Building a Brand: The Art of Reputation and Connection in a Digital World - with James Burtt

23:39Because you either like me or equally, you might loathe me. But either way, you know what you're going to get. Somebody tells it as it is, straightforward, likes to have a laugh, takes the job seriously, but not yourself too seriously. It just tries to have a little bit of fun. If that's what you want from an agency, then you're probably going to come and work with us. Same with the branding side of things. that's probably who you're going to come work with will be me. If you're looking for like slick, polished, you know, like Soho, you know, everyone's drinking a chai latte in some fancy Prada coat, like that's not me.

24:08So your brand is your reputation, nothing more, nothing less. And you've got to, when you're either repositioning or you're starting to decide on that position, break that stuff down, spend some time working on that. My wife's an amazing graphic designer. She helps people to sort of create their brand online. And so many times people come with, you know, I was thinking it's got to be green and it's got to be about nature. And she's like, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. Let's take a few steps back here. Core values, USPs, mission statement, value proposition, all that stuff is really important. And then you get the sense of what a brand is.

24:39A great example is people will look at like the Nike tick and go, that's a brand. No, no, it's not. That's just the logo. That's the trademarkable logo. It's so well done. It's even got its own name. It's called the Swoosh. And even the name Swoosh is trademarked. That's not what Nike is. Nike's brand is whatever the perception of that brand is in your mind. So I think of like running, fun, Michael Jordan, Phil Knight. That's what I think of when I think of Nike. To other people, they might think of, you know, low paid workers in the Far East who are sticking their shoes together. Like nothing is right or wrong.

25:15My opinion of it is not any more valid than anybody else's. But it's the brand position that they've put in my mind. And this is the crazy thing. You can't, because the brand exists only in the mind of your consumer, you can't control that, but you can curate it with your content. So you can make content that looks and feels in a certain way to take that person to the resolution or the realization that you want them to ultimately have. And I think it's interesting, you know, because a brand that has a story behind it, you know, and it can often be a founder story, can't it? Or a lot of brands are created, I think, because there's a need, you know, there's a need, there's a gap that's not being filled.

25:53You know, see that a lot with charities, actually, you know, where maybe a family member, a family has had, you know, a child that's got some kind of, you know, sickness or something or a condition and they're not being served. So the parents will often start a charity, you know, because there's a need there and then that can evolve. Right. The same happens in business, doesn't it, as well. But I think a brand that has almost a storytelling element to it as well brings it to life, doesn't it? Because you have an affinity to that. So, I mean, obviously, Apple is a classic, isn't it? You know, Steve Jobs, Steve Wozniak, you know, from their garage and created what now today is like just part and parcel of the way we live, really.

26:38You know, incredibly powerful. But most people understand at least part of the legacy of the founders. Yeah. And that's still, even though obviously, you know, Steve Jobs is no longer with us, that's still there, isn't it, in the DNA? Yeah. And it's also if people are listening to this and go, yeah, but I'm not Apple. You know, I'm just I'm a one man, one woman band. Yeah. It's still the principles. People will buy into you before they'll buy from you. And part of that is brand. And again, brand is not about, you know, a fancy color palette and all this stuff and a fancy website. You know, when I talked a minute ago about the coaching company that I used to run where we'd done, you know, three quarters of a million quid or whatever it was in 18 months, we didn't have a website.

27:15Did not have a website. We used to post on social media. That was it. It was mad. But we didn't have a website. Didn't have a colour palette. But what we had was, you know what we stood for. Yeah. And you knew what we stood against. Like we were very Marmite as coaches. Me and a couple of then friends. That's a story for another day. Different podcast or therapy. But you knew what you were going to get. hard hitting, no apologies, cutthroat coaching to get you results. If that's what you want to get to the result, we were the business and the brand for you. That was the brand for you. If you wanted a customer cuddle, if you wanted looking after, if you wanted nurturing, it was absolutely categorically the wrong place.

27:55So you need to have a brand that says what you are and also says what you're not. And I think that's really important. whether you are Apple or you're not Apple, everyone started their day one somewhere. Yeah, completely. You know, Nike was just Phil Knight at one point trying to peddle shoes around that were better than everything else that was there. Steve Jobs just wanted to make one computer that was, you know, a computer that was better than anything else from a garage in San Francisco. It all turns into folklore in the end and it's like, oh, but it's part of the brand origin story and blah, blah, blah.

28:27But that was the reality of it, but they stood for something. Yeah. You know, Steve Jobs' demand for quality, he stood by that sort of brand mission so strongly, he got kicked out of his own company. It was still so important. They brought him back into the company to save it again. So that's how important your brand can be. But also if you, on a smaller level, I always think of it like, if you've heard me saying core values, USPs, mission statement, value proposition, all that stuff, you don't really get what it is. Think of like core values is like your North Star. What are you trying to do?

28:57Who are you trying to do it for? And how do you do it? That's kind of it. It keeps you on the right path at all given periods. And then you can, you know, for example, once you understand your brand position or you understand the brand message you want to convey, then it feeds into your marketing. It feeds into your social media posts. It feeds into your website. It feeds into your design. It feeds into how you show up at networking events or online or offline events. But it all stems from that foundational principle of like, who are you and what is it that you're creating? And you have to understand that stuff.

29:29And it takes work, by the way. Oh, yeah. A lot of people are like, oh, right, I'm going to, you know, got a sack from my job, got redundancy. Right, day one, start my business. Right, I'm going to go do some sales. But what are you doing it for? Like a hold fire, work out the basis because your brand, I always think of it like the foundation. The brand is the foundation of your company. It doesn't matter how good your marketing is. It doesn't matter how good your PR is. If you don't actually have a solid brand position, it's really difficult to build something that's got genuine stability. The challenge with brand is because it's a bit esoteric.

