Make Your Personal Brand Work for You - Teacher: Cher Jones

I've been in the personal branding space for a long time. I mean, my first talk about personal branding was back in 2013, 99 problems and my brand ain't one. 

This is Cher Jones, a personal branding expert, corporate trainer, and speaker with over 25 years experience in communications, marketing, and broadcasting. She helps professionals excel in their roles. Elevate their careers and amplify their influence both in person and online. And in this episode of Useful Content, we drop right into the conversation on personal branding. No intro, no fluff. No waiting.

Because this is not the first time I've spoken with Cher in this long content format and the last time we spoke that way, the Clipse from that video got the most engagement of any video I had done up to that time. So, you know, Cher knows what she's talking about. And today we talk about why leadership of a company needs to lead with their personal brand.

I think that the leadership does need to put, their brands out there. They do need to lead because there is power in brands showing up the personal brand showing up as a collective, that brand advocacy is very real

We talk about the five KPIs of a well built personal brand.

because of your brand, because of the feeling, the stories and the expectations, People want to work with you.

They're excited about working with you. There's something about you that this alignment feels good. 

and in the conversation, she gets me to admit to something about LinkedIn that I've never said before publicly. 

Well, here's the thing, uh, here's the thing I have, I have tried desperately to not become 

Let's make useful content. 

as we're talking here, we'll figure it out. We'll start officially, but you could go ahead and talk.

Okay. Um, yeah, we're, when I think about my clients and what they want to accomplish, they're not trying to be superstars on LinkedIn. Yes, I have a set of clients that are, because it is, they're more in the individual creator, um, in that mindset and that space of, of they want to get that upper echelon of thought leadership, but the average corporate professional Who is crushing it in their jobs or wants to get to that next opportunity, wants to be seen and more visible.

LinkedIn's not necessarily their biggest focus. I would say, you know what, let me, let me even take a step further and say LinkedIn is not their plan. It's a part of their plan, but they're not just trying to build their brand on LinkedIn to get the stuff that they want. It's just a tool. And what's interesting with that is they're recognizing the power of their message.

So when they're showing up, when they are, when they are introducing themselves, what are they saying? What are they saying? So that people in the room are like, aha, I see you, I see your value, I see how I can work with you. I see what value you have to add and when you add that value and I know how to work with you.

And those are the things that. Are often lost when we're talking about personal branding, because, especially because we are people who are building our brands and leveraging LinkedIn heavily in our brand strategy. We, you know, in this, dare I say, incestuous space of creators and, and the thinking, when I say incestuous, it's more like around the, the thinking we all are in that same mindset.

And, um, most people don't see LinkedIn the way we say LinkedIn. It's just a tool where we are seeing it as a space that we live. So it's just different. Anyways, that was just a little tangent. Um, but I'm excited to have this conversation with you.

Well, here's the thing, uh, here's the thing I have, I have tried desperately to not become a LinkedIn person, like somebody teaching about LinkedIn while being on LinkedIn. I have really avoided that deliberately so much to the point where I tried to avoid content that can only be used on LinkedIn. And, um, uh, and I think I fee, I fee, when you say that it resonates with me, because it's a, it's a tool.

It's where I spend most of my time. And that's fine. Choose your platform. You can choose your distribution channel. And I learn a ton of things from LinkedIn, from people like you and others on the platform who are very, uh, much, uh, invested in building real relationships and sharing great value about what they do.

And of course you have a business as well. So you want to get the business too, but I, I, I mean, it's, it's really hard for me, like on LinkedIn, when I look now, where, you Like almost every other post is someone teaching you how to be good at LinkedIn while on LinkedIn. And I'm saying, am I like that? I've had these moments where I say, am I doing that?

Do I want to do this? And I've said, uh, I don't want to do this. I want to just, this is Elaine. This is what I'm going to say. I'm not even going to put LinkedIn in my bio. I, you know, I'm just going to ignore it totally and build the thing that I feel my company has to be and who I have to be on the platform.

I love that. And I went through that similar process as well, where at one point I was my, my career has evolved in, in this space. Anyways, it has evolved from. From being known and being recognized as a social media trainer where I was training all different things. And this was very early when they weren't as many platforms, but that's what I called myself.

