Your Trusted Authority Roadmap + Timeframe: What To Focus On When

Everyone knows the importance of doing the right things to get the results you want. However, it’s not just about doing the right things. It’s also doing the right things at the right time and in the right order that makes all the difference.

Since we are kicking off the year which means 52 weeks are ahead of you to achieve your goals, this first episode for the new year will give you the roadmap and the exact steps in the right order. The beginning of the year is often also the time when we plan to start a new career, make changes in our lifestyle, want to establish new habits or a new mindset to make the year ahead the best year yet.

Especially if you’re just at the beginning of any major change, may it be committing to building your Personal Brand and expand your reach to starting a business to step up in your career – it can feel a little bit dicey and overwhelming.

And let’s be honest- the struggle is real because there are so many aspects to consider. However, you’ve come to the right place because I’ll share with you not only the steps to take but also focus on the timeline when you should action what and break it down so that you can feel confident that you’re allocating your resources, from time, energy and money into the right things to get the best possible results based on where you’re at.

Because a much as I’d love to give you an exact ETA when you arrive at your goal, this depends on so many factors that we can’t control so I’d also love for you to focus on the journey and process, not the end results as often, this will open up even more doors. 

Speaking of open doors: This week is the final chance for you to enrol in the Trusted Authority program that we kick off at the end of January. The first workshop will be our monthly content creation workshop which happens on the 18th Jan. Doors however for the first enrolment close on the 12th so you want to be quick and not miss the cut off. Over 12 weeks you’ll learn how to go from technical expert to trusted authority and from unknown to known. Hop over to trusted-authorityu.co for the details and I can’t wait to see you inside.

Now with no further ado- let’s jump into the roadmap for your Personal Branding Growth plan.

Would you put a house on the market when the roof is missing or would you commit to running a marathon before you’ve ever even run 5km?

The bet is you wouldn’t.

Same applies to yoyr Personal Brand journey. It’s a process that goes through different stages and in each of those stages, you achieve milestones that are the tick in the box to move forward.

I always put them into 3 stages which is also aligned with my signature framework: it’s clarifying, communicating and commercialising.

I get it- it’s a lot sexier to jump straight into making money with your personal brand and developing cool looking social media posts and maybe even a fancy logo but if you haven’t even clarified your value prop and developed a value statement around it that you can share, you can have the best intentions but the chances that you’ll be successful with cutting through, let alone making money leveraging your personal brand are quite slim to say the least.

So let’s look at this timeline and the key activities you should focus on to get those deliverables in order to move on to get to the next milestone.

Okay, so let’s talk about phase one, the clarification phase where you get started. So this is when you are literally just in the process of either wanting to become more visible to get more senior appointments, board roles, or speaking engagements, maybe you are considering starting your own business or you are looking to change industry and/or profession and need the attention of those new decision maker.

In this phase you want to get clear about your:

-       Brand Personality (Characteristics, I love taking a couple of tests also to make it easier to put some language towards actions and behaviours that feel so natural but it’s hard to put a finger on them why we act that way)

-       Brand Values (what’s important to you and also, what you want to be associated with. This also makes decisions easier in the long run what you say yes and what you say no to.)

-       Value proposition: what is the best result you can achieve leveraging your credentials + characteristics

-       Positioning: this is where you define what space you want to occupy in the minds of your ideal decision makers. In short: what should those who can open doors and have the power to make decisions think of you? What do you want to be known for (which is closely linked to the results you can achieve as well as the personality you bring in, eg: if you love strategic work and thrive in fast-paced environments, you don’t want to attract opportunities to you that are highly operational, require a lot of attention to detail and outcomes take forever due to a lot of red tape. There is no right or wrong – it comes down to your goals, the type of person you are and the stage of life you’re in

-       Goals: this is where we get more granular and define SMART goals that can be measured and managed. The difference to your vision is that those are actionable and very tangible statements like: increasing your LinkedIn followers by 20 new connections every week. This wouldn’t be your vision obviously but if your vision is to build and monetise a community through consulting offers or your own content creation, then this metrics is one to look at. For me, I look at 4 aspects that I’m tracking and that are part of goal setting. 

They are divided into internal and external metrics. Contribution | Growth | Exposure | Connection 

Contribution: which means what type of conversation do I want to start or lead and am I with the conversations and content that I create on the right track?) 

Growth: how much have I grown personally and professionally? It may be through official qualifications, courses, training or coaching. It may have been because of projects and hands in experience. Last year was a stretch for sure, from setting up an online infrastructure to be able to deliver online courses to learn how to launch (definitely still an area to improve a lot) to writing a book to now learn to market it … by the way – my first book is out. Shameless plug hey  It’s a 373 pages bible how you can go from technical expert to trusted authority and it takes this roadmap that I cover today to the next level.

Exposure; visibilitt is a massive part of becoming the trsuted authority. Let’s be real: being the best kept secret sucks. What’s the point of being the best when no one known of you? For me, I have a numbers goal for how many podcasts I pitch to, to how many speaking enaggements I want to have to how many articles and guest blogs I write to how many podcast eoisodes I record and so on. 