29:58and it's a bit like, well, does my brand, if I put a pound into my brand, do I get a two pounds out? No, not always. Well, why would I do it as a small company? But if you don't have it, then quite often you won't get to the point where you can have marketing that you put a pound in and get two pounds out of it because you're not based on anything. What do you stand for? What do you stand against? It's really important to know that stuff. Yeah, no, 100 % agree. I mean, it comes back to, you know, start with why, you know, Simon Sinek, isn't it? Why do you exist? well why do you exist i think as an individual as a human being you know what makes you get out of bed in the morning have a clear purpose for your why and a lot of people never know actually they don't know well why why what's your purpose in life yeah i don't know just kind of go to work and feed the family and and that's it you know so yeah and i work with i work with people uh one to one at a very very senior level and and even those guys that you think would have it all absolutely buttoned down often don't you know surprisingly and i spend time with them trying to help them figure out what's their purpose, especially, you know, if they're going through some changes and next phase of kind of life, et cetera.

31:02So I think it's the same for an individual as it is for a business. You've got to know why you exist and who you exist for. And then almost the what and the how kind of comes a little bit later, doesn't it? But when you're evolving a brand, right, because I interviewed Ronan Dunn the other week. I don't know if you know who Ronan is. Ronan is the chairman of the Six Nations Rugby. Oh, wow. Yeah, he's also used to be the CEO of O2. Oh, okay. And the CEO of a big, huge, the largest telecoms business called Verizon. So he's done some stuff. He's done some stuff. He's done some stuff. I'll look him up.

31:39Done some stuff. His episode will be out soon, so he'll be able to listen to it on Brave Bob. No, but Ronan, fascinating guy, right? You know, very humble, grew up in Ireland, never went to university, you know, very good, solid family kind of start in life, and then went on to do all these incredible, incredible roles and is still doing amazing things today. But interestingly, what he was talking about was the rebrand, the rebrand of what was BT Cellnet. Oh, God, yeah. To O2. Yeah. And O2, what they created with O2, he was talking about his sort of proudest moment in his career. Even though when he was the CEO of Verizon, that business was worth$400 billion.

32:19Wow. Right? Huge, huge, hugely valuable business. But still, his kind of love and heart and passion was sort of reverting to the days of, you know, creating O2 from an existing organization. And O2 became the sixth most loved brand out of every sector at the time. So it's quite interesting, I think, when you've got maybe a brand that's a little bit tired, has maybe got some negative aspects to it to actually create a fresh brand. And how does that work from your experience? What are some of the things, if you're thinking, I'm not sure my brand's working for me anymore, maybe I'm outdated and we need to do something more radical with the brand.

33:00Have you got experience of dealing with those situations, James, as well? Yes, I've done a few things like that, especially back in my PR days, we did a lot of stuff around sort of corporate social responsibility, which is a bit of a, was a buzzy word back in the days. but it was brands trying to position themselves in a slightly different way. I saw it done very well and I saw it done very badly. The key thing is, I think, for any rebrand is it's got to be real. Yes. And it goes back to the principles I mentioned a minute ago with building a brand full stop. Core values, mission statement, value proposition, ideal buyer, stakeholders.

33:38When you know that, because a brand and an organisation is a living, breathing thing, if you don't build it on something that is real, it will fail. So at some point, to your point about sort of the BT Cellnet stuff, I remember that. I remember BT Cellnet, they were big blocky phones and mobile phones. It was very boring. It was like, you know, back in when it first came, it was 40p a minute or it was 35p a minute, or you had certain deals overnight and a text was like 20 pence and they were just giving you sort of marketing messaging. They weren't building brands. I remember O2 because O2 was the first one that had Sean Bean, I think, as the voiceover had the bubble effect that came through the O and all this stuff.

34:14And then they bought the O2 Arena. Correct. Now, you only do something like that when you're really solid on what your brand positioning is wanting to be. They wanted to go from being a telephone company to being a lifestyle brand. And that's a big shift, but that only happens from where you understand you need to work out where are we right now, where do we want to go in an ideal world, and what steps are we going to put in place to get there? So with an O2, for example, I think my wife's been with O2 for 20 years now. You don't even consider, I don't think she even considers moving ever. It's too much hassle.

34:51She gets enough of the little sort of customer cuddles. Oh, you can get early access to Olivia Dean at the O2 Arena or whatever. You can get early access and blah, blah, blah, all those things. But that's based on the positioning that they wanted to have for themselves. So if you are looking at doing a rebrand and interestingly, you know when I did a podcast with Ted Baker obviously they had a repositioning from sort of like one Matt sort of like one small very eccentric guy who's a very interesting character and it was very much you know like a London brand you know it's Ted Baker London it wasn't Ted Baker London it went sort of globally and then the actual retail business in the UK actually went bust because it was being operated by a different company yes that's right so when they were what I've talked to them is like, what do you want this to be?

35:36What do you want the positioning of this podcast to be? And we made content that is aspirational towards the goals that they have and the audience that they want to reflect and the journey that they want to take people on. So you have got to, again, it sounds really wishy-washy, but it's like, where are you now? Where do you want to go? And then what are those steps you're going to take? But it's, again, got to be based on something that's very, very real. Because if, you know, back in the day, if the BT CellNet collective had got together and gone, no, no, we just want to, you know, we want to fast track shareholder value.

36:07Well, that doesn't line up with putting in place a five, 10 year plan to become a lifestyle brand. And then you've got to have somebody, a very strong CEO or a CMO or a very strong C-suite who goes, no, we're doing this. This is our timeline. These are our deliverables. And this is the mission that we are on. and then you backtrack in terms of sort of achievement points from there. Because if you don't have faith in that rebrand at that point in time, someone comes in year three of BT CellNet. I've never mentioned BT CellNet so much in a podcast in my entire life. But someone comes in from BT CellNet and goes, well, you know, we're not seeing an uptake in shareholder value, blah, blah, blah.