That's what I considered myself. If I look back at my old screenshots of my profiles, that's what I was. And then I moved into more specifically, I've been in the personal branding space for a long time. I mean, my first talk about personal branding was back in 2013, 99 problems and my brand ain't one. And it is verified facts on YouTube.

You can find 

Yeah. Yeah.

And the one thing that I have been doing as well is disconnecting the linkedin trainer association because I am not a linkedin trainer. I train linkedin as a part in the sense of I train the people I work with. On how they can leverage LinkedIn, but I'm not rolling up as here. I'm going to train you on LinkedIn.

That's not my space. And there's a lot of people who already do that. And that's fantastic where I have stepped back to take a more holistic approach to personal branding because your brand is not LinkedIn. LinkedIn is a tool. And so what I want to use is my gifting around helping people master their message, really identify what their value is and give them a better framework for communicating that value on multiple mediums, whether it's face to face or online, whether it's through their work, these different exchanges that they have, because From a corporate professional standpoint, most corporate professionals don't care about being a creator.

Yeah.

That's not where they're at and they don't care about creating content or, or becoming an influencer, but they do want to influence and they do need to show proof of what they say they know what they say done and what they say they can do. So that's where content get in my world gets reframed as proof.

And it doesn't necessarily have to end up on LinkedIn. They can be creating a lot of internal content. And I'm seeing, uh, you know, even with internal podcasting becoming a thing and content that shows up in their projects, content that shows up in their presentations that will never see the light of day, but they're produced similarly, as far as the light on LinkedIn or anywhere else on social.

But they are getting circulated and they are also creating those same sort of benefits from the outside in on, on LinkedIn. They're getting it from the inside and sharing it, sharing those same types of content on internal platforms. That's creating that visibility. That's creating that trust. That's creating that value for them so that they can achieve their goals.

Because a lot of the LinkedIn advice is great if you want to be a thought leader and you want to. Get out there, but it doesn't help the average corporate leader who's trying to influence change, transformation, influence, adoption, influence a different direction or to stay the course or to attract talent that spending most LinkedIn will not help them do that.

Absolutely. Absolutely. Um, so, so my thoughts are on that. You made a very, very good point about using the things that we've learned on the platform for internal, um, uh, expansion of, of content and, you know, for internal marketing as my good friend, Carrie Ann Benton Stipson would say for internal marketing. And, um, What we've discovered to some people may not know this. Mostly clients that we get are not necessarily for one on one or personal, um, building content. They don't want, like you said, they don't really want to become creators. They might put their toes in if they're. That type of CEO. I just came off a call with the CEO of a company who we've been, we've been working with, and he was thinking about setting up his studio at the office. And we were just talking about him doing that and we're doing content for him, but we're doing a ton of content done for you for him because he needs that. Right. And then he's thinking about he, he, he wants to do his own content, but not every CEO is like that. In fact, the vast majority of CEOs actually resist that idea of having to create for themselves.

And, um, and I, and I, I love what you're saying in that there are different ways to approach this thing. And it's, it's not just. Become a creator or put all this content out on LinkedIn is also what am I doing to build this thing internally? Uh, and that's what the ethos of what you get at. What is my brand at work?

Exactly. And then going back to even that CEO conundrum, I think that the leadership does need to put, um, their brands out there. They do need to lead because there is power in brands showing up. And, um, and when I say that the personal brand showing up as a collective, that brand advocacy is very real, but there are ways to do it, especially when you can tie it back to your goals.

And then again, I think the other thing that we have to think about, which is a great move for that CEO thinking about putting a studio in, because if they have a strategy, a guesting strategy, for example, where they are going to go in the OPP world, other people's platforms and show up. And that is one of the best ways to.

Brand and expand, right? You're literally going out into other networks, amplifying your reach, and you're representing your company in such a way that again, we, when we see these personal brands at work, whether it's internal or external, again, it depends on, on that individual's goals, but. What we see is at work, when your brand is working for you, more people want to work with you.

More people want to work for you. More people want to refer you. More people want to learn from you and more people want to champion you. And those are my five KPIs that you can, you, you can bet money that when you are building your brand effectively, that's what happens.

