0034: Building a Global Personal Brand & Why your business should with Personal Branding Expert & Global Influencer Hope Brookins

Ea interviews episode 34 inspiration, transformation, success stories and the imperfect action round. Seven days a week join Mario Ficcini for today's Expert Authority Effect interview. Expert Authority World Today is a great day and I'm excited to share with you. Have you ever wanted to do personal branding? Have you ever wanted to get your brand out there? Have you ever wanted to go viral? Have you ever wanted to be on tv? How about have you ever wanted to have your life turned into a movie? Have you been on a thousand plus media outlets? Well, I'm excited to share with you today. Hope Brookins, she has done all of these things and she's going to be sharing with you the importance of personal branding and how you're going to be able to do it for your business and life. So we're going to bring her up right after we thank the sponsor. Congratulations, you got started with your cell phone and I welcome you to the live streaming game. Now you're comfortable on camera and going live regularly but I caution you don't get stuck in startup mode. This is why I stepped up my game with Wirecast Pro and advise you do Too get your 30 day free trial at eainterviews.com Wirecast Here she is everyone, Ms. Hope Brookins. Hope, how are you doing today?

I'm great. I'm very excited to talk to you about all things self promotion and personal branding today.

What inspired you to get into it? Why personal branding? Because I've had people ask me, you know, they think it's kind of controversial because some people believe you shouldn't be self promoting or you shouldn't promote yourself or do any of these things. And while I agree it shouldn't be about look at me and egotistical and stuff of that nature, if you have a business, it's absolutely paramount to getting the message out there and getting the visibility out there. How do you tread that line and what inspired you to get into it?

I definitely cross way over that line first of all. But what inspired me to really start helping other people build their personal brands and their personal brand platforms is I love it when people are living their best lives and presenting who they really are to the world. The good parts and the bad parts. I think that too many times in society we're told to fix the bad things, to hide the bad things and I'm all about leveraging the bad things to make money and get attention on the Internet.

Do tell me more about that. How do you leverage the bad things.

So often?

When clients first come to me, maybe They're a financial advisor and they've been in debt. Or maybe they are a. Or look at myself. When I first started, I was scared because I thought the worst thing about me is that I was young. Well, for example, the financial advisor that I worked with was able to leverage the fact that he knew what it was like to be in debt. And I was able to leverage the fact that I was young and a millennial to say that, to help clients who were also millennials and to add a fun millennial young spin to all of my work that people are, quite frankly, looking for these days.

So who would you say you help and how do you help them? Because there's a lot of people that need your services. But who's your ideal client?

I work with professionals. Now, that sounds kind of broad, but it's people who are really good at what they do. It's not people who are trying to learn a new skill or do something new. It's people who are already really good at what they do and just want to get more for it. Most of my clients usually end up being millennials. It's just who loves me. But I do work with some older people and I'm sure that long term, I'll work with some Gen Z too.

All right, so we have to have a qualifier on there. What do you qualify? Older people.

Anyone older than millennial.

Well, that's a interesting thing because I've looked up the whole millennial thing and there's about a six year span that depending on the source, it could be.

From 81 to 84.

What's your take on it?

I don't have numbers memorized, but typically whatever source is like whatever source allows for the oldest definition of millennial. That's usually where my client range cuts off. All right, it's people who may not even know their identity, Millennials before they start working with me and learn it afterwards.

Well, that's cool you're creating new ones.

Well, technically, they just didn't know they were one.

All right, so what's the process you take them through? Tell me more about what you're actually doing for them. And let's say I'm already a successful business owner and I want more attention. What are you going to do for me?

Yeah, I work with clients in two main ways right now. I either help them build their platform from the ground up, or I just help them get publicity if they already have a platform built. So since the latter is a little bit more self explanatory, I can dive into the More general platform building to start off with. So when I. When someone first comes to me, they're usually already successful. They usually already have a lot of great things they've done, but they're not talking about them. So I help people define the bigger category of what they want their message to be so that they can then move forward and.

Leverage all of these things that they've already done that they're already really accomplished that I've had people who have had days named after them. They literally have a day named after them and they don't even talk about it, or it's not even a public thing. It's not even in their bio. So helping people take all of those things and then leverage them into a bigger platform. So for some people, that looks like helping them refine a message that is going to work better for them to be on stages. For some people, that means refining a message that's going to shoot them off towards a reality show or towards a podcast or a book, whatever. So it's all about refining that initial message so that they have clarity and can move forward very strategically so they're not wasting any time.

Why do you think most people have a hard time with that? Because I've experienced it with my clients as well. When we're working on their messaging for their book or their show or whatever the case may be. I can totally, 100%, unequivocally relate to the whole award, award, award, recognition, recognition, award. And they're like, is anyone going to listen to me? Like, really? You have a whole wall of accomplishments over here. Why do you think that is?