36:45But if that's not the mission, we said that we weren't going to be doing this. We're three years into a 10-year play of building a lifestyle brand. This is to be expected. So you've just got to understand where you are going towards and then taking incremental steps to get to that place. And again, if you're listening to this and you're a smaller organisation, it's not just about, you know, a change of colours or a change of font or a change of website. Or I'm going to refresh my landing page or whatever it may be. I've dealt with loads of those clients previously and then they don't get a big result off the back of it.

37:17It's because you haven't actually changed what you're trying to represent. This is a big mistake I see people making. instead of going an inch wide and a mile deep, they go a mile wide and an inch deep. If something doesn't work, we'll just do something different, aimed at loosely the same sort of demographic. And then we'll just try, if that, you know, we're going to do high performance coaching for X, Y, Z. I can't land those sorts of clients. So they're really hard to get. Okay, we're going to do high performance coaching for a slightly more entry level brand of people. Okay, we're still not being able to do that.

37:46Right, we're going to do online group coaching. I'm only saying that because, you know, someone I spoke to literally last week about it. But until you get solid on what your value proposition, the offering is going to be, you're just going to continue to go wider, wider, wider, wider, wider, wider. And then the problem is, oh, there's no clients here. Oh, the marketing doesn't land. Oh, people just don't want to pay for this stuff. No, no, you've not made people want to pay for this stuff. Yeah. Because in the coaching context, this person that I was speaking to, they're worried about getting a couple hundred quid out of somebody.

38:14Tony Robbins is charging you 10 grand. And some. And then you've got to fly to his island And you've got to pay that off your own dime. I think the platinum with Tony Robbins is like a quarter of a million quid a year. There's a waiting list to give him a quarter of a million quid a year. So if you can't sell your 250 quid coaching program, and he's got too many people who want his$250 ,000 coaching program, the issue isn't necessarily the service, it's how you've branded the service and your value in that demographic. I don't know what I've gone off on a tangent. I'll beat you selling it. We've had it all.

38:45Tony Robbins, we have had it all. We've had it all. Well, in fact, talking about Tony Robbins, I went to date with Destiny in December. I'm going this year. You are, it's going to blow your socks off. Where did you go and do it? In America? Yeah, West Palm Beach. Okay, so I'm not doing that. I'm doing the one before that. Okay. The Waking the Giant or wherever it is. The big arena one. Okay, so this, yeah. So you'll enjoy that. You'll enjoy that. So I'm posh. I'm not as posh as you. Well, I couldn't possibly comment on that, James, you know. But I'm just saying, it was life-changing. Was it really?

39:16Life-changing. Completely. Did you go with your partner? Nope. You went by yourself? It was a purely self-indulgent thing. That's what I've done. Yeah. I'm going for six days to Cologne. Yes. It came up, I'm like, I'm just going to go and do it. And I've got loads of mates who would want to go. I'm like, I want to go and do it by myself. Yeah, no, no. I just want to go solo. Honestly, it's a bit bonkers. You've got to go with an open mind. Yes. But personal development, right? Yeah. You know, personal development. And I think if you've always wanted to do something, you should just bloody do it.

39:40Yes. You know, because my catalyst was,

39:46long story and I when I was recovering I thought what you're doing what are you doing you know you need to you need to if you want to do these things bloody do it and so I paid out my significant significant cost of the ticket and the flight and the economy you know it was an investment but it was life-changing so you will absolutely absolutely love it and so yeah I can't wait to hear what happens when you come back and for people who are listening to this podcast yeah what else has got to do with branding? That is an example of branding right there. Yep. I said it earlier. Your brand is your reputation.

40:18It's what people say about you behind your back when you're not in the room. Absolutely. Tony Robbins has gotten in this environment within people who are in the personal development space. You've dropped thousands with him. I've dropped now hundreds with him. I've watched his content. I've watched the Netflix documentaries. The brand position that we have is that Tony Robbins is an amazing coach. Change your life. I'm looking forward to him changing my life. Yeah, yeah, 100%. On the flip side of it, there'll be someone who has got a more negative mindset towards personal development. They'll watch the Netflix documentary.

40:51I saw a lot of this happen. Oh, he's a witch doctor. He's a snake oil salesman. He's just trying to rip people off. He's got 15 ,000 people in an arena and he's taking 1 ,000 quid off each of them. Both of those things can be true because, again, the brand only exists in the mind of the consumer. To you, you change your life. Oh, completely. To me, in September, fingers crossed he's going to change my life. Yep. So we have that brand positioning and it's just a very good example of it lived out unrehearsed. That is branding. That conversation we just had, that is brand. Absolutely. And I think it's really interesting as well, because I often say I'm not for everyone.

41:27I am not everyone's cup of tea. I think you are everyone's cup of tea. I'm genuinely not. Let me assure you. I'm genuinely not everyone's cup of tea. No, I'm not. And I know what I'm good at. I know where I add value. I'm very confident on how I make a difference with our clients, with the businesses we work with, with the individuals, with the pro bono stuff that I do. You know, I'm really confident with that. And I don't I say confident, not arrogant. But it also means that what that means as well is that people will do business with those that they know, like and trust. We know that. Right.

41:58So if you stand for something as an individual or as a business leader or if you're in a job and you're running a department or a part of an organisation, how you carry yourself and your personal values and what you stand for that's aligned to your business or your job or your profession, I think is where the real magic actually happens. and I'm comfortable with that. I am really good. If someone says, oh, you know, I'll start saying, oh, I'm not sure I can afford to invest in X, Y, Z. I'll say, that's absolutely fine because there'll be other people that are right for you and maybe at a different place put a different investment point.