So let's, let's get into those five KPIs that you just described. The five things that people need to look at if they want to measure

if their brand at work is working for them. So let me get the list again and we can start from number one and we go all the way down to five.

So I think it's really important that I, to, to define personal branding from my perspective and then go into the KPIs. So the, the personal branding is in my, in my eyes, I think that we all get a feeling about somebody and that's part of their brand. So their, their brand is influencing how we feel about them and the way we feel about somebody.

Influences the story that I'm going to tell myself about that person. And that story becomes an expectation, whether I've interacted with them or not, I'm already expecting, okay, this is going to be a professional podcast. This is worth my time because I've already seen all the great things that Juma is doing.

I've already seen how he shows up and I get a good feeling. And so your brand, your personal brand is the feeling that you're The stories and the expectations that other people have about you based off of their interactions with you, whether it's the first time or the hundredth time. And so with that as our foundation of, of where I'm leading us to your personal brand, the number one, the first KPI, it's not necessarily in an order is that because of your brand, because of the feeling, the stories and the expectations, People want to work with you.

They're excited about working with you. There's something about you that this alignment feels good. And you'll notice that as you build a brand, more people want you on their team. More people want to work with you for you to, to, to lead that way. They want you to, um, work alongside you and, and, and partner with you.

Or you're attracting talent. So people are seeing the type of leader that you are. And they, they align with that and they want to work for you. They want to be on your team. They want to follow you through a transformation. They want to follow you through and believe in you and believe on the other side of that change, whether it's implementing a new technology or an entirely new process or approach, they want to work for you as we get through that and do the work, right?

The next thing is people want to refer you. So they have that good feeling, those, that story that they've told themselves that, oh my gosh, this person needs Juma, this person needs you to help them do the thing because they expect that they're going to have this amazing experience just based off of what they know, which could be a little or a lot, depending on that interaction.

So we've got work with you. Work for you. Refer you champion you. So referring champion are two different things. And they, of course, they can get into intertwined. But that champion is, I believe so much in what you're doing that I'm willing to open doors for you. I'm willing to create opportunities for you.

And as you see more people willing to do that, or as you see that through your brand, you have now empowered a sponsor or a champion to better advocate for you, you will see those doors swinging open and you'll see that person who is sponsoring you or champion you doing it with pride because you make them look good.

They already have a feeling about you. They have the story, they have the expectations, right? And then finally, people want to learn from you. So again, your brand is admitting this knowledge, this wisdom, this feeling that when I watch your content. Or when I listen to you speak, or when I have a one on one with you, you're worth my time because you're going to teach me something you're worth stopping the scroll for.

When you look at that and when you think of that baseline of the, the, Definition that I have developed around personal branding, which is the feeling, the story, the expectations you can see that while it is not something where it's a digital measurable, such as likes and comments and all that good stuff, um, these metrics you will see.

An uptick in the ones that matter to you because that's what you're branding for.

That's so good. I'm wondering based on that list. So you have your personal brands, which is your feeling your story expectations. Yeah. And then you have these, these five things, these five KPIs that you have to look at in order to know how established how your personal brand is taking root and the first one was not in a particular order but one of them is people wanting to work with you

Yes.

what are the so many things that you've seen when you're interfacing with people that make people not want to work with them 

I love that question because it's still a feeling story and expectation. I don't get a good feeling about the way that you show up or the way that you talk to people or the way that you interact with people in the comments. I don't get a good feeling about that. So I don't really want to work with you.

We've seen people where they just seem. Like they're not a nice person. I've seen it in the comments. I see how they come as I see there, I see their behavior. I see how they interact with people and I don't get a good feeling about them. And now I'm telling myself a story. Well, what if I were to work with them?

Are they going to make me feel that way too? Because I see what they're doing to others. And now I have an expectation that if I do, I'm going to expect them. To do what I've seen them consistently do with somebody else. So that's just an example of how that works. And what I want people to know is that that feeling story and expectation is what others have about you, but you have a lot more control to influence how people feel based off of how you position your brand, how you determine what your messaging is, and then how you introduce yourself, Or face to face, what do you say?

