Developing a refined brand can be extremely challenging. It takes time, dedication, and a lot of inner work to craft a brand identity that truly represents your values, mission, and vision. But once you’ve refined your brand, the next challenge is bringing it to life. How do you take all your work into your brand and make it tangible, visible, and impactful?
This episode of Influence by Design is the last in our three-part series on how to reinvent and transition your personal brand. In this episode, I am joined again by Paula Brennan as we discuss how you make the leap and bring your refined brand to life.
Paula and I share insights and tips on how to translate your brand identity into a visual representation, communicate your brand message through content creation, and leverage various channels to promote your brand.
We also discuss how to stay true to your brand while adapting to the changing needs of your audience and the market.
If you’re ready to take your refined brand to the next level and make it a reality, this episode is for you. Join us as we explore the practical steps you can take to bring your brand to life and impact your industry. Let’s dive in.
IN THIS EPISODE YOU’LL DISCOVER:
- Brand reinvention – what does it really mean? (02:30)
- Which one of these two types of people are you? (03:35)
- Should you show others your reinvention journey or hide it? (05:26)
- The art of crafting a personal brand that stands out (07:02)
- When to re-launch your new brand (09:42)
- Matching your visuals to your brand message (11:54)
- How to represent your brand every time you show up (15:12)
- How to help others feel confident and relevant (19:13)
- Unlocking your best self by being confident (22:06)
QUOTES:
- “It’s important to surround yourself with people who have been on the journey before you.” -Samantha Riley
- “Think about your personal brand as a history; you don’t have to be rigid.” -Paula Brennan
WHERE TO FIND PAULA BRENNAN
- Website: https://paulabrennan.com.au/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/paulabrennanphotographer
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/paula-brennan-64b91330/
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/paulabrennan
- Pinterest: https://www.pinterest.com.au/paulabrennanphotographer/
- YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCdIypfcDBP1rMOv-FI3eQvw
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BOOK AN INFLUENCE AUDIT
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ABOUT PAULA BRENNAN
Paula Brennan is a personal brand photographer, educator, and host of the popular podcast, The Business of Personal Brand Photography. With over 16 years of experience in photography, Paula has built an impressive portfolio of work, from wedding photography to personal brand photography.
Through her work, Paula discovered that she could bring values and emotions to life through her guidance and imagery. Her passion lies in bringing out her clients’ connection, confidence, and authentic personality through her photos.
As a result, Paula started working with entrepreneurs to help them communicate their brand personality through unique and authentic imagery. She is dedicated to helping her clients create a powerful visual identity that reflects their brand values and resonates with their target audience.
With her talent, passion, and dedication, Paula Brennan has become a leading figure in personal brand photography, inspiring and empowering others to create meaningful and authentic visual stories.
TRANSCRIPTION (AI Generated)
Samantha Riley 00:00
We’ve been talking a lot about reinvention in the last couple of episodes. But what exactly is reinvention? It’s the action or process through which something has changed so much that it appears to be entirely new.
My name is Samantha Riley, and this is the podcast for experts who want to be the unapologetic leader in their industry. We’re going to share the latest business growth, marketing, and leadership strategies, as well as discussing how you can use your human design to create success in business and life. Inside and out. It’s time to take your influence, income, and impact to the level you know you’re capable of. Are you ready to make a bigger difference and scale up? This is the Influence By Design podcast.
I’m Samantha Riley from samanthariley.global, authority positioning strategist and host of the Influence By Design podcast.
Paula Brennan 00:53
My name is Paula Brennan, and I’m a personal brand photographer. And I’m the host of the Business Of Personal Branding Podcast. And welcome to this third in our three part series on transition and reinvention inside of your career. Now, if you’re currently thinking about making some changes to your career, or business, or you’re feeling like that, you want to be doing something bigger with your life more aligned with your purpose. Welcome, friends.
Samantha Riley 01:19
So if you haven’t listened to the first two episodes, then go back and do that. We’ve talked a lot on getting really clear on what you want to do in your business and your life. We’ve talked about positioning niching messaging, and today, we’re really going to dive deep into how to create this personal brand, how to turn it into something that is ready to relaunch and bring it into the world. So how do we how do we actually make that transition? How do we get it to work? Now I
Paula Brennan 01:50
think one of the things that comes up for me when people contact me, and I don’t know if you get this as well, but I know when people come to me, they’re talking about building a personal brand. And they think of it rather as a to do. And I like to think of it more as a being like you’re living every day, and you’re being yourself and you’re being true to who you are and being true to that vision that you have of your business. But it’s so easy to like put it down on a to do list and think of it as something that you have to kind of like work harder total, it doesn’t necessarily need to be hard, right? It just needs to be out of your everyday actions.
