The Art of Authenticity: How to Define Your Personal Brand Ep. 108

But to the absolute essence of my personal brand is expressed through the phrase of radical authenticity. I am radically authentic. I'm completing myself getting in a lot of trouble. It's not all good and, and doesn't just often stand out, but it's truly who I am and I believe and standing out, speaking up and being radically authentic.

Welcome to FASCINATING ENTREPRENEURS. How do people end up becoming an entrepreneur? How do they scale and grow their businesses? How do they plan for profit? Are they in it for life? Are they building to exit these in a myriad of other topics? Will be discussed to pull back the veil on the wizardry of successful and FASCINATING ENTREPRENEURS. My book, RELENTLESS is now available everywhere Books can be bought online, including Amazon and BarnesAndNoble.com. Try your local indie bookstore too. And if they don't have it, they can order it. Just ask them. The reviews are streaming in and I'm so thankful for the positive feedback as well as hearing from people that my memoir has impacted them positively. It is not enough to be resilient. You have to be relentless. You can go to TheRelentlessBook.com for more information. Thank you so much. Marina Byezhanova is the co-founder of the personal branding agency, Brand of a Leader. We talk about how to define a personal brand and how to put it into play, and how she's building a multi-million dollar business with zero full-time employees. Now, let's get right into it.

So a personal brand consists technically of a couple of things, but really it's an expression of who you are deeply. But in marketable terms. And catchy and punchy terms consists of two things. One, it's an angle, a unique angle, and two associations that your name evokes in people's minds.

Very interesting. So how do you get to the essence of developing a brand?

It really consists through a deep process of introspection. And you know, it's interesting because personal branding and corporate branding are similar in many ways, but they're also different because in personal branding it is an entirely inside out process. It's not market research, and here's the gap and here's how I'm going to position myself in corporate branding. Yes. For some of the marketing we do in personal branding, yes. But for expressing what your personal brand is, it's a process of introspection. It's deep dive, it's understanding what makes you, you. Choosing from a ton of things that make you, you that are unique. Choosing one, putting a marketing spin on it, and then finding a way to market it to build visibility.

I'd love to have you talk more about that, because I saw your workshop in San Francisco and you. Presented this idea and this step so beautifully, like masterclass on Presenting Zone Genius. Can you give us a couple of those slides that you talked about?

Of course. So you go, as I mentioned, through a process of introspection to figure out, well, this is going to be my angle. That consists of looking at all of the highs and lows, the most significant moments of your life, and perhaps catching a pattern and saying, "okay", that's what I'm going to build my brand around. That's going to be my angle. It consists of looking at your core values and saying, "This is really expressing who I am very deeply." Let me build something around it. For some people, it's their crazy, outlandish personality that really expresses who they are. Whatever you land on, it has to really encapsulate your true essence so succinctly that when somebody tells about you and says, "oh, Natasha Miller, that's her brand," and just maybe adds the byline. Without knowing you, people feel like they almost know you. That is the beauty, so that is what it takes. It sounds easier than it is. You go through the process of digging very deeply, but that is the outcome that you're hoping for.

I'd love for you to share an example of one or two of those exercises and the outcomes that you've done.

Of course, it's always so hard to choose because we have so many and we grow so emotionally connected to those examples on those clients as well. One example I can give you is a fellow EO member from, uh, EO Canada, member leader Kate Holden. As we went through the process of, uh, deep dives with her, that is our process that we take clients through three deep dives and farewell, structured what came through and what was shining. More than everything else, although there were so many incredible things about her, is that she's over the top in the most incredible way, but she's over the top. Everything she does, how she thinks, how she experiences life, and so for her, we came up with the angle of one level extra. And what became incredible Natasha is, well, it really resonated with her and she loved it, but it's really incredible how quickly people around her adopted it too. All of a sudden we started seeing that people would tag her on social media and put hashtag one little extra, and then months later we noticed that people would use it in sentences. Kate, thank you for that one level extra event you put together. No, you know, it's a turn of phrase that we invented, we came up with, but it became, because again, it was so on brand, it was so on point. People started using it in sentences.

Yeah, so I know Kate and visually she is one level extra for certain. But it's interesting because in the group that we were in, she was subdued and quiet. And of course we all show up different ways for different places. So visually you can see Kate is one level extra. I don't wanna explain it because I want people to go and, and Google her, her business, her brand, the way she looks. Internally she's such a sweet, genuine, caring, wonderful person. And the, the Kate I know is quite subdued, so maybe I haven't interacted with the one level extra version of herself because of the places that I've met with her in person.

And that is one of the beautiful pieces of the process that we take the clients through, is we dig deep and we dig things out of them. Right. Um, so as we were having those deep dives with Kate, for example, you know, we would be in an Entrepreneur's Organization learning event together, and then would have a follow up call and she would say yes. You know, those seven books that they mentioned that got all of them. I'm already halfway through Like, how did that happen? Or, you know, there would be an event and there was always. Extra mentality, right? So not necessarily extra in self-expression in certain ways, but in personality, in mentality, and way of thinking. And so again, that's the goal. The goal is to go deep. So if you are thinking of building your personal brand, one of the maintain is to not only look at what's on surface. Sometimes yes, it's low hanging fruit, and sometimes it's so obvious about you and it's going to be that. But the deeper you dig, the more meaningful that expression becomes.