How do you, I call it value shifting. How do you shift the value that you are presenting based off of who you're presenting to? Because you can't have one stale little elevator pitch that works for everyone because that's never going to happen. So you've got to know what matters, what is valuable to the person that you were in front of so that you're able to.

Throttle or shift that value. I wish I could use the term code switching cause it's kind of like that, but that's already taken. And it has a very good definition that doesn't totally align with what I want to communicate, but the words work, but it is value shifting. You've got to shift it up or down depending cause you want to give everybody that you introduce yourself to, you want to give them that aha moment.

Ah, I know what Cher does. I know who would want to work with her. Work for her, learn from her, champion her, refer her. I know. And like, that's what we have to work towards. And also being able to communicate your value to the right people at the right time, they will know when and how to engage you or how to refer you and champion you all that good stuff.

So if people listen to you, and I know people have been listening to you for many years, they'd probably think, well, Cher is such this bubbly, outgoing person and she has this engaging personality. Um, and I guess there could be a, a, thought, and maybe building personal brands only for people with that type of disposition, somebody who is outgoing and who can talk to people. Um, is that true? And if, if it's not, how do you help people who are not like that in personality, but still want to establish their personal brand?

I love that question because it, when we look at how we see these bigger personal brands come out there and they, they, it seems like they've got it all together. They've got the studio, they've got the on camera presence. I get that. And I get that that can be like, that's not even something that some people aspire to, but your personal brand, what you've got to look at it as more as a utility, as something to get you somewhere, somewhere to.

Something to help you. So I want to roll back again. Cause that, that even that mindset around share has this big personality and share does this and all, and that stuff. That's great because that, that aligns with my direction and my goals. However. What I want people to look at is it starts with your brand actually starts with what you want.

What is it you need to accomplish? And when you think about your brand at work, what does it mean? What do you need to accomplish in your role? What do you need to accomplish in your career? And what do you need to, how do you need to show up as an employee advocate? As a solid employee advocate, if you're in a, in a role or an advocate for those that you partner and work with, how do you, how do you show up?

And so when you can start with that tangible kind of a utility approach, how can my brand help me? Well, one is about building trust. So it's not about necessarily, you know, the, the glitz and the glam it's about how am I communicating to you? That I understand the problem that you have, because problems are dog whistles, prob people with the problem that you're talking about, I'm going to hear it because I have that problem and you're talking about me, AKA my problem, I'm leaning in.

So when we think about the power of personal branding is one is your ability to, to articulate your value to the right people. Because now we're, we're, we're attaching it back to goals, right? So you need to make sure that we're not just thinking of personal branding from an influencer perspective, but we're thinking about it as a utility.

We want people to trust us. We want people to know that when they leave something in our hands, we've got it. And so as an individual who's not thinking the creator direction as far as personal branding is concerned, and they're just thinking, well, why do I need one? You want to increase the speed of trust you want, and that is done through your credibility and visibility by giving people the language to talk about you by influencing how they feel the story they tell themselves about what this exchange is going to be like and the expectations they have for you to get your work done.

And that's based off of. Your value that you're able to communicate. So why can I trust you to do what you do then by you communicating your experience, your expertise and why you understand their problem, they're going to feel better about working with you.

I like the idea of your personal brand being a utility.

It makes it almost seem like you have a building that needs to function. And these are one of the essential parts of the building. So it makes it feel like maybe it's electric or water. Or, you know, internet, because internet these days is like a utility. Uh, and I like that whole idea of for a functioning, a whole, you need to have this component that works. Is that what you're getting at when you call it a utility?

Yes. So you're using it as something that you're. That to serve you, there's a very intentional process in, in leveraging your personal brand, whether it's going all to the influencer space or influencing how people feel so that you can get your job done so that you can enjoy what you do. Because when people trust you more, guess what?

You feel better. You're in your zone of genius. You also attract more of what you want. So the utility side of it is how can I use my brand? To get attract more of the work that I'm excited and passionate about more of the work that I know I can add tremendous value because here's the thing. Most people don't know what you can do unless you tell them.

So there are too many people who are just working hard and expecting people to notice. That this is what you bring to the table. If you do not communicate your value, how are they going to know? They're just glad the work is getting done. So you have to look for ways where you can insert your value. I call it value dropping so that, and you're not doing it in a sense of bragging.