Samantha Riley 02:22
And I think that this is what we’ve really been unpacking over the last couple of episodes, that really reinventing this brand isn’t about a new logo, a new color, a new font, it’s not about that at all, it’s about really looking within, and who is it that we authentically want to be? Who do we want to be showing up in the world as so that we can create this business that sets our soul on fire, but gives us the income that we’re really looking for and helps us to impact and you know, make the change in the world that we really want to be.
Paula Brennan 02:54
So we’ve kind of identified that there might be two types of people when it comes to sort of like launching your refinement of your brand or relaunching your personal brand out there into the market. And we we just wanted to put a caveat down to begin with, because we want to make sure that you don’t go too far in these two opposite directions. So the first one that we’ve got right is the person that can overwhelm the market or guests because they get a little bit too excited about what they’re relaunching, they get really passionate and they found a new toy. So yeah, they want to share it with everybody, but the time pressured him to everyone and they can actually lose people in the process as well. So just if that’s you, we just want to say to you just to calm down, just take a breath,
Samantha Riley 03:35
take a breath.
Paula Brennan 03:39
Now the second type of person, I know you can relate with this one as well.
Samantha Riley 03:43
Absolutely. And then there’s the second person, that’s the complete opposite of the sort of person that polar shed. And this is the person that doesn’t share anything until everything is perfect, or their perception that everything is perfect.
Paula Brennan 04:00
And look at both sides of the camp are very, very normal. So if you’re feeling either one of these, they’re completely normal. I find most people either fall far in one camp or the other. And it’s totally fine. We just wanted to make sure that you’re aware of this where we have this next part of the discussion, because we want to make sure that it doesn’t trigger each any of those reactions.
Samantha Riley 04:20
Absolutely. We want you to fall somewhere beautifully in the middle, so that you’re able to take your audience on the journey of sharing your new personal brand. And I think I’ve just said that and I’ve kind of given it away, Paula that it is about taking your audience on the journey. Yeah,
Paula Brennan 04:39
I love when I can see a person’s journey. And I think that’s the thing is some people feel like you need to hide everything away and box it up and then all of a sudden bang out a calm Jack in the Box. I’ve got this whole new thing going on. And I think it’s really kind to your audience if you can sort of like help them to transition with you rather than like springing stuff on them. And I was telling you just before it’s really interesting as I look through My daughter is 16. And I look at her Instagram feed. And you know, teenagers these days, they’ve only got like three photos, they’ve erased everything that’s happened before them. Whereas I love when I go into a business page where I can actually see that transition. I love to see the story of the reinvention. I love to see the history of the built up understanding and learning and growing inside of their business. And I don’t know if maybe for me some sometimes I don’t necessarily trust the business if I can’t see that. It’s not that I don’t trust them. But it helps to build a trust, right?
Samantha Riley 05:30
Absolutely. Well, we did speak in the first episode of this series, about not throwing the baby out with the bathwater, that we have this experience that’s accrued over many years. So why would you want to delete that people want to see it, they want to know that they can trust that you’ve got a broad experience. So don’t be afraid of sharing this reinvention.
Paula Brennan 05:55
Yeah. And I think that what you need to understand as you’re sort of like traveling through this journey for yourself, is that your personal brand, it’s the main thing that comes with you, it’s the thing that sort of travels with you, from career choice to job to business, you know, two different versions or like versions, I would say, if your business is that’s the thing that really stays true. And so you want to make sure that you’re not throwing too many different conflicting things into the mix. And you’re not sort of being with this one day, this the next. So it’s really, it’s it is important for you to think about your personal brand, as a history is, as something that’s layering up, it doesn’t mean you have to be rigid. But I think you do need to be very definite and considered about the moves and the shakes that you’re making. As you’re doing this transition, that it does feel like it’s a natural progression rather than a knee jerk reaction.
Samantha Riley 06:46
Totally. So in saying that, just understand that your personal brand, or the thread that will join all of it together is a lot of this unseen things, it’s your values, it’s the things that you stand for all of the things that we talked about in the first episode, this is what makes our personal brands so valuable, so that when we do make this reinvention, that’s just it’s sort of like the the very top of the, you know, the pot of gold, all of the gold underneath the golden thread that’s brought through the whole lot, is the piece that is still so valuable.
