Personal Branding: A Master Key 🗝️ | Part 1
Introduction to an in-depth Personal Branding Mastery newsletter series.
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Personal Branding Radically Changed My Business And Life — And It Can Do The Same For You
In January 2007 as I was walking through the main foyer at my University, three-quarters of the way through my undergrad studies, I received a call that set in motion a chain of events that radically altered my trajectory in life. I was going down the traditional path - go to a good school, get good grades and get a safe, secure job. And I was excelling! I ended up graduating with honors from Kettering University with a degree in Mechanical Engineering and a job already secured upon graduation with a growing medical device company. Shortly thereafter, I received two patents for my designs for a new laser atherectomy device. From the outside looking in, it looked like I had it made -- doing well in my career, credentials, comfy salaried position, good benefits. What you couldn't see was the tug-of-war inside me. That call in 2007 fertilized a seed of a dream inside me. It began to grow and the more it did, the more I realized that an engineering career would not and could not fulfill that dream.
Over the ensuing years I transitioned out of the engineering world and into the entrepreneurial world. Many of the dreams that I clung to started coming true -- traveling, speaking, time freedom, etc. It felt great, but it was accompanied with a growing stress: it was getting increasingly difficult to find the next client.
While my business created amazing leverage, I felt as though my input was maxed out but yet nowhere near what I believed was possible. See, like many of you, I built my business largely offline - prospecting, meeting, presenting and selling in person. The bottleneck in the process was prospecting -- finding and connecting with qualified people in my target market. Sure, it can be done offline through networking groups, referrals & referral groups, coffee shop conversations, etc, but all of those require two things: lots of time and personal presence. I was all too familiar with this. In 2017 I ran up 50,000 miles on my car doing business presentations, meetings, training events, and prospecting. Again, I knew something had to change.
In a place of frustration and nearing burnout, my mind opened up. See, up to this point, I was constantly told that you can’t build a solid business with social media. That you can’t create real connections. That social media is a waste of time and that I needed to cut it out completely and use that time on more productive things. Without any other options being presented except for “just do more of what you’ve been doing,” I decided to start investigating this social media thing. It was a complete freaking train-wreck. No wonder I was always taught to avoid social media for my business. All I saw were people that turned their FB profile into a billboard for their business -- posting their product, service, house listings, etc in almost every single post. Talk about annoying. It was obvious that these people were destroying their influence and bankrupting their social capital. I would be lying if I didn’t feel discouraged, but I was determined to figure out a way that worked (because it was obvious that the crap I saw, wasn’t).
Through a crazy chain of events (a story for another day), I was introduced to the idea of Personal Branding -- a method by which you can systematically and authentically grow your influence, network, social capital, and business utilizing social media.
The more I dug in, the more it resonated with me. It became obvious that it was the way forward in my business. The sad part is that my co-founders didn’t agree and actively pressured me to stop. But by this point, I was done with the old way. There was no going back. The only way forward for me was learning and trying something new. So I walked away from a business that I had been building for over 10 years. I left 100% of my income. I literally hit the reset button in my life and my only plan to move forward was learning personal branding and leveraging it to build a new business. That was in late 2018.
In 24 months, using the techniques I will describe in this newsletter series, I completely rebuilt my business (organically!) — a business that had originally took me 10 years to build. The best part is that this time I did it from my phone and laptop from home (or wherever I felt like being).
Make no mistake — building a personal brand and leveraging it for your business will take dedicated, persistent and consistent effort. You will have to learn new skills. It will take time to see results from it. But I can promise you this: it will be worth it! The freedom, relationships, reach, and opportunities for monetization it opens up are incredible. It’s a Master Key that will open up doors everywhere in your life. 🗝️
Today, when I look around, I see so many entrepreneurs, marketers, and salespeople that are ignoring or misusing perhaps the most powerful networking tool we’ve ever been given: social media. It pains me to see so many struggling the same way I was, so I decided to share every personal branding strategy I know — FOR FREE! The strategies are not theory — I literally use them each myself and teach them to my team where they only payback is through results.
I’m beyond excited for you to learn these strategies and multiply your influence and business!
Let’s get started!
Why is Personal Branding Necessary?
People generally fall into one of two camps regarding leveraging social media for their business: either ignore it altogether and just keep it for personal connections or turn their personal profile into a billboard for their business.
Both approaches leave tremendous value on the table.
Social media is the most powerful networking tool we’ve ever had at our disposal. Literally billions of people are only a couple mouse clicks away.
Personal Branding is the key that unlocks the potential of social media and allows you to find, attract, connect and engage with like-minded people in your target market.
What Is Personal Branding?
Let’s first talk about what it’s not. Personal branding is not promoting your company, product or service all over your FB profile. It is not faking it until you make it. It is not pretending to be something you’re not. We’re not talking about renting a Lamborghini to film a video in front of here.
Personal Branding is systematically and authentically growing your influence, network, social capital, and business by adding value utilizing social media.
Personal Branding is built upon two key principles:
Principle 1: Add More Value Than You Extract
“Focus on adding value daily, add as much value as possible as often as possible, never wait to add value, give without keeping score so motives stay pure, and welcome any return as an unexpected blessing.” -John C. Maxwell
A solid personal brands adds multiple times more in value than it seeks to extract. It gives much more than it asks.
Principle 2: More Relationships = More Business
“The business of business is relationships; the business of life is human connection.” -Robin Sharma
A large portion of what you’re about to learn focuses on one simple thing: relationships. More and deeper relationships will lead to more and better business.
Part 2 is coming next Tuesday! We’ll be digging into How To Discover Your Personal Brand.
Share this series with your teammates, friends, and colleagues that you think would benefit by learning personal branding!
GIFT CARD GIVEAWAY: Share this newsletter on Facebook and tag me in the post and I’ll enter you into a drawing for a $25 Mōdere gift card. I’ll announce the winner in next week’s newsletter.