You want them to feel like, don't worry, I've got this. And here's why. I've have a lot of experience working in this area. In fact, I've worked with so and so and I did this for them and this is what happened. So I want you to know that I got this for you and I think that this is what we can create. So that little value drop in there, while in the past we might have reframed that as if we just randomly said it without purpose and intention.

That might have been looking like, Oh, you're, you're bragging because you're talking about all the things that you've done, but it was framed and packaged in understanding their problem and their concern and letting them know, I've seen this before. Here's what I've done for them. And here's what I'm going to do for you.

And that allows you to. To value drop the names, the titles, the, the projects, the, the gravity of that and doing a good job articulating that because what we don't recognize is that when you work on your personal brand, another thing that you eliminate and you speed up one, you eliminate that unconscious bias that people have about you because they don't know anything.

So they're going to their default. Thoughts. And if you have a default brand that doesn't articulate your value, you get what you get and don't get upset. You can't expect them to know. So using your brand is in a utility. So when, and again, that becomes very intentional. I want people to feel super comfortable that I know how to do these things.

I want the people I work with or the people I'm supposed to attract to understand that this is what I can do for you. Feel comfortable or feel excited about working with me. And expect that this is going to get done. Expect that this is going to be the experience.

Uh, that's, I like that you get what you get and don't get upset. I, that's, that's so good. So it's like, you're taking control. You're, you're, you

are taking agency over how people see you exactly.

And you're being very precise about it. And you're saying, this is who I am. This is what I want you to think about me. And essentially. It's, it's like, uh, you know, I'm not going to leave this to chance. There's no wiggle room. I'm going to set this thing up so that you can see exactly through this lens. I'm going to give you as much as possible. So if anything goes off, I know it can be me. It has to be something else on the other side, but I'm going to give you everything that you need to know who I am.

Is that it?

Exactly. And that's recognizing that that also evolves over time. As you evolve, as your messaging evolves, as you evolve how you articulate that value, the things that you want to attract more of, it's your job to put it out there. Because if you don't, they're not going to know it's your job to be intentional and getting very clear on how you are using your brand so that the majority of our days.

Our waking hours, especially, um, is we're working, so why not set the conditions through your brand as the utility? So now it's in the utility in the sense it's working for you so that you can get what you want to do and get more of it and enjoy the experience because what you're doing is you are transferring trust.

By letting them know that you can trust me and you have to, and, and when we're working in an environment where we feel trusted, where we feel like we are the expert in our own domain, we feel better. We give more, we feel more confident and also people are coming to you at the right time. So, for example, one of the things that I see a lot of and is an area that I'm expanding in is a lot of tech.

Most companies are turning into these days, a technology company in some way or shape, right? So we have a lot of technology people in working in technology, and they're often seen as a utility. They're often seen as I. T. Fix stuff when it's broken. In other words, there's no other value. You're there to fix stuff, but they're there as a business partner.

They're there to help people make better decisions on technology implementation, how to work it, what works best together based off of the systems that, and the data that's already in place. And they're there as guides and consultants, but oftentimes they're. They're taught as install this, my, my thing is not working, fix this and if they as technology team.

So what I'm working with them is what is their team brand? What are they trying to communicate to the business so that they're not seen as just a utility? They're seen as a partner. So and for a success partner in making sure the the internal clients that they serve are doing better are working on the best capabilities and they're being engaged earlier as in the consulting side before it's the implementation side, right?

So they need to better articulate. What their value is and how best to work with them. And then within their team, they've got teams of experts that do different things. And the individuals have to be able to communicate their expertise to the business as well. And, and their teammates have to understand who are our experts, what do they do?

And how can I, while I'm talking about my team. Lean into those personal brands at work for work. So that's a peek into some of the work that I'm doing now, which is really about helping teams and the individuals on the team's brand themselves collectively at the same time.

That's good. And SME subject matter experts, it's, are those, do you have to see yourself as a subject matter expert in order to build your brand, or is that something that you can develop over time?

