Have Uncompromising Values When Building Your Brand

People contemplate over their brand position in the market, especially with the advent of so many social media platforms, and tools.

Realistically, the creative direction people can take, and where they can deploy their knowledge, insights and wisdom can number in any infinite combination, and so… people underestimate the amount of creative freedom has been made available in the age of the Internet.

It’s not always obvious where you should dedicate resources and time, because it’s not always obvious what people will like, as mass appeal isn’t always congruent with where you want to position yourself among a sea of influencers who focus on various audience niches.

Whether you focus on comedy, business, motivation, fashion, entertainment, and so forth. It’s not like we’re at a shortage of choice, but rather… a shortage of influencers who have enough conviction in their ideas to fully actualize their thoughts and ideas in a creative medium that’s digestible to a global audience.

In a sense, your job is to attract the right people to read, listen, or view your content, which is harder than it looks on the surface.

The best way to win an audience is to represent yourself as honestly as possible, so they can follow your narrative, or ascension to global relevance.

The platform you create has to be driven by values that you can believe in, and it has to be representative of who you are.

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Never compromise on your values

I’ve faced criticism on countless occasion from various people, whether they mean well, or whether they’re out to haunt me, it’s really irrelevant to me.

I really want you to double down on your values, and then externalize that with your communication, because you’re building a relationship with people across the world with the words you write, or the thoughts you communicate.

So, when you publish something, you’re not publishing for the sake of publishing, but really spreading the ideas or thoughts that might motivate the right people to live a better life, to be entertained, to be informed.

Basically, the only differentiator is your ability to connect with your audience, and when you have their best interest at heart, people are more motivated to listen to the words you publish regardless of publishing medium.

It’s not a matter of whether you’re the most likeable, because this isn’t a popularity contest. It’s not like there’s a shortage of eyeballs chasing after new content every day, but rather a shortage of people who know how to connect with their audience, and present something of meaningful and lasting value.

This is harder than it sounds, because people are chasing after metrics, or they’re chasing after other celebrities, or they’re trying to sound like someone else, when in reality… they’re better off sounding like themselves, while they weave the fabric of their existence thoughtfully into the lives of others.

You have to build your platform carefully, to build trust thoughtfully, and without compromising your values. So, whenever you communicate, people know you’re not kidding around, or you’re not purely driven by the amount of attention you get.

When you communicate, the words you use have to be representative of who you are. That you’re intentional with the words or thoughts you share, as opposed to the amount of money you’re about to make, or the amount of adoration a post is about to generate.

Everybody has to be motivated by something of deeper substance, because people with substance are the ones who build meaningful brands, whether personal or via a business they’ve created.

Your personal brand has to be about yourself, about the things you represent, and those ideas have to be shared at scale. Whether they like who you are in the present, or who you might become, or who you have been… the delivery is more important than ever before.

Ironically, it’s more important than ever… to present who you are to your audience. Some transparency goes a long way, perhaps more so than many other things. If you’re a little abrasive, it’s okay, if you’re a bit pompous, that's okay too. Everybody has a bit of a personality quirk, and it comes through in the way they communicate. Masking your true self becomes difficult, so instead… why not represent who you are?

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If your authentic and have values all the better!

People miss-use their platform once they scale up, which is a challenge for many who ascend higher and higher among the ranks of influencers. It’s a matter of understanding your values before you proceed to present who you are, because if you don’t have sound values and principles for how you conduct yourself at scale, things become way more complicated.

People have an evil side and a good side. Both sides come out, and so working on yourself, and embracing who you are, whether you’re introverted or extroverted, or you have weird ideals that might not make sense to other people, or your personality sucks, or you’re way too pretentious in how you present yourself. All of those personality traits whether good or bad will eventually come through.

All of those things can be worked on, which means you can come prepared when you’re ready to present your ideas. Meaning, you’ve worked out who you are, and why your message matters to people, before you scale up.

This is important, because if you’re not working on yourself before you present yourself… the outcome is going to be very bad.

Imagine swimming buttnaked in a swamp, and that’s how bad things could turn out when you’re not presenting the truth, or “who you actually are.”

There are countless examples of people backtracking or changing the narrative around who they are, but they’re doing it when the spotlight is on them, which means they’re getting exposed, for what they have become as a consequence of becoming more famous, or wealthy.

Ironically, when people get exposed, they behave in any number of ways, but of all the ways things could potentially go wrong is when the spotlight is shown bright, and you’re on stage naked, for all the things you actively do, or the things you do, that negatively affect those around you.