Paula Brennan 07:21
Yeah. And I think that it’s important that you, as we’re talking about sort of making those transitions, and it’s important that you stay recognizable within it. And as I was saying, like not to do that knee jerk thing where you do like a complete overhaul or anything like that. It’s more about sort of, we keep using the word about transitioning and making sure that the EU that shows up today feels the same as the you that turns up, you know, you’re saying like that the values are still the same, all of that stuff about ourselves, we can’t fundamentally make those massive shifts and changes overnight. It does happen over time. So I think it’s just about making sure that your audience can still come along with you and feel like they still get you, they still understand you, they still feel like they’re you that you’re for them. And they’re for you, as you’re making this. We talked a lot about losing clients or losing customers along the way, as you make changes about what your offers are. But when as you change your offers, it doesn’t mean you’re fundamentally changing who you are. Yeah. So in this point of reinvention, you could say, or this refinement process that we’ve been talking about, please, just make sure you still look and feel like you the you that turns up.
Samantha Riley 08:32
Absolutely, absolutely. So we’re talking about, you know, when do you do this re launch? Or when do you show up with these new parts of your brand. And I think it’s really important here to say, don’t make that decision when you’re in the weeds. So don’t while you’re in the middle of working out what this new message is that you come out like at full force, because it will mean that your message is very muddled might not be understandable to your audience. So it’s really important that you’ve gone through the process of really understanding what it is that you’re about.
Paula Brennan 09:06
Yeah, and I think, you know, this is about making key decisions, whether it be with people in your life that can, you know, like business coaches or anything like that, that can help you but it’s about really making sure that the timing is right around when you’ve got your products ready to launch or whether your services are ready. All of those kinds of things. I know that for a lot of us we want to hold on tight as we said that we’ve got that person that wants to hold on tight till Everything’s perfect. But sometimes it is about sort of sharing the message and getting your audience excited about this next phase before you’ve got the thing ready to go. Other times you need to be really careful about making sure that you do have your ducks in a row in order to make sure that if people want to start working with you, then you’ve got the product ready to go. So I think that there’s a dual conversation that needs to have here and sometimes you do need the help of an expert to help you make that decision. Right?
Samantha Riley 09:56
Absolutely. Because it’s not one or the other. It’s and it’s not one or it’s and,
Paula Brennan 10:04
yeah, I love that you added that. So I guess this is a great time for us to start talking about the visual aspects of your personal brand. And this, I guess, is my wheelhouse.
Samantha Riley 10:12
100%.
Paula Brennan 10:15
But I think that a lot of people can make the mistake in there kind of like, you know, their excitement to get things out there, they can make the mistake of kind of launching and not being sort of visually prepared, I guess, or visually preparing the audience. And you can find you can hit that point where the visuals just aren’t matching the messaging, the messaging won’t land, if it’s not, you know, there’s not an alignment there. And I do see this a lot. Have you seen that before Sam in your in your work with your clients
Samantha Riley 10:43
totally, because you need to be showing up in a way that matches your messaging for your ideal client. So if your message is, and this is very random, but if your message is to work with, you know, CEOs of organizations, but your brand looks like you’re, you know, you’re wearing outfits that look like they’ve just come from the shop, it’s not going to resonate, it’s not, they’re not going to even, it’s almost like they won’t even recognize that you’re there. So the visuals do need to match everything, so that it comes together as one whole. Yeah, and
Paula Brennan 11:22
I think there’s a different levels of different types of content that you can be using to help you to sort of like, bring this wrap this up and bring that sort of new brand messaging to life. Obviously, you know, my wheelhouse is photography and videography. Now, whether you choose to do it professionally or not, you need to make sure that it’s aligned with the quality of the service that you want to provide. So I don’t always suggest that people need to go and get the help of professionals. But if you are working with certain niche markets, or things like that, and their expectations are set, that it needs to be presented in a high, professional way, then this is definitely an area that you’re going to need to look at investing in. I’ve seen other people from a visual perspective, also invest in things like styling, so they’ve done a little bit of a, you’ve just talked about the clothing aspect of things there. And a lot of my clients before they come working with me will hire as a stylist, to help them to be able to just put it to just match it to just match the energy of the way that they’re showing up in the world. And I think also to you know, doing things like this, it also helps you to change the internal conversation that’s happening, when you sort of are turning up differently in the world, you start to feel it and you start to embody it differently as well.