Um, I guess there's different levels to subject matter experts. So there's the thought leader subject matter expert who wants to well, actually, let me let me pull back because you can be a subject matter expert and not a thought leader. Um, and I'll say this in the sense of, uh, my definition of a thought leader is someone who is an expert in their area of thought, of course, at least from their perspective, but they have a specific way, they have a specific methodology that they're championing and they have evolved and they have their own take on it.

Whereas an expert means something, some is a deep knowledge in something. And, um, so as a subject matter expert, that doesn't mean that you've come up with your own way necessarily, which goes into the thought leadership piece, but a subject matter expert is someone who knows and can widely apply based off of their knowledge.

So they understand different areas within that same subject matter expertise. And I think that it's important that if you are looked upon as the expert in the area, Don't worry about thinking this subject matter expert title is bigger than it is, right? There's levels to it, but there is a level to your expertise when people are coming to you because you know something and you know how to do something.

And then in your immediate environment, you are the subject matter expert. You've become the web expert at work or you have become the security expert at work, whatever it is. Um, You do have to own it if you want more of it. So to kind of wrap it in a different way, if you want more of that work, if you, cause sometimes people are an expert in something that they don't want to do any more or they never wanted to do.

They're just, just because you can, doesn't mean you should, especially if you don't want to. So it comes back to the whole round personal branding and goals. When you can really be intentional about your personal brand, when you're leveraging it as a utility so that you can influence and you're, you're controlling the narrative, and then you're influencing how people feel, what people think.

The stories they tell themselves and the expectations they set now you can, you're in charge. So use your brand as a tool, as a utility to direct the attention and the focus on where you want to be direct the attention and the focus on what you want to give, what you want more of. You're in a, you have a lot more control than you think.

And I show people how to get there. I show people how to, to reframe their experience so that their value is reflected in the direction they want to go so that it, it influences the feelings, the stories, and the expectations. It's, it comes back down to just my, my, My number one skill set and why I do what I do and, and what I constantly get this feedback as is I can, I, I, first I want to know what you want and then I can listen to what you're saying and then I can take that message and reframe it in a way that they would say it.

But it, it's a, it becomes a directional message. It leads people down that path. I can, I can knit together anything that you tell me and I can see why you're in going in that direction. It's not about spinning it right where it's kind of like making up something. I can see how you got there. Now how do we effectively communicate that so other people are going with you?

Other people are championing you, right? They want to work with you. They want to learn from you. They want to work for you. All that good stuff. They want to. Because they can see the unique perspective. They can see the value that you bring. And most people were not good at talking about our value because culturally oftentimes we were told not to just work hard, keep your head down.

They'll notice it doesn't work anymore. Never really worked for us, but it doesn't work. It just, it just doesn't work the way. So I have a concept called the branded wheel gets the grease and it's just,

an interesting play on that one. Go ahead.

Yes. So the branded wheel gets through Greece, meaning that oftentimes it's not because someone didn't think you couldn't do the job, why you didn't get that opportunity from them.

It's that they didn't remember or they didn't know, but those who have been working on their brands, those who have been clearly articulating their value in a way that it's going to be received. And that's that other piece. They are the ones who are being remembered. They are the ones whose opinions are respected.

They are being recognized for that associated skill, not mindset, knowledge, skills, whatever. They are being noticed and recognized for it. Right? And they're being referred and all that good stuff. So have to, if you don't tell people, how are they going to know?

Hmm.

And it comes back down to, you know, what we were talking about earlier.

They, you, you are in charge. You have to let them know, do not default brand anymore. They don't know.

Yeah. Yeah. So I would say, here's how I would frame this. Here's how I would say it. I would say your brand speaks up on your behalf, but you just have to give it the language to do so. All

right. Yeah.

Exactly.

Yeah. Well, I've definitely been there where I'm doing something that I'm really, really good at. But I don't want to be known for that thing anymore.

I've been there and the transition, it takes a while, but it has to be very, very deliberate. And, um, if I had a share around at that time, I'd be like, Oh, please help me. But I had to figure it out. I had to figure it out. The transition from who I used to be known as. And, um, and for me, it took part of it was, it took a change of platform.

Like I had to move away from one platform and moved on another platform, which was more appropriate for where I wanted to go. And do you see, um, when people have to make shifts like that, uh, as one, as part of the process, deciding where they're going to talk as opposed to how they're going to talk.

