7 Secrets to Growing and Scaling Your Personal Brand

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Dennis and Dave Carroll of Dope Marketing at the Commitment Summit

Did you know what the most important number is in the world?

It’s 1440. Why? Because that’s how many minutes you have during the day and if you spend it intentionally, you can fly. 

So if your goal is to become a speaker and whether you are a newbie, an agency, a business, or whatever it is, make sure that the minutes you’re spending are going towards your goal. 

When you are trying to build your brand, you might be thinking that the only way to be known is by going to Mastermind Classes and connecting with people that are at a level where you can challenge yourself to do much better just because you see other people just like you and what they are doing and you tend to believe that you can also achieve the same level of success too if you just follow people that are already in that process–on that path. 

But what we tend to forget is we are all experts in our area and the best way to build your authority, you would think is by you going more on camera and sharing what you know, and building forces and all this but I’ll tell you the secret is actually

Interviewing someone that has a much bigger audience than you

Have you heard of the phrase, “You are who you surround yourself with”?. 

You have to interview other people that have a bigger audience than you, that is respected by the people that you want to be able to buy from you. 

So a lot of people are making messages that are direct such as, “Hey, buy from me. Here’s my course, Here’s my program.” but if you actually make videos with the people that your target audience respects, we call that Inception and that is one level up where you get better reach. You have people who speak better, that have more authority. 

So when you put yourself around the right people, go to the right events, make the right connections, get the right people interviewed, or simply start making enough content to get it in front of the right people, you will get results. 

So, who is that person you can make content with so that communicates what you do in a much stronger way without you ever needing to say it?

Inception is you plant that idea in their head and below is how you make it happen:

1. Create your Topic Wheel

Topic Wheel 1 1

So on the topic wheel, you are the hub, your products, and services at the very center. That’s what you are selling. 

The spokes are what really provide the power in the wheel and those are connecting topics. 

So we like to have six spokes. So what are three things that are professional and three things that are personal? 

And a lot of people think, “Well, it’s just business. I just, you know, help publishers drive more leads through Facebook ads or something”. Maybe that’s what you actually do, but people buy based on your why.

2.  Make a connection with your audience via your Content

Most people don’t understand this, but if you look at the people who are really successful in your niche, whoever the LIGHTHOUSES are, what percent do you think it is the content you see from these people that you respect that has nothing to do with their business? 

Let me tell you, it’s 80-90%. Why is their content 80% not even related to their business? Are they just wasting their time? 

What they are trying to do is make a connection with the audience. 

Need help with Content? Here is a course in Content Marketing that will help you get started!

Too busy to figure out what content will resonate for you and your business? Here is our Content Engine Package designed for busy people like you. 

3.  Figure out who your LIGHTHOUSE is

4.  Think about who you want to approach

Not saying that you go to the conference and just go and stop people at what they’re doing, but think about who you want to approach.

Like who would be a LIGHTHOUSE for you? Is it that you would need an introduction for who you would like to have on your podcast or you can make that happen? 

And you might say, “Well, I don’t have Dennis’ network, or I’m not going to all these different conferences. This doesn’t apply to me. I don’t have the interviewing skills to be able to do this, or I don’t have the friends of friends”. or “I don’t know these other people compared to Dennis as he is a well-known speaker. So it’s very easy for him to just walk up to these people”.

But it’s not even necessary because all you need to do is literally just reach out and say hi. 

5. Figure out your Message to Audience Match 

Social media is what you put behind after you figure out your message to audience match. 

Why are you sending those emails? 

Are you doing it because you feel like you’re obliged to or are you doing it because you know how to make it work?

A lot of people are sending emails to their whole list. Don’t get into the habit of sending your whole list an email.

Remember that there’s somebody else on the other side of every email that you send, it’s a real person with real pain, real frustrations, real fears, real concerns, real goals, real dreams, and aspirations. So we wanna make sure that we’re talking to people right where they’re at. 

A lot of marketers make the mistake of sending their whole list of emails. It’s not enough that you have people on your list that will bring you some conversions, but ultimately your emails should serve the population that it meant to serve.

We’re supposed to be taking care of people and really serving them. So find out where they’re at and make sure we have a message audience match. 

Once you figure out that message-to-audience match, which you can do through email, you can do it through dollar-a-day strategy targeting. 

Not sure how the Dollar-a-Day Strategy works? Here is a course on Facebook for a Dollar a Day that will keep you up to speed so you can enjoy driving Traffic and Conversions For as Low as $1 Per Day!