42:38And that's absolutely fine. So I think I interviewed a lady called Barbara Muckerman quite a few years ago and she was the CEO of Silver Sea Cruises. She's now the CEO of Kempinski Hotels, which you may have known. She's a real fireball of a woman, super glamorous, just gorgeous, right? But so, so shithart at what she does. And the conversation we had, and it's just come back to me as you were talking, was about brand. And she said, you have to stand for something. 100%. Otherwise, if everyone likes you, you're a plain vanilla yoghurt, was how she described it. You're a plain vanilla yoghurt, and I don't want to be a plain vanilla yoghurt.

43:17So it's okay, and I think sometimes you've got to be prepared to say, I am not going to go for all of those clients or all of those customers over there. I'm going to focus. I'm going to niche down. I'm going to do that absolutely to the best of my ability. And then once we've nailed that, OK, we might then expand from there. But having the confidence to say no and to exclude a part of the market, I think takes a little bit of courage. But when you do that, it makes the difference, doesn't it? Because then you focus. If you try and be everything to everyone, you end up being nothing to no one.

43:49honestly and those brands become irrelevant and they get forgotten about and it is true and the same with small businesses if people are listening to this going well i'm not a big brand that is the same for you though if you are let's say you're a marketing agency like i could quite easily have a you know a generic marketing agency and at one point i've made that mistake a few years ago we did end up starting to go down these verticals who were more of a of a generalized marketing agency And that resulted in a massive influx of clients, massive influx of cost, massive influx of team. And then I had to shut it all down because I didn't stand for anything.

44:24We were just another. We were another. Whereas for me, for example, how many people have launched 194 podcasts? Very few people. Probably no one else in the world has done 194 podcasts. How many people have been a broadcaster so understands how to actually broadcast podcasts? How many people have been a PR person who understands the back end of it as well? How many people have launched a company that's gone from a standing start to best part of a million quid with three people involved in that company with zero overhead in 18 months? Very few people. So the more I niche down into that, the more value that I can add.

44:57But to your point, you're absolutely right. There is a fear. Broadness is comfort. Every time I speak to a client, bar none, they generally want to go after that chunk of a marketplace. But the more valuable you become is by niching down. And I understand why it's scary because you think that, well, actually, if I'm only going after 5 % of the pie, there's 90 % of people that can't pay for my services. Yeah, yeah, you're right. But you're going to get all of the money in the 5 % rather than get mediocre money from the other portion of that pie, if that makes sense. And it works again and again.

45:32We had a client a couple of years ago and he wanted to be, I have to say it in the right way, is like management consultancy, which is a gig I don't really understand because I'm not from that. I've got, weirdly, I've had lots of clients who've been through, and friends who've been through like Bain and McKinsey and all this stuff. I don't get it. I'm like, what do you people do? You just dish out advice. That sounds like a madness to me. How come you've got a massive office next to, you know, Charing Cross and all you do is dish out advice all day? It makes no sense. But he wanted to be sort of competing with a Bain.

46:06He wanted to put himself in that space, in that sector. But he had a big military background, which, again, a lot of the Bain consultants do because people understand systems and processes and structure. I said, you've got to niche down into that. And weirdly, he'd landed a very big project for a small consultancy firm that would keep him quite contently working for the next two or three years. I said, me personally, you can fight on that battlefield. You can fight and dominate that sub-niche. You can't fight Bain. You can't fight McKinsey. I was quite intentional in my language. like let's put it into a context he understands.

46:41He's been on the front line in Afghan. He's been on the front line in Iraq. He understands fighting. Yep. Where would you want to go and fight? Do you want to just go spray and pray when you walk into a building or do you want to go and sniper it? I mean, that's as much as my analogy can still go to. I sort of run out of road there. I had to think about movies that I knew of. But when he did that, he's still working in that sector now and has killed it in that sector. and when he finishes this massive infrastructure project, which is probably, you know, he's done him very, very, very well financially, the next one will land automatically because of the brand reputation that he's built up in that sub-sector.

47:21That job will come to an end. He'll put some posts out on LinkedIn and the next one I guarantee will walk its way through the door. If he's been consistent with the marketing of, I do this in this place for this bunch of people and that is so much, that has so much more leverage than people understand. Don't fear, fear being broad. Don't fear the niche. See how niche you can go. The more niche you can go, the better. Yeah. And not the other way around. I know it doesn't feel like that to start with, but that is the reality. Yeah, no, I agree. And it's almost like, you know, you want that bullseye, don't you?

47:52You know, if you think of a dartboard, you want a bit in the middle and absolutely smash it there and be known for something, be famous for something. But then you've got the little circle around that, right? And then you can find that all of a sudden, you know, you get the odd client that's a bit random, that's not quite in the bullseye. But before you know it, then gently, gently, you know, you have expanded, but not by like trying to go for the whole dartboard. Isn't it? And I think that that's really great advice for people, isn't it? And like you said, this isn't all about big brands. Any business, even if you're a solopreneur, you are a brand.

48:28You're a brand yourself, which is why I want to then move on to personal brand. Seamless. I can tell you've done 600 episodes of this. She's just taking us on a journey, guys. She knows where she's going. Just enjoy where you're going. Don't worry, Jeanette's got us. I'm in the presence of greatness with Mr. James Byrne. There we go. The podcast hero. Sure. No, because there is a bit of a fear, I think, in business about people are quite comfortable behind the business brand. Yeah, yeah. Right? And you can be, you know, you have a job title. Maybe you have a nice car and you have the bells, the whistles, you have your team, and you've kind of got all this stuff around you.

49:11But that's not who you are. That's what you do. Yeah, yeah. You know, that's what you do. And people confuse their identity. They get their identity so entrenched within an organisation, which can then put them in a sticky wicket when maybe there's a change and they're no longer required, right? So that's a different topic. But personal brand, how do you bring in personal brand into the business world that means you can do everything you need to do for the business but you still can bring out your authentic leadership as we talk about and your personal elements? How do you get that right combination, James, do you think?