Samantha Riley 12:32
Now you’ve talked about the visuals there, Paula and the styling and how we want to look. But there is a distinction here that I wanted to make. And this was an interesting conversation that you and I both her head before we hit record. And that’s for both of us, our brains grew as our dress size did, which at first we were had a little bit of a giggle at it. And then we really started to unpack what this was. Because we’re talking about the visual aspects and making sure we’re showing up in a certain way. And the reason we wanted to bring this up is because we both Paul and I both seen many people holding themselves back because they don’t, and I put this in air quotes look a certain way, and not a certain size. But here’s the here’s the piece that we uncovered as we were having this conversation, the change in our business was because the focus went from us being or having the focus on ourselves, how we looked, how we were showing up, what we looked like to and moving it to our focus being on our audience and how we can show up to serve them in a better way. So whilst there’s this, I guess, aspect of showing up in a certain way, don’t get that confused with I can’t have a gray hair showing, or I can’t be a certain size clothing, because that is not the case at all. Is there anything that you want to add their polar?
Paula Brennan 13:59
Look for sure. I feel like for many years, I would know myself personally, I was crippled by feeling like I needed to be a certain way to show up. Otherwise I’d be judged. And I don’t know where this judgement panel was sitting, I’m going to be really honest with you. So I typically speaking and I know you, Sam, you and I both sort of had this discussion, you know, conventionally speaking a certain size that is condemned sort of like you know, very highly acceptable when it comes to women in general. But for for most of the time, I still felt inadequate, even though the numbers stacked up and looked right on the scales or in the dress size. I still felt inadequate and I don’t know what happened. I can’t pinpoint it. I think there was just a point where I became very confident in myself and in the services that I was providing that I was able to just shelf all of the rest of it and I’d be like, Oh my gosh, you know, I’ve got to get on video today. And instead of it being like, Oh no, I can’t get on video because I haven’t gotten to that size again or whatever it was. I was able to sort of reposition that in my head and say I need to get on video today so that she can hear this from me. Absolutely, I need it to be about her. And I think when you can start to really put the person on the other side of the camera, on the other side of the phone, when you’re writing on the other side of sitting opposite you at the desk, when as soon as you can start to do that, and stop looking at yourself in the mirror beforehand, everything just starts to unlock and start to become a lot easier for you do you agree?
Samantha Riley 15:27
Oh my goodness, so much, let’s dive into this confidence piece more, because it’s the confidence, it’s like this, I’m gonna call it the confidence circle, because it doesn’t, you don’t have confidence. And then you’re able to launch this brand or grow your business. And you can’t grow your business without having the confidence. It’s like, which comes first the chicken or the egg. That by you need to have a certain amount of confidence to launch the thing. But as you grow the thing, you get more confidence, right? Yeah. So let’s dive into this confidence piece. Because as I mentioned in the first of this little series, that one of the reasons I wanted to unpack this whole training with you was the way that you helped me really stick into my confidence in our photo shoot. So what is it that you do that helps people to feel confident and feel like they can take on the world?
Paula Brennan 16:27
I think the first thing, if I’m really honest, is just asking the right questions. And I think that’s a lot of what you and I have been discussing over the series is really just asking people, the right questions, so that I can help them to feel heard. And I can really start to unpack that to be able to reflect that back to them. So a lot of the time, the cues within my photoshoot will cue to that version of herself that she wants to be seen as, and the second I can start calling that in for her, she starts to lift and I can definitely start to see a physical change in her as she starts to sort of let go, Yeah, I am that CEO lady, I am the boss lady, I am that person. I think then, you know, obviously a big component of what I do in calling that out is that I’m helping her to feel seen. And a particularly I guess, with women is we’ve probably you know, when you’ve got children and businesses and partners and lots of things going on in life, it’s easy to sort of put yourself down into the second, third, fourth place of things that are important. And this soul experiences helping her to feel seen and helping her to feel relevant, and helping her to visually I guess bring to life a version of herself that perhaps she hasn’t seen before. Do you know, so listening to how she wants to be perceived, and then being able to mirror that version back to her. And that effectively is kind of all I do, I think I create a safe space, for her to feel confident and to allow herself to become that. And this maybe goes back to what we were talking about, you know, giving yourself that space and giving yourself that time to kind of develop and to think and to become I think that that’s what the photoshoot experience with me really helps people to do is actually just to like step into that, and have that that safe space to kind of play into be and to to invigorate that. Now I know that a big thing that I do is I give permission to people to, to bring to life the things that perhaps they’ve kind of kept hidden about themselves in the way that they weren’t, we’ve seen Yeah, and that’s a huge thing. So you know, helping people to feel comfortable in that, and then showing it back to them. That helps them I like to think of it as a bit of a vision board, I guess for them to be able to bring that vision of themselves to life. And you know, we’re talking about that whole chicken and egg thing like what comes first, you know, so for me, this is a sort of self fulfilling cycle is when she puts a photo up and she gets positive reinforcement, she’s more inclined to kind of keep going in that direction to keep showing, I guess, to keep showing up like that version of her. So yeah, that’s, you know, that’s, that’s, that’s a beautiful part of what I get to do. Now, Sam, you’re not without doing this same similar sort of role in your work that you do with your clients. I know a big part of what I do is on the outside, but I know a big part of what you do is helping people to do the step by step actions in order to be able to become confident in themselves. So can you talk to me about how you love to help people to feel confident in themselves and in their businesses?