Connection: last but not least: connections measure your network. You don’t need a massive network but you need a strong one, one that supports you, acts as sounding board as well as cheerleader when things go rocky but of course, also who can open doors

This first phase is usually the most tideous one as it requires some deep diving in your current mindset, skill set and heart set. Often, the reason we want a change is because we either feel some sort of emptiness or boredom or simply unfulfillment. It comes down to getting on the core of this and then setting the vision where you actually want to go whoch often isn’t as clear either. I’ve eard many times from my clients thatthey aren’t sure what tey wanted to do next but they wanted to make an impact which is why I named my business impaccct. There is so much confusion going on that detracts from focusing on the big picture and without the clarity, you can’t develop a strategy which is the next part So phase one is the most time and energy intense one but also the most rewarding one. I’ve tried it many times myself whenever I was on a cross road and have never been able to see the forest for trees. I’ve always worked with coaches on this first roadblock so I’d highly recommend you do the same. Any kind of support and sounding board is good!

Now when we have a strategy which is basically the biggest outcome from phase one, we then move into phase two: communication:

This is where you want to ensure that your online and offline presence and communication matches. 

Building a trustworthy and memorable reputation comes down to easy recognisability. This is where your tone and voice and look and feel come in. This is where the first stage outcomes come to life. It’s when you match your values and your value proposition with colours, fonts, elements, images and a voice which means which phrases and saying will you use, how will you communicate? 

In this phase, you also want to define and develop a content strategy that is aligned with your positioning that you defined in phase 1 and that helps you to hone in, cement and elevate your positioning. You want to identify 3-5 content pillars that are perfectly aligned with what you want to be known for, commit to 1-2 platforms where you share content (and that can include an internal communications platform also, especially when you want to improve your internal visibility. This is also when you can start setting up templates that you can use and set up a process that you can rinse and repeat. As for anything – you need to set up a repeatable system and process to maintain doing it to get the results you want. 

Are emojis part of your brand or would it be off brand? You see – the ‘sexy’ part that everyone associates with branding comes in pretty late. Biggest mistake I see people make is they start here and then just abuse stock images and have random posts for any sort of topics. That’s’ when it’s either confusing for people what you do and what you want to be known for or it can be damaging your brand because of the impression you leave behind. This again is why it’s so important to do the groundwork first before you commit to the shiny stuff.

Ok- now let’s dive into the final phase, the most exciting one but I emphasis it again: the last phase in the process. The commercialisation phase.

This is where you align your value proposition, goals and personality with commercial opportunities.

If you don’t know where, how and for whom you can create value that is not only extraordinary but also lights you up, you won’t be in for the long game and make this a sustainable pathway.

If you say you love words and communication but the majority of tasks are analytical and numbers based. Clear mismatch. Same with industries – highly regulated and slow paced vs free fall, fast-paced and ever changing.

Again, no right or wrong- it’s a matter of knowing how you can shine and do it sustainably.

For me, the first insight and experience I had where it was a massive mismatch was in my first role in Australia. It was draining, exhausting and I burned out. Funny fact though- it wasn’t from working too much or having too much on my plate. It was because of the opposite: it was slow, highly regulated, people were extremely unmotivated or inspiring. It was the opposite to what I was used so that clearly was blood money 

It is so important to align your contribution with your strengths and interests. There is no point committing to doing weekly videos if you dread being infront of the camera or when you overload yourself with done for you services when you actually excel in developing high-level strategies that others execute. For me for example, I wouldn’t want to make free facebook groups etc a priority because I’m not good with community management nor do I enjoy it so there is zero return that I’d get from it.

However, what is important in this phase is the network and community piece. This is where the groundwork you’ve done in phase 1+2 pays off by the right people reaching out to you, by the right opportunities being presented and by the right environments that you become part of. Remember – most opportunities are filled through your network so making this an ongoing priority once you’re clear what you bring to the table and can communicate it. 

This is also when you’d consider being a guest on a podcast or speaking at industry events. For me for example, I wouldn’t speak at a say beauty conference because a) that’s not my audience b) I don’t want to build a community around this industry and c) my personality doesn’t fit in there at all. It’s not an interest of mine, nor do I know much about it and the type of people don’t resonate with me. I grew up with my mum being a beautician and let’s just say – we are chalk and cheese  I’m not girly, get bored talking about makeup for 2 min.

In this phase, you also want to consider getting your Brand shots done, professionally taken photos that show you from different angles and facets. I always call them in action, personality and headshots because you’ll need different styles for different occasions. A proper headshot for your online profiles but then more an in action shots when you talk about your work and how you create the results that you have clarified in phase 1. You see – it’s all connected..

This is the framework I developed and work through with my clients. The end-to-end process, working 1;1 and having weekly sessions takes us 3 months to develop not only a solid foundation but also a sustainable process based on the roadmap.

If you do it yourself, it will take a little longer as you will do a lot of research first, lots of testing, trying, probably also a little bit of swearing. I sure did that a lot at the beginning too.

However, if you want to take out the guessing and trialling and want to follow a tested framework but may not be able to invest in a 1;1 program right now but need some structure and strategy, then I’d love to invite you to become part of the Trusted Authority program that kicks off at the end of January. If you listen to this in realtime, you have exactly 1 week until the doors close for good and we are not opening again until March for an April start. Words of warning: the program will be more expensive so if you’re looking for a sign … this is it!