The next question, I'm not sure if you'd be able to answer or willing to answer, but, but maybe you will. Let's find out. Is there an example of a bad or not so great personal brand?

Anything that expresses not who you are, but what you do. And that sometimes becomes, you know, a contentious point for us with clients that are, let's say, looking to really are very passionate about their business. We all are, but really are focused on growing the business. And so they want the brand, their personal brand, to represent the vertical of the business, to represent what the business is. That is a mistake, that is not a personal brand. That is you becoming a spokesperson. For your business, great. That's there's place for that as well. That is not a personal brand. So a personal brand needs to express who we are, not what we do. So any advice that you see online of I help X Achieve Y, that's a marketing position in which is, again, there's place for that too. That's not a personal brand. A personal brand expresses who we are regardless of any pivots that we go through in our life and what our vocation.

And what do you say about people that haven't gone through a personal branding exercise? Does everyone have a personal brand even though they haven't focused on it? So I'll ask you that one question without the end yet.

I am curious about the end.

I know.

No, I do not believe that everyone has a personal brand. Same as not every business has a brand. There are businesses who did not go through the intentional exercise of building a brand, and yet it built, but it's not everyone, right? There are businesses. It's just, it's not a brand. It's same in personal brand. And there are people that will land on a clear brand for themselves without being intentional. It just develops. And for some people it does. Vast majority, no. It takes that intentional process of developing it.

And who is the best candidate for having and developing a personal brand? What kind of people?

I'm biased. Right in favor of the work that we are doing at Brand of a Leader, because really I think that it's anybody who wants to have a voice and scale the reach of their voice. It's anybody who wants to either have increased visibility or wants to have a platform to scale the reach of a message, right? Anyone? Um, for some people that means becoming an, I know Instagram influencer, lifestyle influencers monetize in that. That's not our audience. For us at Brand of a Leader, it's Gen X entrepreneurs, which shows that very intentionally. From day one of the business, they zero the business.

I don't remember what I'm,

You are.

OK.

You are, it's, you know, entrepreneurs in their forties, fifties who are successful in what they do, but they typically come to us and they want to build a personal brand, not because they're looking for leads for their business, which is also a reason, but it's not the only reason. They want to express themselves with more clarity, have more clarity into what their voice really represents, and they want to have a platform. They want to make an impact. So for us, that is the best candidate to build a personal brand because it's people who want to make an impact. And what can be more inspiring than that?

Have you ever thought that you should write a book, that you should write the story of her life to help other people learn from your experience? Please go to memoirsherpa.com and learn how I can help you write, figure out your publishing path and market your story, your memoir, to a best seller status. So switching to the business itself. I'm working on a three year vivid vision plan that leads to our BHAG, and I wanna know what you think your business would look like in 2026. If you give that a moment to think, will it have scaled and grown exponentially? Will it kind of be excellent work at, you know, a similar level? What do you see?

Absolutely exponential growth as it has been so far. And we're not going to slow down. We want to be the number one personal branding agency for Gen X entrepreneurs globally. We'll measure that by being number one in Google search unless Google gets replaced, which had GPT, and then that's what's going to come up as an answer. What's the best personal branding agency for Gen X entrepreneurs? And that's going to be us. So that's number. Number two, I'm planning to have a book published in the space. So that is number two. We're going to continue doing our one-on-one work with clients. Because it develops our expertise, it develops further refines our methodology. But we're going to have a plethora of other tools, such as online courses and things that are available at scale, but we'll never completely divert away from that one-on-one work. It is the most inspiring thing that I've ever done in my.

What is a challenge that you guys are facing as a small business at you as an entrepreneur right now? I really like to share vulnerabilities with our listeners because there's something happening that is not, that's a challenge right now in your business. I don't know what it is. I have my own. What's happening for you today?

So many I'm very comfortable sharing vulnerably and, you know, as proud as I am of so many things, there are of course things that are hard as well. Number one is before launching Brand of a Leader, I had another business that was, you know, my 10 year old business, which crashed and burnt during recession, completely crashed and burnt. And that, that does a true number on your ego, right? So now as I'm developing a Brand of a Leader, it is growing exponentially. It's inspiring, there is nonetheless that sense of failure. You know, not only loss, but failure and impatience. Because as fast as we're growing, we're not where the other business was after 10 years, certainly. And that makes me feel incredibly impatient. That makes me feel restless. And I can't enjoy the success because I keep feeling, you know, but when am I going to be here, but when I'm going to be there? So there are other issues too, but this is of course one of them. You know, everything that's in our head. Typically becomes the biggest issue.

Yeah. Thank you for sharing that. How old is Brand of a Leader.

Just over two years old.

Okay. Well, we'll talk in 2026 and see if you are where you were at 10 years, at 6 years. Okay. And then what is the strategy that you guys are focusing on this year to continue the growth of your business?

So one of our strategies behind building, Brand of a Leader was to build a 100% no employee. This is something that became a dream of mine. Before I knew I was going to crash and burn on the other business, just read a book. It came on my radar and I felt This is me. This is for me.