So just because it's a good opportunity doesn't make it the right opportunity. So whether, um, You know, even down to making choices on you've been invited to certain things. That's morally more connected to your previous version of you, right? As you're moving into this next version of you and you could see that's a great platform, but I'm going to now be on this great platform talking about that thing that I'm moving away from.

And so we have to. Kill the darlings. We have to kill the things that we once loved. And it's actually not working for us now in this new season, even though we, we have so much, the reason why it's hard is there's so much confidence in the past and the things that we've done. And so I would say. The branding issue is not much.

It's not really what you put out there. So much as it is what's inside here. The branding issue is your willingness to let go of that old brand and leave it behind. And it's okay to, um, you know, you know, grand closing grand opening on a new brand, but you do have to have the narrative, of course, to transition over.

But it's more, I would say the thing that holds people back is that confidence that they can move forward and they can leave that other piece of confidence behind. And that's hard because that is that validation that we get from knowing I'd done good over there. And now I'm moving into this new space.

And while I'm confident in my skill set. I don't have the validation yet. So we're leaving behind. And I think I've never said this or thought it just, as I was saying it, the way that I want to articulate it is the biggest challenge as we transition our brands from one area to the next is being okay.

With leaving behind the validation that made us feel good about ourselves and our ability to serve. As we move into this new space where we are re earning our credibility and we haven't received that validation. And so that separation is hard and I know how hard it is, but it's more about here. It's not what other people are thinking because.

That's where proof or content comes into play. How do you prove that you know what, you know, say what you can do and show what you've already done to prove that you're going in this right direction. And, and once people see that, you know, cause it's not that hard. If you shift somewhere else and you say, I'm going to get it, I'm only going to podcast produced.

I'm not going to do any more video, but you show me how your podcast, you're producing the podcast. I can see the transferable skills and that's your focus. You're doubling down, you're tripling down. You're 10 X ing on. On this one direction, that's totally fine, but you have to mentally be able to, to cut off the, the, the, the feed of validation that won't be there for a while.

Oh, that's fine. Fire stuff from Cher Jones here, just, just oozing thought leadership as she goes along. Um, and so I think, I think this is great. I think this conversation, uh, was a bit spontaneous. Now, everybody who has, who listens to the Useful Content Podcast will know that usually I'm extremely structured. And, um, but Cher is such a dynamic thinker and has so much experience in the area of, of, um, Branding and personal branding that we didn't start off the usual way, and we're not going to end the usual way. We just had this conversation. And so share, I know people may have been highly impacted about what you shared so far. Could you tell them where they can find you online if they want to learn more from you?

Yes. Your best bet is to connect with me over on LinkedIn. That is where I spend the most time as far as connecting, interacting, feel free to message me in the DMs. Um. Also, um, use that link in the bio and it's going to link you to my latest stuff. There's a few things that I'm working on. So, um, either way, I would love to get connected.

Send me a DM if you've got questions about building your brand and not thinking about it from the creator brand perspective, or even if you are and you want to build. That authority at work for work, I would love to help you out. So feel free to reach out and, um, I'm here as well. Just even if it's just a question, it's what I love to do.

I loved the organic nature of this conversation. Uh, and I hope that everybody get a lot out of it.

Yeah, I absolutely will. I got a lot out of it and um, it opened up my eyes and my ears to a lot of things that I hadn't thought about before. So thank you again, students for joining us on the Useful Content Podcast. Thank you again, share for gracing us with your presence and for having such an excellent conversation, useful content classroom. Dismissed. And we're clear.

very clear. I

No, normally, normally I have this, I have this intro. Well, this is good. This is good. I'm going to say that when we have the beginning of the podcast, I'm going to tee this up in this way. Oh, this is good. I should, I should not plan things more often.

know, but you got to pick the right people. See, I could do it with you where I could do something. I'm not planned on. I'm good, but not everybody can do.

And not everybody can do this. And it's a good thing as like, when you, when you said, cause I really thought that you might be like, oh, well, I'm not prepared. I'm good. When you say either way, I said, well, sure. If you, if you're going in, I'm going, I'm going in too.