to do initial outreach to share your brand and idea.
- What it looks like when and why the media outlets start to approach you.
- How to create a marketing project around your brand identity.
- The definition of a marketing model you can use to share your big idea.
- The one thing, above all else, that you need to do to create and own your own space in the marketplace.
…and other golden nuggets of advice!
You can get my book here: “Idea Climbing: How to Create a Support System for Your Next Big Idea”
About My Guest
Marti Konstant is a workplace futurist, inventor of the category career agility and the best-selling author of “Activate Your Agile Career”. She has an MBA from the University of Chicago Booth School of Business and is a former technology executive who has worked in Silicon Valley.
As a Top 50 Future of Work Influencer, she has been featured in media outlets such as NBC Chicago, Forbes, and The Muse, and has worked in companies like Samsung, Dow Jones, and Apple.
With her current work at Next CoLabs, an AI strategy organization, Marti is an expert at AI learning and development strategies for the future of work. She is a keynote speaker, trainer and workshop designer, enabling people and organizations to become AI-empowered.
