Building a personal brand as a startup founder.

“You can't build a reputation on what you are going to do.”- Henry Ford

Welcome back to my newsletter. I’m Matt, and today, we’ll be covering personal branding.

However, although you might know HOW to build a personal brand…

Knowing the reasons behind how it can help you...

?As well as arming yourself with the right knowledge...

Can help you potentially shortcut your growth to making it big, with a following that engages with your content.

Especially when you’re a founder of a new, budding startup, looking to make it big.

As usual, let’s get straight to it.

But first, let’s recap what a personal brand is.

So, a personal brand is the widely recognized perception of you.

Your identity.

How you’re seen through the eyes of other people.

That’s why, regardless of if they’ve actively worked on building one or not, everyone has a personal brand.

From your values and experience...

To your industry of expertise...

All of these things go towards building your profile, which impacts how you’re seen, online or offline.

And, although it’s just an overall representation of you, it can help you in many ways.

From getting a better, higher-paying job, to finding beta testers for your new SaaS product, to even attracting angel investors for your startup…

There’s a lot that you can get out of it, simply by sticking to it.

So, now that we've covered that...

Let's see how it can help.

Other than simply helping you grow, there are five things your brand can do for your fledgling startup:

1. Attract more business
2. Help you get investors.
3. Attract the right kind of talent.
4. Help you gain more customers.
5. Help increase your brand’s awareness.

Let’s explore how each of these happens, and then get into building a personal brand that can help you do just that.

So, firstly: Attracting more business.

Put yourself in the shoes of someone who wants to, say, work with a new startup.

You’ve got a few companies and each of them has a founder.

Now, when you want to go work with them, say on a corporate level, you’re going to want to know more about the people behind it.

Not just management, and the company’s brand values...

But how the founders and the C-level execs are.

What type of people they are, and what their attitude is.

And how are you going to do that? You’ll check out their social media.

LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook - wherever you can find them.

And, simply by looking at the content they post and how they engage with people...

You’ll be able to gauge what type of people they are.

“Okay, that makes sense. But how are investors going to be influenced by my brand?”

Well, when you’ve got a startup, there’s a lot of risk involved.

The business could fail. It could run out of cash.

Someone else could come out with something better, for cheaper.

When that’s the case, and you decide to invest, you’re not just investing in the idea.

You’re investing in the people behind that idea as well.

When you’re doing that, it’s even more important for you to know who’s behind it, what their experience is, what their values are, etc.

Why?

So you're sure you're investing in the right people.

The content they put out and the way they engage with their network in public is enough to help you decide if you should consider them.

You're going to be giving them your money, and being a part of their team, so isn't that the least you should do?

”Okay, I can agree with that. But it can’t possibly help me attract talent, right?”

It can.

Nowadays, when you’re looking for a job, you’re not just looking at the pay and the flexibility of work.

It’s also about the people you’re going to be working with, the work environment, the company culture, the relationship with management, etc that will impact where you choose to go.

There’s no point in getting paid a lot of money if you’re sacrificing your mental health trying to get the job done.

On the other hand, money isn’t going to be a MAJOR issue if you can connect with the values and ideals of the person behind the idea.

You’d rather be in a place where you’re appreciated, valued for who you are, and given the opportunity to show your true colors, as well as be compensated for it fairly.

And, if you communicate these things, you’ll be able to build a good team in no time.

A team that you want, and a team that wants to work with you.

And it's the same when it comes to customers.

People buy from people. Just like investors, you want to be able to trust the person you’re giving your money to.

That could be anything from a subscription to their software to purchasing a physical product.

And, having a proper personal brand makes it easy for people to form that connection.

When you’re interacting with your audience, posting content, and offering up value, it’ll show you’re active, and go beyond just wanting to sell your products.

It shows that you’re there.

That you’re present. That you care. That it’s not just about sales for you.

The relationship that you’ll have with your audience will help others feel that trust as well.

Sure, you might have a really good quality product, with amazing corporate branding.

However, you’re the person behind it. You’re the person people will most likely look to before making the decision.

And, the last thing: Help increase your brand’s awareness.

Suppose you decided to post about everything you’re doing.

Everything from your brainstorming session takeaways and the conversations you had with other startup founders…

To the things you tried and tested out and the experiments you conducted…

All of them are on your social media, in some way, shape, or form.

Simply doing that didn’t just help you build a following for yourself.

It helped you increase your brand’s awareness as well.

Talking about fair equity sharing between founders? You’re mentioning your brand.

Talking about problems you’re facing? You’re mentioning your brand.

Talking about company culture? You’re mentioning your brand.

As you’re focusing on building your authority and communicating value to your network…

You’re also exposing them to your brand.

I mean, you’re talking about what you’re up to, right?

You’re mentioning your struggles, problems, and wins at your startup as well, aren’t you?

“Uhh, Matt? Sounds kinda weird doing that. Why’d I talk about that stuff on a place like LinkedIn or Twitter?”

You want people to be able to relate to you, don’t you?

Do you want leads, customers, and investors without working outbound?

Do you want to be able to build an audience?

“Who doesn’t want to do that?”

Well, then it shouldn’t be weird. Building an audience, getting feedback, and sharing what you’re up to are only going to help you.

However, before you get to focus on relationship-building, engaging, posting, and all that good stuff…

Let’s just make sure that you know what to do.

So, you already know that your brand is important for you as well as your startup.

It’ll help your company leverage your authority, get inbound leads, and potentially grow more.

However, where do you start?

First, you define your niche and target audience.

Make sure you know who you want to talk to, and what you’re going to be talking about.

Next, put together your USP.

Having something different is what will help you in your journey to growing your business to new heights.

There are solutions out there that people already use. What’s so different about what you’re doing?

Figuring that out will also help you stand out from the crowd.

Thirdly, have a branding statement.

That way, whatever type of content you’re sharing on different social media platforms, you'll always be clear on:

• How you plan to serve your audience.
• Your target impact.
• What you’re doing.

One glance is all you’ll need to make sure your content aligns with what you want to achieve.

After doing that, decide what type of content you’re going for.

Do you want to share personal insights into your daily life?

Or would you rather stick to the business side of things?

From there, settle on a few topics that you’d like to be known for, and share what you learn.

That way, not only do you build a following, but you also present yourself as a knowledgeable authority figure on the selected few things you discuss regularly.

And finally, connect with leaders in your industry...

Sure, you’re doing all of this.

But, as you’re up and coming, you can further shortcut your journey by connecting with people that are either at the same stage as you or further in your journey.

Eg. If you're building a SaaS tool to revolutionize cold outreach, connecting with people using AI to help people hyper-personalize their emails in bulk would expand your network as you connect with people working towards a similar goal as you in your industry.

That way, you also get to be exposed to their network, while connecting with people that can potentially help you grow as well.

Before we wrap up…

Take all of this with a grain of salt.

At first, everything might seem overwhelming.

From having a branding statement to figuring out the content you’re supposed to be putting out…

You might decide to simply put this to one side and just focus on your business.

However, this is a process. A personal brand isn’t something that forms in just one day.

Rather, it’s something that takes shape over time and keeps changing.

So, start with focusing on consistency, and then move on to each of the elements.

Remember, there’ll be no point in all of this if you don’t focus on consistency.

Pick one platform, be it LinkedIn, Twitter, etc., and stick to it.

Then, as you get results, and explore different things, think about expanding to other platforms as well.

And, that’s it for today.

As usual, if there’s any way I can help you out, just let me know and we’ll see what we can work out.

Otherwise, this is enough to help you get started.

Until next time,

Keep building,