Samantha Riley 19:16
Yeah, totally. So when I was talking about the confidence circle, it is about sort of bouncing between having the confidence to do it and then doing it and then that gives you the confidence and that keeps going. So I think it’s really important to surround yourself or to align yourself with someone that’s been on the journey before you. Because whenever you’re creating anything in your business like this, I mean, we’re just talking about a brand here, but anything that’s growing or scaling your business, there’s like a million different steps to take. And there’s understanding that how do we make this to happen? Well, as I’ve mentioned before, how is an extremely and resourceful question and you know, having to know all of the different parts is very overwhelming. So it’s really important to align yourself with someone that can help you just to break this down and say, What is the next one step I need to take, or what are the next three steps I need to take. Because then you can just like clear the decks, get rid of all of that, and just focus on those one, two or three things, which means you’re able to execute at speed, with a little bit of help, which then gives you the confidence back to then repeat that cycle. So I think that’s really important to have it really broken down. So you can just repeat this cycle over and over again, which means you’re growing at speed, or you’re scaling at speed, and growing your confidence along the way.
Paula Brennan 20:40
And I love this, this whole idea that you kind of like going up and up and up and taking the next step, rather than sitting at the bottom of the ladder and looking at all the rungs.
Samantha Riley 20:49
Yeah, because so, so overwhelming. Overwhelming.
Paula Brennan 20:54
Yeah, absolutely. So I hope that this conversation has really helped you if you’re sort of in this space of reinvention, myself and Sam here have unpacked so many different ideas, wonderful ideas. And I know that you know, a lot of this, you know, it can sort of feel overwhelming at times. So I hope we’ve been your friends in your ears that has helped you to sort of unravel some of this stuff, and to be able to focus in the right direction, as you’re making this really exciting step because it is exciting, and it is important. And what you want to do, it’s not to be discounted, it is important. But the action steps do need to be taken with some sort of decisive and effective kind of measures so that you do get the outcomes that you want and quickly.
Samantha Riley 21:36
Absolutely. And just remember, you can’t read the label from inside the jar, you do need to have help from the experts. And as we talked about needs to be the right experts. Hopefully, you have got some really great ideas through these last three episodes, you’ve got some fire in your belly, to create something and lean into something that feels even more aligned to what you’re doing now. So Paula, for people that are listening, and they just have loved this conversation, how can people stay connected with you and continue the conversation?
Paula Brennan 22:10
Well, by far the best way as I’m a visual communicator is on Instagram. So you can find me at Paula Brennan, it’s a very easy one to find. And how about for you, Sam, where’s the best place to connect with you.
Samantha Riley 22:20
You can find me also on Instagram at the Sam Riley, or my Facebook group, which is coaches thought leaders and changemakers where we’re having conversations every day on how you can grow and scale your thought leadership business.
Paula Brennan 22:33
Fantastic. Thanks so much, Sam for giving my audience your beautiful insights and I hope I’ve been able to do
Samantha Riley 22:39
The same and likewise polar it’s been an absolute pleasure. And like I said, as you’re listening or watching, please don’t let this be the place where you get all inspired and don’t take action. Use what we’ve talked about to inspire you to take even greater action and take your business to the next level. Thanks so much for listening.
Thanks for joining me for this episode of the Influence By Design podcast. If you want more head over to influencebydesignpodcast.com for the show notes and links to today’s gifts and sponsors. And if you’re looking to connect with other experts who are growing and scaling their business to join us in the coaches, thought leaders, and changemakers community on Facebook, the links are waiting for you over at influencebydesignpodcast.com
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