49:47So in my own business, I reckon that 80 % of our clients don't know the name of my company. I reckon that everyone comes to work with phonic content because of James Burt. Yep. Which might be the most overblown ego statement ever. And if someone's editing this together, they're going to be like, right, let's cut that ego play out. No, we're definitely keeping that bit in. They're coming to work with me, me, me. But that is the reality of it because it's faster to grow a personal brand because you are your own person every day. And to your point, I think you've beautifully articulated it. Your job is the thing you do.

50:23It's not the thing you are. The job, the career, the role is part of you, especially you and I know from running your own thing, it is all consuming. Yeah. But there's also, do you know, who likes fitness? Do you know, who likes travel? There's all these other bits of you. And people, you know, we were talking before we started recording about some of the stuff that you all work on with some of the brand you all work. It's insane what you're doing. they're coming for you. They're coming for you, not for they're coming for you. But they're coming for you. They're not coming for whatever the limited company is.

50:53I don't even know the name of the limited company. I know Jeanette. And I know if somebody came to me and said, oh, we've got a bit of a challenge with some leadership stuff in the travel sector. I'm like, I know the person you need to phone. What's their company? I don't know. Here's their number on WhatsApp. Yeah, Breakboard Brilliant is the name of the company as well as the podcast. Get it in there as an advertorial. And Jeanette Linford Associates. There you go. But in that instance, I've brought into the person and I will pass on that referral to you, if that makes sense. And even if you're, so I think you've got to use yourself as a tool, which sounds like a very strange thing to say.

51:26I always think of personal brand being like a director's loan. I can loan that thing to whichever company or organisation that I want to. So, for example, Phonic Content is a B2B production company for B2B podcasts. That's what we do. So we work with the likes of Ted Baker, your accountancy firms, recruitment agencies. We do B2B content that is for expert authority, building awareness in your sector. Opening doors and using it as a business development tool, which a lot of people don't use podcasts for. It's unbelievably powerful for that thing. That's what we do within Phonic Content. I've got another business, which is called Pivot Productions Group.

51:58Pivot Productions does joint ventures with celebrity talent, and we basically make their podcasts for them. We jointly own the intellectual property with them. So we've got a football podcast. We've got a boxing one that we're in the process of at the moment. We've got a 90s nostalgia music one we're working on at the moment. And we have got a different marketplace for that podcast company. I also do consultancy. I don't do lots of it, but I do brand consultancy. If people know of me, again, it comes to me through word of mouth recommendation. I don't do loads of it because it's quite intensive.

52:29So when I'm doing it, I can only do it for a small number of people. I don't advertise it because any time I've finished doing a project, another one vicariously will just pop up. It has been much faster for me to grow those brands and companies because of me than it is through the company. You cannot hide behind your logo and expect to get the results. You can't, again, a logo, a company, a colour, a palette, a font, a website isn't a brand. It's the voice of the brand. It's the tone of the brand. If you're the sorts of people that you're dealing with, there will be layers of management and senior management and middle management.

53:05and before a CEO is putting out anything, it's gone through, you know, legals have checked it and it's gone through marketing and it's gone through PR, which it should do at a certain size and scale. But even still now, companies and organisations are starting to see the power of personal brand because people will buy into the personal brand of the people who are pulling the strings within those companies. I might have a really bad experience of Virgin Active, right? I had it this morning. I've been in there. I've been going back consistently for the last three or four weeks since I've had a neck injury, I've had one person in eight weeks say hello as I walk through the door.

53:42That is beep, customer service. Terrible customer service. From a brand perspective, I don't rate Virgin Active and how they look after their customers, quite frankly. But I love Rich Branson. Yeah. I think Rich Branson's amazing. I'm pretty sure if I put a post up and said, hey, Virgin Active, do you want to know a way to build more brand affinity straight away? actually bloody say hello to people who are coming in at 6 o 'clock in the morning. Yeah. Because I've been in and out past the same person today who couldn't be arsed to even look me in the face. I reckon that someone will come back to me from that organisation.

54:15If Richard Branson found out about it, I bet he'd be absolutely fuming. Yeah. But I've bought into the personal brand of Richard Branson more than the service, if that makes sense. I'm not leaving that gym. It's overpriced and the staff are rude. But I love Richard Branson. Yeah. Yeah, so you can build brands so much more quickly, but you have to be mindful of the positioning that you're trying to put out there, if that makes sense. And by the way, if you're sitting here listening going, well, that's great, but I'm not an entrepreneur or an intrapreneur, you can still use your personal brand to scale up and to become more valuable.

54:46To your point, if there's a change of management, change of leadership, there's a buyout, and all of a sudden they're consolidating teams. If you've been putting all of your stuff out underneath the brand of your company, no one knows about you. Now you're on the job market like everybody else, Whereas if you have used your personal brand to leverage and you can just show and highlight the company the right way using your personal brand, then you are in a safer position to be in, frankly, if you're an entrepreneur, because there's no such thing as a job for life anymore. No, not at all. It's just not how we work.

55:14The main way to build personal brand, though, if you are in those situations, is to use your personal experience. Because the most unique thing, everyone's going, USP, you know, unique selling point. The most unique selling point about you is you. Yeah. The you in USP, ironically, is you and the experience you've got, the knowledge that you've got and the person that you show up as. So even if you are in a big organisation, find ways where you can leverage your personal brand through the work you're doing for the organisational brand and put that stuff out there. So, for example, let's say that I am working with this and we are doing some consultancy at the moment for an IT firm.

