One of the most surprising things about Personality Not Included for me has been just how popular the book has been when I introduce it or talk about it with small businesses. There are a few easy reasons I think why this probably is:

1. PNI is very case study heavy, so small businesses will likely find at least one example that relates to their business.
2. PNI is easy to read, particularly for people who may not consider themselves marketers, but need to promote their businesses nonetheless.
3. Small business owners connect with the idea of personality because often the vision, emotion or growth behind their companies has been the result of personal vision and personality on their parts.

As a result, I love doing events, seminars and podcasts devoted to small businesses. I have another one coming up tomorrow evening hosted by my good friend Shashi Bellamkonda and his company, Network Solutions. Frank Gruber from Somewhat Frank (and a super engaging guy) will be interviewing me and we’ll be leading a discussion with more than 100 small business owners about the importance of personality. Like our previous event we did at Busboys & Poets downtown, this event was sold out within a matter of days of it opening up and should be a great event. For those who can’t make it or missed signing up before it was sold out, check out Frank’s site for some audio and video from the event.

Tomorrow evening at Busboys and Poets in downtown Washington DC, there is an event that I’m particularly excited about for two reasons. First, because it’s a very unique format and will be highly entertaining, and secondly because it’s one of my first appearances talking about the book that will be focused on small businesses. The event is a live edition of Jonny Goldstein’s highly popular Jonny’s Par-tay podcast. For those who haven’t heard Jonny, he’s got a style that is extremely engaging and unique - probably the reason why his podcast is one of the most popular in the DC area. For those of you with longer memories, you’ll also remember that Jonny won the prize for Best Interview as part of my Virtual Interview Contest - so he’s clearly got personality as well and our conversation should raise some great topics. Even if you can’t make it to the live session in DC (it’s currently sold out), you can tune into the show live tomorrow evening (June 4, 2008) online from 7pm EST to 7:40 EST.

During our session, we’ll chat about the necessity for personality, how it works and answer lots of questions from entrepreneurs and small business people about the power of personality. Attendees will also have the chance to get their own signed copies of the book. Also, a special thanks to Network Solutions for sponsoring the event. Shashi Bellamkonda (the “Social Media Swami” at Network Solutions) has been a great champion of the book and has taken on the role of “accidental spokesperson” at his company to help them connect with more small businesses in a really innovative way by participating in social media and hosting events like this one. Thanks to his strong marketing efforts, the session sold out within a couple of days of announcing it. Given the popularity of this event, we’re already thinking of doing another one in DC in the coming months and perhaps expanding the event format to a few other cities as well.

Link Love and Thanks to Sponsors:

Network Solutions
DC Media Makers
Busboys and Poets
Jess3

One of my favourite topics is looking forward and trying to predict what’s next. Tomorrow I’ll be leading a great panel devoted to exactly that topic in New York at the IAB Social Media & User Generated Content event. Here’s a description of the session and the other participants:

The Future Is Now - What’s Here, What’s Next and What’s In the Way?

Advertisers and marketers are continually on the hunt for creative opportunities to be “in” the social space. The landscape is constantly evolving but there are some pioneers of the platform who “got there first” and did it right. This panel teaches future-thinking advertisers how to be on the outer edge of the social space by encouraging new ways of thinking as well as sharing emerging techniques & technologies which address the paramount issues of privacy, monetization, scale and brand control.

Moderator: Rohit Bhargava, SVP, Digital Strategy & Marketing, Ogilvy 360 Digital Influence
Aaron Lilly, Senior Marketing Manager, Microsoft
Geoff Reiss, CEO, Associated Content
Ian Schafer, CEO, Deep Focus
Chad Stoller, Executive Director, Emerging Platforms, Organic

I’ll be speaking on a very interesting panel as part of mesh08 in Toronto today. The event is one of the largest interactive marketing events in Canada and has a wonderful gathering of smart folks, including many that I have not yet met (making this an event that stands out from many others here in the US that attract the same speakers and attendees to every conference). Here’s a description of our panel:

Building a Brand on the Web
As the reach and efficiency of traditional media for marketing purposes continues to decline, companies and marketers alike are questioning how they can build a brand identity without any of the usual tools. What strategies make sense for brands when they move online, and how should they be structured to take advantage of the medium? What are some of the pitfalls of trying to use social media to do so? Join a discussion about these and other issues with Rohit Bhargava, author of the new book “Personality Not Included”, Maggie Fox of The Social Media Group and Michael Garrity of CommunityLend, with Mark Evans, moderator.

Afterwards that evening, social media monitoring firm Radian6 is hosting a get together where I will be giving away several free copies of PNI at The Pogues Irish Pub in downtown Toronto. Here are the details in case you happen to be in Toronto and can join us.

As part of the Blogger Social event this past weekend, I had the chance to host a really interesting and unique meetup for several bloggers who were willing to pull themselves out of bed for a 9:30 am brainstorm meeting all about ideas to promote PNI. The core challenge to all 15 people who showed up was to answer the question of how they would promote the book is they had 25 copies and $200. Below is the winning idea that the group voted for, which actually combined two great ideas from Matt and Anna into a single one. Many of the concepts focused on passing books around in a viral way, and this idea had an interesting structure and charity component to it. Since this was the winning idea, I’ll be working with both Matt and Anna (depending on how much time they are both willing to give) to make this idea happen:

THE WINNING IDEA (Matt Dickman and Anna Farmery):

Everyone wants to get their book into the hands of top influencers. The best book marketing involves lots of pass along too, where people tell others about the book and share their insights and feedback. The trick is getting the right people to read it and pass it on. The winning idea combines the necessity for getting the book into the hands of right people with an innovative way to get them to pass it along. Essentially, we would identify a list of top 10-25 marketers, bloggers, authors and executives. Each one would be given a copy of the book to read and share 6 “margin notes” - 1 per chapter (reflections to passages in the book). Once they have finished with it, they need to pass it along to another influencer in their network. That person would also share their margin notes (again, 1 per chapter).

Anyone would be able to track progress throughout the campaign and at the end, all the resulting books would be auctioned off for Charity (or given to charities to auction as part of an existing event). what do you think - does this work?  Also, please share who you think might be a good candidate for this list.

As part of the launch of Personality Not Included, this blog will aim to share all kinds of content focused on the theme of marketing for the book …  that personality matters.  Over the next several months (and possibly beyond), you’ll find the following types of content:

• First look at new bonus content created around the book
• An inside preview at all the marketing for the book and latest news
• A special section called BIWIM (Brands I Wish I Mentioned) which profiles great companies that didn’t make it into the book
• Interview series with a range of authors, businesspeople and others
• “Faceless Alerts” that highlight situations of corporate facelessness and suggest alternatives that could help them regain their personalities
• And lots more!

To start, let me point you towards a series of interviews that I just completed with more than 50 bloggers who generously took up my offer to send their 5 questions relating to the book to me for answer that they could publish on their blogs.   The compliation of these answers offers not only an interesting conversation about the nature and importance of personality in business … but also several clues about content in the book, stories behind the stories and exclusive content and insights that I have not shared before.  It would certainly take some time to get through all the interviews … but you can go through and read one or all 55 on my other blog - the Influential Marketing blog.  I’d love to hear what you think of them!