Wait, what book?

It is 1,000,001 Person Business by Elaine Pofeldt, who is by the way, harnesses ghost writer. I read that book, it fascinated me. It was on my radar. And then as I started building this new business with my co-founder, I said, that's what I want. I want a network, global network. Our freelancers and contractors, no employees on payroll. Nobody's, you know, quite quitting because they can just, you know, loudly work on something else. There's none of that. So that became a big goal. Within two years, we've built a network that we're continuing to build. We have our contractors across the globe. They're fantastic and phenomenal, better than we could have envisioned. But how do you build the culture now with people who have a lot of other engagements? They love the work we're doing, they prioritize it because it's so much cooler to work on stuff for inspiring entrepreneurs across the world, and then write in some, you know, boring content somewhere else or doing something. But our strategy and goal is to create a very unique culture that we're working on this year that still brings a sense of belonging in unity to freelancers. Because even though somebody is a freelancer, we still all on a human level want those things. And we believe that by doing that as part of our strategy, we will also stand out and have this big goal, Natasha, of winning an award for being the best place, one of the best places to work. With no employees, so having freelancers and contractors, but winning that award for being the best place to work.

I want you to listen to the podcast episode with the gal in Canada that owns the Company Thigh Society. And the reason why I'm saying this is that when I met her maybe five years ago, she had a side hustle with this business and it was doing about a million dollars in revenue. She wasn't sure she was gonna continue. Fast forward. During the pandemic last year, I reached out to her, her business is doing 10 million in revenue. She quit her job. She has zero employees, so I'll send you that, but it's Thigh Society.

We connect it. We connected off of your LinkedIn post. You posted something on LinkedIn.

Oh my gosh.

She comment and said, somehow I noticed maybe it was in her violin or something, that she was building a model like that. I sent her an invitation to connect. She said, "oh my god, personal branding for Gen X entrepreneurs. That's me." And we started speaking and it was thanks to your post on LinkedIn. How incredible is that?

Okay. I'm having a glow up moment right now. Thank you so much for that.

Thank you.

But it can be done. And I'm wondering, you know, for myself, I would love to consider that because the burden that I felt before the pandemic in a business that went to zero, right? Because I, we produce events. Nobody could leave their house. I had a million dollar, payroll per year, pre pandemic, and it was a huge burden. But I also feel like I was proud of hiring people and being part of the fabric of their life. But things have changed and the pride associated with having full-time employees, it's kind of dissipating because not all those full-time employees actually wanna be a full-time employee. So I need to reverse engineer my own thought process. So thank you for that

Yeah, it's very interesting. It's a very interesting conversation. So first, there are those notions of what it should be like, right? And we are judged on our revenue in the business. We're judged on the number of employees, how many offices do you have, right? All those things before. And now some of them have changed, not all of them, but be gets very interesting questions around culture and being able to re-engineer what culture is all about. And I think it's, we're a business owner a challenge is always fascinating.

The last question I wanna talk to you about is how having developed a personal brand can align itself with better and more profitable speaking engagements and such. Can you speak to that?

Absolutely. It's transformational on so many levels because you are able to market yourself a lot more effectively and stand out, right? So in order to attract opportunity, we have to market ourselves. That's just, that is what it is. Some of us like it, some of us loaded, but that's what we do. When we have very clear positioning, it really help people also who don't like the spotlight and are uncomfortable with putting themselves out there. So then when they have a clear and exciting angle, you know, that's what one of our clients said to us. She said, now I have a purpose to share in my story. And I don't feel that. I'm just like, here, "look at me." "Look at me." "Listen to it." I have a message and look for her. It's attracted incredible opportunity, including she's in final discussions for a TV series with that angle. Before that she was completely behind, you know, closed,

"oh my gosh."

Closed doors.

I was gonna guess that that was Stephanie Camarillo. But its not probably.

No somebody else. So yes, it attracts a lot. It attracts journalists as well, because journalists on the lookout for thought leaders, but thought leaders that again, stand out. Right? So it's attracted, in my case, I mean Fast Company, Success Magazine, I mean Wall Street Journal, so many opportunities without having to pay. PR is expensive, right?

I know.

Cost a lot. So it attracts, instead of us having to knock on doors.

So do you have your personal brand defined as the leader of Brand of a Leader?

Yes. And it took me a little bit of time to land. I kept saying, you know, it's one of those typical ones, right, for everyone except for yourself. But the absolute essence of my personal brand is expressed through the phrase of radical authenticity. I am radically authentic. I'm completely myself, getting me in a lot of trouble. It's not all good and, and doesn't just often stand. But it's truly who I am, and I believe in standing out, speaking up, and being radically authentic. That is my personal brand.

For more information, go to the show notes where you're listening to this podcast. Wanna know more about me, go to my website OfficialNatashaMiller.com. Thank you so much for listening. I hope you loved the show. If you did, please subscribe. Also, if you haven't done so yet, please leave a review where you're listening to this podcast now. I'm Natasha Miller and you've been listening to FASCINATING ENTREPRENEURS.