55:51I will make the client. The hero of the piece. You will not see me talking on LinkedIn about, oh, we are brilliant because we've done this, that, and the other for the client. What you're going to hear me talking about, and you'll probably start seeing it, go back and check it in LinkedIn because if I've done a good job of it, you should see it in the next few weeks. We will talk about how brilliant this client is, how many skills that they've got internally, how it's been an absolute pleasure to take those skill sets and turn it into branded content. We work with the CEO, the MD, and the head of marketing to do X, Y, and Z.

56:21I'm going to build my personal brand up for the work that I'm doing for that organization by making them the rock star. Here's the lessons that I've learned from those people. Here's the lesson. Here's what we've been doing and why we've been doing it for that organisation. So we're kind of bringing both things up. You know, you've got the business brand that's being brought up but also the personal brand. So as I say, I can almost direct as loan it and point it in the thing that I want to point it towards. Like on LinkedIn, for example, I don't post about projects, but I don't post about, you know, come and work with my company, you know, phonic content if you want a B2B podcast.

56:52But I will talk about how brilliant our results are for our clients. Aren't they brilliant? Haven't they done great? And vicariously, people are like, well, you've done the work for them, so you must be great. And then I can leverage that personal brand for the organisational brand. Yeah, you've got to get the right balance, haven't you? Yeah, 100%. And I think as a business owner as well, you can become the blocker to the growth. So it's trying to, you know what I mean, build the infrastructure so that the business runs without you necessarily in the weeds, but your identity is still there. you know you're recruiting people that are aligned with your values as well so that you know where you where you add value where you play uh in the organization as well and i think that's a tricky balance for people but actually you know just be your bloody self you know you just be yourself i think and and and put yourself out to the world and the other thing i would say as well what i see a lot is where people are in organizations for a long time might even be their own business that's been successful for a number of years and then all of a sudden it's not successful for For whatever reason, market shifts, competitor comes along, something's changed and they need to sort of start again.

57:57But during the successful years, they didn't necessarily put themselves out to the world too much. You know, and so networking was almost like, oh, my God, no, it's awful. I'm just out to, you know, give us a job. No, actually, networking is building really, really rich relationships that last for decades. I mean, I've got people in my network that I've known for 30 odd years, you know. And sometimes years later, they might turn into a client or they might naturally be able to give a bit of advice because you start from the point of view of giving first. Yeah. Right? I mean, how many times do you ever get someone that you've not heard from for years and years and years and years, all of a sudden they're out of a job and they bring you up or they send you a message going, oh, I just want to get a bit of advice.

58:42Love your post. Oh, here we go. You know, and I'll always help people. I'm sure you do as well. But it's just such the wrong way to go about it. Build human connections that last, which is where we started off about the value of human to human. And be a good person. Put good out in the world. The law of reciprocity will work its magic. And you know what? You don't give to receive. But if something happens to come back to you further down the line, then fantastic. If not, you've been a good person and you've helped someone. But please, you know, don't just assume that your network is just going to be there without nurturing it.

59:18It's a relationship, you know, and I see that where a lot of people, especially if they're a little bit more introverted, they struggle a little bit. Well, then, if you don't want to be on social media, pick up the phone every now and then and say hi or drop someone a text. That's still building brand. That's building brand. Yep, because you're building reputation. Isn't it? Exactly. So I just think that when we can be our true selves as much as possible, I don't want to see me in my bikini on the beach necessarily on social media. Some people would want to, Jeanette. Maybe they would. Maybe they would.

59:49I'm just going to do like from the waist upwards. Don't want to see my knees or my ass. No knees and ass. But, you know, you've got to bring a bit of humour to life as well. Life is heavy. If that's your thing. And if you are a serious operator, then obviously be the serious operator. I think what people are often scared of, and I used to see it all the time, it's becoming less so now. People are like, they hate the selfie culture. They hate the self-recording video culture. That is where we are going now. Look at the burger debacle last week from the McDonald's guy who looked like he was the CEO of McDonald's.

1:00:26You see that? He was doing a taste test. He looked like he was being held hostage. He's like, hmm, this is really good. This burger is so nice. When you've got the Burger King guy there cooking it and grilling it, he's like, where's the onion? Where's the... Like that felt really organic. Yes. So you've got to be careful with this kind of stuff. But the number one thing that I'd say to people who are scared of doing brand because they're like, oh, I don't feel like I'm showing off. Well, then don't. If you can share a learning or a lesson that helps somebody else, that is building brand. That's branding, not bragging.

1:00:54So when we had the coaching company, we used to have a lot of flash stuff. We'd go and give a talk and we'd hire Ferraris and stuff because that was the brand that was just so stupid. But we had like a drone following these cars and we'd buy stupid watches and we did big stage events at fancy hotels in London. but that was the brash brand we were intentionally building. But even in that instance there, when I'm showing off a result, as long as I give a learning or a lesson, it's branding, not bragging, or not just bragging in that instance. And the same thing for people, whether you're an entrepreneur or an intrapreneur, if you share the learning or lesson, you're building brands, you're not just bragging.

1:01:30And that's where people can buy into you. Again, we said it earlier, people will buy into you. They will buy from you when they buy into you. But you've got to put in that legwork. Like you say, you can't just ghost people for five, 10 years on LinkedIn and then think it's all right to come back all these years later. You need to be putting out consistent content. And here's the reality of it. For those people who go, oh, I don't want to do branding. I don't want to do social media. Tough. Tough. Because that's the world that we live in. Yeah. Tough. You know, you might not want to be contactable 24 hours a day.

1:02:03Tough. That is the world that we now live in. That is the reality that we now live in. If you don't want to play the game, that's fine. but you have to be aware that the game is going to get ahead of you. That is just the reality. It doesn't mean you have to be the one who's sitting on LinkedIn till midnight every night and doing the outreach or whatever it may be. Put some systems and processes around it. You know, if you don't want to be posting content every single day, I also get that. Put some what I'd call content pillars into place. So say, for example, for me, I go, right, one thing is, you know, entrepreneurship.

