It’s official. The BIG CHEESE has taken his personal brand to another level. Not only has David LaPlante gained control over his domain by going from davidlaplante.typepad.com to davidlaplante.com, but he has also improved the originality and visual appeal of his design. He did it with the flexibility of Wordpress, which is empowering so many people and businesses in the realm of self-expression and sharing of information.

It is going to be difficult not to sound like I am kissing up to the boss, but know this, he wouldn’t want me to do this post. If I know him well enough, he will never be fully satisfied with it, and he will continue to tweak the navigation, the plugins, the design, and basically anything you can think of. Meanwhile, I am letting you know about it.

What is the impression you get upon visiting David’s blog? For one, you can certainly get a sense of what is important to him - social marketing, branding, entrepreneurship, family, skiing, Reno, Nevada, Tahoe, to name a few. Secondly, you get the impression that this is no ordinary CEO of a successful company with a global base of customers. He is not hiding behind the corporate veil. He is actively engaging the online community, sharing his ideas, and demonstrating his personality. He is inviting people to interact with him. He is building his network and seeking knowledge.

When I first started working at Twelve Horses there was no company blog. David actively encouraged its creation and even offered Twelve Horses’ servers and expertise if employees wanted to start their own. Since then, many employees have entered the blogosphere and have grown their networks, their knowledge-base, and their sense of themselves.

I for one feel that blogging is and will continue to play a significant role in the development of my life. I am constantly learning, and it’s really cool to have a CEO that will come into your office and show you a brand new widget, plugin, or social networking application like Twitter that he has found. The only irritating part is that I have a hard time finding them before he does.

To advise clients on the use of new technologies we have to be using them ourselves. We have to practice what we preach. It is why the environment at Twelve Horses is one of constant learning, collaboration, and change. And it is not specific to one department or set of employees. It is everyone, including the CEO.

So there you have it. Add David’s blog to your RSS Aggregator, bookmark it, remember it, do whatever you do to keep organized, because I suspect he has a few things to say in the days to come.

tags: David LaPlante, Twelve Horses, blog, social, networking, brand, Reno, Tahoe, Nevada

This entry was posted by Robert Payne on Tuesday, March 13th, 2007 at 5:27 pm and is filed under Blog, Company News, Social Networking. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.