Basically, when you have a loud voice there’s bound to be externalities both good and bad. What people don’t pay attention to is the way their thoughts or ideas might affect their audience, and so they don’t take much accountability in the way they behave as they scale their exposure.

It’s why I preach having values, character and authenticity beforehand. Imagine the scope of responsibility you might have down the road with all the lives you impact, and all of a sudden, the role of being a public figure sounds more like heightened responsibility and less like ruling the world.

You can’t turn back the clock, or change who you are at the last minute with some miracle whip hat trick to suddenly make yourself “sound better” or “look better.”

People who have attempted to recuperate their brands or attempt to change the narrative around what’s said about them rarely win the public argument.

Ask any PR department what it’s like to deal with a public relations issue when a CEO gets busted for tax evasion/fraud, or what it’s like to deal with a sudden product recall because of safety issues. No matter how much you try to spin, or try to make a nasty trait look good, people will recognize your biggest character flaw, and exploit that negative trait, because you’re the big bad whale, and when they sense you’re bleeding they’ll move swiftly to take you down.

So, when people find an opening or weakness that seems exploitable, they will take you straight to the cleaners, because that’s human nature.

It’s why you have to work these issues out ahead of time, because if what you’re presenting doesn’t sound a whole lot like who you are, and who you are isn’t that good to begin with…. well you’re not building a valuable brand, you’re setting yourself up for public humiliation, which is what happens to many, many highly successful people who have big brands.

It’s why people no longer trust certain companies who manage significant sums of capital, or it’s why people stopped shopping at certain fashion retailers, or it’s why people stopped tuning into certain news anchors.

Can any of this be prevented?

The public relations disaster is preventable when you work on your character ahead of time and have uncompromising values around what you’re actually attempting to accomplish.

Over the past five-years, prior to ever publishing on LinkedIn, I built a powerful brand for stock market research. It’s why I was rated so high, and it’s why people are willing to give my ideas and thoughts heightened attention in comparison to the countless quantity of stock market pundits or thought leaders on topics relating to stocks, economics and technology.

I made it a point to tell people the truth and have factual evidence to support my stance with uncompromising vigor. I made it a point to explain why this stock would either go up or down in value, and I never hid behind excuses, nor have I ever apologized when things go wrong.

People want to know what’s happening next, and so I made it a point to tell people the truth, and explain why I thought certain market trends, or certain companies would explode in value while other companies will either fail, or the stock price will perform poorly.

Now, I’m not saying every prediction turned out to be correct, but I kept a very good score column (around 70% accuracy on predictions), which gave me more leverage each time I presented my research and stance on publicly traded companies.

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Imagine a scorecard before you publish

That scorecard is your brand equity that’s tied to the end outcome, or end result it might have on your audience.

So, if you’re a comedian the most desirable outcome is making people laugh, and when you’re consistent at this, you win. If you’re a business coach, your job is to make people better managers or business owners. If your ideas contribute to those businesses, you win. If you’re a fitness expert then the outcome is to make people more healthy, and if your audiences becomes healthier, you win.

It’s really simple, every public figure has to work towards an end outcome for their audience. If the audience realizes that end outcome that’s what substantiates your value. It’s what builds trust on your public resume, and it’s what builds brand equity.

I’m not saying that you’re going to be some miracle worker that appeals to everyone with what you publish, nor will they like your approach or how you deliver your messaging. It’s not always going to appeal to everyone, but if you put in the work to make yourself more presentable and have an end outcome that’s desirable for your end audience, they’ll respect you on the basis of merit despite the criticism they might have.

Authenticity, having a strong value system, and demonstrating responsibility in the eyes of the public builds real and lasting authority.

Be prepared for the worst case scenario

In the age of the Internet where everything is scrutinized, and whatever hidden skeletons can be uncovered due to some cyber-criminal looking through your computer. Those secrets will eventually get uncovered, and it's really hard to prevent this from occurring.

It’s better to operate on the assumption that everything is being scrutinized. Both the public and private, because people really are that nosy and intrusive.

It’s funny when famous people, executives or politicians wake up the next morning to find their personal data or personal information exposed for everyone to look at.

Like, they never thought information could actually escape, or become publicly known, but in an age where data is difficult to guard, or protect, it’s better to assume that you will get exposed.

Don’t think for one second that the world isn’t watching, or people are so ignorant and na?ve that they’re going to believe whatever false narrative you might present of yourself.

To be congruent, or honest is your best method of protecting yourself, so even if people were to expose who you are… show and tell was rather boring, because it’s not like you were ever hiding who you actually were.

Best of luck,

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