 6. Start segmenting and getting the right message to the right person at the right time at the right phase of awareness under the right conditions.

ACC Funnel 2020

And now we’re talking to people where they’re at. 

How do you think social media and email work together? 

So social media and email go hand in hand for most clients. They’re already sending emails. They’re already running ads. They’re already spending a lot of money to acquire a lead, so to speak.

But they’re wondering why their emails are not working and frankly, what’s happening is they’re trying to bring leads in. So you might bring some leads in from social media and then they just sort of fall off the face of the earth within a month or two because you don’t have any kind of nurturing sequences. You don’t have any of the stuff that’s really required to keep that conversation, going to keep people front and center with your brand to understand that you really do understand their problems and that’s the key to the whole thing with email. 

When people believe that you understand their problems, they automatically assume that you have a solution.  

Start from the beginning of where it is.

You start at the end. Start with the end in mind. What are you trying to do to help them convert? Where is your conversion? Then you work backward from that to find the beginning point of what you need most in the conversion to actually get to know your customers and get their attention.

If you wanna know if you’re hitting inbox, look at your Open average rate. If you are at 16% to 26%, this is super low. You don’t wanna be there. Shoot for the forties, fifties, and sixties, because if you’re in the average, remember the average person has a bunch of stuff going to spam.

So that’s the first thing you should check if it’s not in a good place is if:

  • we’re sending too much, too fast
  • we’re sending things too often. People are getting tired of it
  • we have too high of a bounce rate
  • we’re not getting enough opens
  • people just aren’t responding well to what we’re sending out there

Common reasons why that is so:

  • We are using spammy words or phrases or too many links
  • We use Bitly and LinkSnipr as a link shortening in your email. 

Bitly has a bad reputation. And if you put a Bitly link in your email and in your text, then you are guilty by association. Your email may be beautiful. It may be according to all best practices. It may be speaking right to that ideal client. But if you have a Bitly link in it, you’re not going to be able to find out because it will not be served. It will not be put in front of people, kind of like Facebook that if they don’t like the links that you put in there, they don’t like what you’re putting in your Facebook ad, they’re just not gonna deliver it. 

And if they think people aren’t gonna respond well to it, they’re just not gonna spend your ad money. They’ll charge you way more.

With email, it’s the same thing. If the email algorithm says this isn’t gonna work very well, then they’re just not going to put it in front of people because it is real estate that’s so valuable as well.

Want to learn more about how you can drive leads through your funnel? Here is an Office Hour Episode that discusses How to Use Interactive Video to Drive Leads Through Your Funnel

7. Have all the conversations happening all at the same time.

Converse with people everywhere. You can, wherever they prefer. Everybody has their own preferred method of communication. 

In Summary,

Why do you think people spend all this money to come to events like conferences and conventions instead of just watching them on YouTube and other places? 

It’s all about the connections and the distilling of the information and putting it in perspective like the speakers and making a difference. 

So when you co-create content with other people, repurpose it with the help of your VAs into blog posts, YouTube videos, press releases, Instagram reels, and all of these other kinds of content.

The beauty is when you co-create content with people who are high authority, you don’t even need to have any of the expertise. 

Don’t make the mistake of just sitting there and listening, because it’s fun to sit there and listen. It’s safe but that is not where you can harness the full value. 

Go ahead and just step out and make a request. Go ahead and say something. Go ahead and share something. 

Need help with how to grow your personal brand exponentially? Here is a course in Personal Brand that will help you out.

This and all other episodes of Office Hours are now available in the Academy.

Dennis Yu
Dennis Yu
Dennis Yu is co-author of the #1 best-selling book on Amazon in social media, The Definitive Guide to TikTok Ads.  He has spent a billion dollars on Facebook ads across his agencies and agencies he advises. Mr. Yu is the "million jobs" guy-- on a mission to create one million jobs via hands-on social media training, partnering with universities and professional organizations.You can find him quoted in major publications and on television such as CNN, the Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, NPR, and LA Times. Clients have included Nike, Red Bull, the Golden State Warriors, Ashley Furniture, Quiznos-- down to local service businesses like real estate agents and dentists. He's spoken at over 750 conferences in 20 countries, having flown over 6 million miles in the last 30 years to train up young adults and business owners. He speaks for free as long as the organization believes in the job-creation mission and covers business class travel.You can find him hiking tall mountains, eating chicken wings, and taking Kaqun oxygen baths-- likely in a city near you.