1:02:30One thing is podcasting. One thing is branding. Let's say I'm going to post about one pillar per week. I've only got to do three things. I could pre-plan it. Right, I'm not going to post about entrepreneurship this week. or I'm going to post about podcasting, I'm going to post about branding this week, takes all the heavy lifting off it and still puts out content that adds value to the marketplace and elevates my position on my brand without it becoming a full-time gig, unless you want it to become that thing. But for those who are going, oh, well, do I have to do it? Yes. Yes, you do. It's just that simple.

1:02:56You know, a mate of mine is just buying a car company. The reason why he's buying these car companies is because they did not move with the times and they thought that they could just sell through dealer networks and force them to sell at a certain price using an old school brochure and that was going to be it. Or maybe we're having like a nice photo shoot of the new model. It don't work like that anymore. Yeah. No, the world has shifted. It's a bit like we're saying about AI. You know, it's not coming. It's here. And any business that isn't embracing AI, you're going to be dead in the water. You're going to get left behind.

1:03:23Or you may become irrelevant. Yes. You may become, you know, maybe a Kodak moment or something, you know, that comes. So listen, loads of amazing advice, James. Thank you. Thank you very much for all of your huge contribution today. We could carry on for hours, I think, chatting and chewing the fat. She can't say where she's got to go, but I tell you what, big in the game, build on personal brand. That's a good example, though, isn't it? Yes. Did they come to you via the company? They came to you via you, I'd imagine, first and foremost. Yeah, from being on stage at the Festival of Entrepreneurs.

1:03:55Got to give a shout out to Mr. Alex Chisnell. And then, you know, people go, oh, interesting. I didn't know you did that. Let's have a chat. You know, so you don't want to be the best kept secret in the world, But you've got to do it in a way that feels congruent with your values and how you want to operate in the world. So, no, I think that's hugely important. And so much value for this. Someone listening, whether you're a sole opener, whether you're in the corporate world, whether you're building a business, scaling a business, shifting brands, podcasting content, we have covered a lot, James.

1:04:22We have covered a lot. So you've given loads of advice. I'm going to come to my final questions, if I may. Okay. What's the best piece of advice that you've been given? Oh, this is brilliant. and I didn't take it at the time because I was a 13-year-old know-it-all, but my dad said to me, and he used to say it to me all the time and I hated it, he went, you, young man, have two ears and one mouth. I suggest you use them in that ratio. I can still remember it now. I can still remember it now. I was probably like smoking a fag thing and I was called like a Benson Edge's gold. What do you even know, old man?

1:04:52You have two ears and one mouth, use it in that ratio. It's such good advice. It's very good advice. And the thing is when you're a good talker, which you are a good talker, actually you know it does sometimes we have to slow down listen because actually when we do that we learn something don't we normally we get the answers given to us there you go top tip very good advice from your old man fantastic what's your dad's name mike mike standout advice from mike yeah i love it love it sadly he passed away years passed away like 15 years ago so i never got to be like a proper grown-up with my dad as one of my my sort of my biggest regrets he He didn't get to be a granddad and stuff.

1:05:31So now my mission is to impart some of the wisdom that I refused to take at the time. He was full of one-liners like that. I love that. It was great. Mike's legacy lives on, which, again, is another great thing about podcasting and these kind of conversations because, you know, you're paying it forward. My dad passed away 13 years ago as well. So Arthur and Mike, wherever you are, if you are somewhere, you know, listening, listening, listening to him. My dad's piece of advice actually was men never make passes at girls who wear glasses. And that wasn't great because I did wear glasses at the time and that led to me having contact lenses very early on.

1:06:09Thanks, Dad. But he gave me lots of really good advice as well. Oh, my God. But I love the advice from Mike, so that's wonderful. So, James, if you could describe this year in one word, what would it be and why? It would be, in one word, stillness. It took me a while to get there, but how do I express it? I am someone who has forever, as far back as I remember, been go, go, go, go, go, go, go. I'll chase down an opportunity. An opportunity will come up. I'll go and do that thing. I was PR, radio, singing, TV, doing all this interesting stuff. And at a certain point, I was like, just sit the F down.

1:06:52Take a breath and work out what it is that you want. I did it, you know, I had to let a bunch of people go. As I say, I had to make 12 or 13 people redundant. It was the worst day of my career. It was pit of the stomach sickening. Something I hope no entrepreneur will have to go through, but most will have to go through at some stage. And I remember sitting there and going, right, if you're going to rebuild now, and I was busy, I was like, what am I going to do? How am I going to help this person find a job? I went, right, well, right, just wait. and I wrote down, do you ever swear on this podcast?

1:07:24All the time. Okay, fine. So I wrote down a piece of paper, what the fuck do you want? And I underlined it, the fuck bit, what the fuck do you want? And I said to myself, I'm not allowed to move for two hours until that piece of paper or that entire notebook is full. That's what I did. I just wrote down, just carried on like this journal of like mad stuff I didn't even know was psychologically buried somewhere, but obviously clearly was. I just kept writing and writing and writing and I got real, real clarity and you only get that clarity from stillness. So I've got very into like breath work and meditation and all these things recently.

1:07:57And yeah, I've really learned stillness. I've got a friend of mine who's very sadly, very, very poorly, you know, matter of days to live. And he I went to see him last week in hospital. He's like, can you come and see me? He's like, of course, I'll come. Like any time, any opportunity to be around you, I want to be there. And he and he sort of said, it's really interesting when you sit still and look at life because everything's just a transition. He said, I've decided I'm not going to die. I'm just going to make a transition. But you only learn that from the stillness. And I was like, you know what I'm saying?

