- Hey everybody, this is Roberto Blake of robertoblake.com,
helping you create something awesome today.
Today I wanna talk to you about personal branding.
Personal branding in my opinion
is more important than it's ever been
and I think that there's a lot misperceptions,
I think there's a lot of confusion around it.
There are people who are gonna tell you
"oh, don't be a Kardashian, hun."
or "hey, you're not a product, you're not a bottled water.
"You're being inauthentic, you're being fake.
"What do you want a personal brand for?"
You know, I had a personal brand when I was eight-years-old,
it was called being the kid with all the Nintendo games.
I had a personal brand when I was 17-years-old,
it was called being the smart aleck, cross-country captain.
You have a personal brand whether you leverage it or not,
whether you think you have one or not,
whether you want to be a Kardashian or not,
everybody has a personal brand 'cause everyone has a story
and it's a story that people choose to tell about you,
it's about whether you're going to help
dictate that narrative in an intentional way
that serves your higher purpose
or that you're gonna let other people paint
a narrative of you that probably is unflattering
or has nothing to do with who you think you really are.
Personal branding isn't about narcissism and ego and vanity,
I mean, I know there's some people
who must think that that's the case
if they're looking at Instagram profiles
of the most high-profile people in the world
but at its core, that's not really the point
and that's not necessarily an example
that scales to everybody else.
That's just painting in broad strokes
and we can do that all day about people
in any category, in any arena,
in any industry, in any demographic.
You could sit there and you could talk trash
on any one you want for any reason you want,
I just think that that's a waste of time.
Let's approach this differently,
let's reframe how you think about personal branding
and how you explain it to people.
From my point of view, your personal brand
is not only a combination of your reputation
and the story that you tell yourself,
I think it's also a matter of the body of work
that backs up that story,
that backs up that narrative, the evidence.
I think that social proof isn't about how many Twitter
or Instagram followers or YouTube subscribers
you happen to have, I think that social proof,
at the end of the day, is what you have to show people
in terms of something that either lends to your credibility
or to your authenticity, and again,
it's about showing your work.
In fact, one of my favorite books from this bookshelf
is the book Show Your Work by Austin Kleon.
I think that this is a really practical book
for you guys to read.
You can definitely find it in the description there
if you're looking for it,
but this is an important book because
I think it teaches valuable lessons
about the fact that demonstrating value
is important especially if you're going to ask
something of other people.
Building your personal brand is about establishing
the know, like, and trust factor.
If people don't know you, then how do they buy from you
or how do they hire you?
If people don't necessarily like you, why would they?
And if they don't trust you, again,
there's a lot of anxiety in making any kind of decision
if trust isn't there.
As for authenticity, if you don't want to be fake,
don't be fake.
Nobel idea, I know.
But in reality, it's really straightforward.
If you want to be authentic,
your personal brand is a great way to use that authenticity,
to attract the right relationships to you
and if authenticity is something that's really important
to you which it is for me,
there's another value to it
that you may not have considered.
Authenticity can attract the right relationships to you
and it can also keep people that are undesirable at bay.
When you're authentic and you're communicating your values,
your principles, the things that you are most interested in,
and you're being very straightforward about it,
again, people can make an informed decision
as to how much time and effort they want to invest with you.
When you're being fake about that with your agenda
instead of upfront about your agenda,
then people are making an uninformed decision
or sometimes they can sense that
and then it makes them uncomfortable with you.
There's nothing wrong with doing something
and having a specific intention
or a motive behind it if you're clear and upfront
about that motive, then it's not ulterior,
it's not something under the surface,
it's something that you clearly stated.
If you said "hey, you know what,
"I'm actually really interested in meeting people
"that are successful because I want to learn from them
"and I want to interview successful people",
then people who don't have the confidence
and don't consider themself successful
won't ask you for an interview if you're upfront about it.
They won't waste their time and they won't waste your time.
That's how authenticity is both a funnel and a filter.
People who consider themselves successful
and have the confidence will approach you
and be like, "hey, you know what, I want to be
"on your podcast or I want to be interviewed
"and everything like that.
"I like your program and I think I have value
"to offer your viewers or your listeners."
So again, building your personal brand
is about acting intentionally with regard
to how you communicate, how you story tell,
how you network, how you build your work,
how you show your work.
That's all it comes down to at the end of the day.
And again, a lot of the people who are telling you that
"oh, personal branding is packaging yourself
"and it's being fake", those are the same people
that if you interview with them for a job,
are gonna tell you to package yourself and you be fake.
They're not gonna want your opinion in the job interview
of how you really feel.
They're going to want you to dress
to the standards of the company and that company's culture.
They're not gonna want you to dress
in what you're comfortable with.
They're not going to want to care
about your individuality or your style,
but again, these are the same people
who are gonna tell you that if you build a personal brand,
then you're being fake
and you're being polished and you're being packaged
when the reality is that they are probably
a little bit more packaged and polished than they would be
if they were being truly authentic
and if they were worried more about communicating
who they are as a person versus what they think
is gonna be respected for someone in their position
or with their job title.
And again, I do understand that I'm speaking
somewhat broadly there but again,
that is what the majority of the criticism is
whenever anyone advocates for personal branding
or building a personal brand.
The things that they attack are just talk about vanity,
they talk about inauthentic, and they talk about packaging
but again, if you actually look at their own actions,
then you can see that there might be a thread
of hypocrisy there in most cases.
The reason I'm advocating for you to build
your personal brand and that I give a lot of advice on this
is I've seen how widely successful it's been
for other people and not just myself.
Remember, four, five years ago,
you had no idea who I was.
Two years ago, three years ago, I was not a public speaker,
building my personal brand, showing my work,
showing my reputation, showing my abilities, my skills
and what I feel that I'm educated about
made a huge difference in the outcomes of my life,
my career, and it grew my business
and I believe it can give you similar opportunities
if you do it intentionally and if you do it
from a place of authenticity and if you do it
from a place of self awareness more than anything.
So, that would be my advice in you
building your personal brand and that would be my message
to people who don't believe in it.
Question of the day, who are you?
What's your story?
What value do you offer to people?
Let me know in the comments section.
Who knows, maybe you can offer value to me
or somebody else in this community.
In any case, it'll be just interesting
just to see how many different stories we get
form different people with different perspectives
and different skills.
Like this video if you like it, don't forget to subscribe,
check out the other awesome content on the channel.
As always you guys, thanks so much for watching
and don't forget, go out there
and create something awesome today.
Don't forget, show your work.
Take care.
(chill music)