1:08:30Like it just slaps you around the face. I was like, oh my God, like life lesson, write that down. So yeah, stillness would be my word for this year. Weirdly, more positive results are coming off the back of being still because I'm not running around like a headless chicken. Which is another thing my dad used to say. Stop running around like a headless chicken. Yeah, well, it's all linked, isn't it? And like less is more. You know, the point that your dad Mike made about listening, zip it, listen, stillness, Tony Robbins. You know, it's all coming together. It's going to be an amazing year. It feels like you're in this sort of exciting phase, but you've stopped.

1:09:09Yeah, I had to stop to get to the exciting phase. Sometimes there's so many things going on. You know, you run multiple companies. I've got two small children I love more than anything and you're doing the school runs and you've got a fantastic wife and you just do, do, do, do, do. And sometimes I think activity can be a protection mechanism. If I run fast enough, I don't have to look at my trauma. If I run fast enough, I don't have to look at the fallibility in me. If I run fast enough, I don't have to look at my flaws because I'll just go on to the next thing, on to the next thing. If there's something that's not working, again, I said earlier about going a mile wide and an inch deep is a mistake.

1:09:46I think we can do that as people. that you just keep doing stuff to not really actually sit and go, here's the thing, let's just go sit on this table. That's the thing you need to solve. But you run around and come back, it'll still be there. Yeah. Horrible realisation, but I was like, just need to sit still. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But that's great advice because, I mean, there'll probably be loads of people who'll be listening to this, watching this, thinking, shit, that's me. Just sit still and be comfortable in the silence, which is very uncomfortable. And if you feel uncomfortable with the idea of the stillness, that's even more reason why you need to do the snowman.

1:10:19Because I was that. I was that. And I literally wrote down that whole, what the fuck do you want thing? I read a book called The Miracle Morning. Yes, I love that. Brilliant book. And it's got that savers protocol. I started doing that every single day. So I was like, what's got me to here will not get me to there. I was in a bad place. I was like, right, I need to get myself out of this bad place. I've tried running. I've tried running in that direction. In that direction, I've tried running at different speeds. How about let's just stand still for a minute. And since then, I'm not like a Zen Buddha, but I'm definitely, I'm like calmer.

1:10:47I'm more content. I'm happier. Cause that's the thing. I was doing all this stuff. I was so unhappy. I've got all the trappings of stuff that you, I've got a beautiful wife, amazing kids. I'm healthy. You know, I'm sitting there the other day when my power has got days to live and I'm still running around trying to do all this stuff. And he's just telling me to sit still. I'm like, sit, fuck still. David's telling you, sit still. He's closer to an elevation of spiritual enlightenment than you are. Sit still. He's telling you, sit still. So yeah, stillness is going to be my word. Ironically, I talk loads very aggressively.

1:11:18Be still. It's going to be so good for you. Meditate. You'll feel amazing. I still like to do it in a slightly aggressive way. Yeah. No, but there's a real strong message in there. Somewhere. There is. There is. And I'm the same. I do my Miracle Morning every morning. I have done for years and years. Really? The book is by Hal Elrod. Yes. Miracle Morning. Thin little book. Super powerful. Amazing. I agree. It really is. Have you ever had Hal on your podcast? No, I haven't, but I would love to have him. We should get him on. You get him for me, James. I'll get him for you. You get him for me. I'll get him for you.

1:11:48You heard it here, the commitment from James to get Michal Elrod. Yeah, absolutely. So we love music at Brave Bold Brilliant, and you are obviously a big music fan as well. What are we going to add to our playlist from you then, James? It can only be one thing. Tell me. My Way by Frank Sinatra. That song will mean so many different things at so many different points because you will hear the same words, two ears, one mouth. Use it in that ratio. You will hear those lyrics so differently depending on where you're at. If you're in a hole. That song will bring you to tears and will make you have a cathartic emotional experience you need.

1:12:31On the days where you've won, you've landed that deal, you've got a gig, you hear that. you're like, yes, I did it my way. You sometimes will sit and look at your, I'm playing in the car, I look in the rear view mirror and see the kids playing. It has a different connotation to it. But it's the same lyrics heard through so many different sets of ears, depending on where you are at psychologically, I think. So yeah, My Way, Sinatra. It's also my go-to karaoke song as well. It will normally end a night, one way or another. One way or another ends the night. Excellent, I love that. And actually we played that at my dad's funeral.

1:13:05It's often played at funerals as well. There we are. And he definitely, good old Arthur, definitely did it his way. So there we are. So much meaning, isn't there? Yeah, absolutely. So I love that. Fantastic. Thank you. So final question. Now, this podcast, as you know, is called Brave, Bold, Brilliant. What does that mean to you? If you'd have asked me that a couple of years ago, I'd have meant something completely different. But going back to the stillness thing, I think Brave, Bold and Brilliant is working out what you actually want and then being unapologetically driven to go and get that thing.

1:13:38Even if it's not the thing you're told you should get or you think you should be getting, getting clarity on what you want and then chasing that down. Whatever chasing it looks like, that to me is brave, bold and brilliant because otherwise you can find yourself so easily leading a life that you didn't really ask for, but you just got it. you have to be intentional with your decisions to get the life that you really want and that's you know we're here for a for a short time we might as well have a good time to get clear on what you want and then go and relentlessly chase down that end goal that to me is brave bold and brilliant what a way to finish thank you james pleasure thanks for having me i really hope you've enjoyed this episode of brave bold brilliant remember check out our new website www.brave-bold-brilliant.com You're going to find loads of resources on there that's going to help you with your leadership journey and with the businesses that you're trying to scale up and grow.

1:14:41So take care, everyone. And remember, there are no limits to your growth, but it is by being brave and bold that you're going to unlock your brilliance.