Well, society tells us that we cannot be proud of ourselves. Society tells us that we cannot take credit for our accomplishments. And that's just wrong. Because if you, as an experienced person, don't credit for your accomplishments, then people who are much less experienced will end up with the clients and they won't be able to help them as much as you would. So the way that I help people is helping them focus on a very specific category. So if they're someone who deals with. If they're someone. If they're. If a business owner comes to me who owns a software company that's all about lead generation, they're not going to go speak on stages about lead generation. That's not going to lead them to have a bigger platform. What's going to lead them to have a bigger platform is a more overall focus on communications or on communicating with your personality, communicating with fun, whatever. So I'm helping them identify that Bigger picture thing and then basing a strategy around that, it helps expand their audience, it helps expand their platform, and it gives them a lot more opportunities, whether in the media or in their own brand and business.

Have you ever suggested to a client to do something that's referred to as contrarian, such as you're saying if they're doing software, they're probably not speaking as an author would. Have you ever told them to cross that bridge and break into it for the sheer fact of no one else is doing it?

Most of my clients are very ambitious. Ambitious would be an understatement to describe most of my clients. So they already typically have dreams of conquering the world.

I don't know if I've ever had a single client who doesn't already have it in the back of their mind that they belong on a stage. Sometimes they don't know why or what for, but they know that they have a message that they need help clarifying to take on stage. So typically for me, you know, once or twice I've had to say, you need to write a book. But overall, they already had that on their to do list too. So I'm very lucky with the type of people that I attract that it's more like honing down their ambitions and saying, okay, you're going to do your, you're going to do all of these big things, but first let's focus and then let's make a step by step action plan. Because you can't do, you can't take over the world in one year.

That is very good advice because so many people underestimate what they can do in five years and overestimate what they can do in one year. So how do you break that down? If I say, you know what, I not only want more attention, I want to write a book along with the podcast on video and I want to be speaking three times a week around the country and I want to open an E commerce store. And why not? Let's have some swag too. We need mugs printed.

This sounds like my typical sales call. So the first thing that I usually do with people is define their goals. And that sounds big and broad, but overall, what it really comes down to, 90% of my clients, their number one goal is to make money immediately. So while all of those things are big fun, brand and platform builders, the clothing line, the magazine, the podcast, we typically based on client goals, instantly look at what is going to generate the most revenue for you in your unique situation right now. Sometimes that is public speaking, sometimes that is more one on one consulting programs or courses. But typically what we're making, the top priority is making money.

I love that as the top priority. I also take my clients through it and whether it's the books, the show, whatever the case is, if you don't have sales, you don't have a business. Have you ever had any clients that want to be on stage, they want to do all these ambitious things, they have high minded goals, but they don't like selling.

No.

Really.

I think that because I tend to work with more people who are already business owners. Owners, that's what they're good at. They're usually better at selling than me. One of the funny things that happens to me on sales calls often is that my clients are almost selling me on why they should work with me. And I'm like, you just took over my sales call, but you sold me on myself. Like, yeah, I'm convinced. You need a personal brand too. So it's really funny. I think I'm in a unique situation there with the type of business owners who come to me that they're good at sales, they're better at sales than me, they don't need help with sales, they're not afraid of selling themselves. I think what most of them lack as opposed to the sales goals is they need to focus. Because like you said, they have 20 million dreams and they have, you know, 5 million different things that they're actually really good at. They're so accomplished that they just need to hone down and pick out which thing to focus on and really explode out there into the universe.

Well, that is awesome that you have that set up. It's one of the things I help my clients set up in their business because I encounter it. It's maybe 50, I was going to say 50, 30, 50, 50, 70, 30. Whatever the case is, some people like sales, some people don't, but they want to get better at it. They might, you know, they might not want to do it, but they know they need to. And there's nothing better than when I help them create a qualification process. And I know exactly what you're talking about, where you're on the phone going, I never said yes. Tell me one reason I should allow you in my program. I've said that to my clients and all my best ones. I'm thinking of a lot of them right now and even one that just recently got started and we're launching her book in about six weeks. It was the same thing. What do they all have in common? They're all going, oh, here's why I'd be great. Here's why I'd be great. Here's why I'd be great. And then the other type of people who I don't really work with anymore, they're just going, so what about this? What about that? Like that entitlement, like I called you, you should take me on. And I tell everyone, absolutely not qualify them, and if they're not selling to you, they're probably not the best fit. So that's awesome. You have it all the time, right?

No, it's amazing when they're like quoting my own bio.

Like, is this normal? It's a really interesting thing.

They've done their homework.

Yeah, I think. And that really comes down to very ambitious people show up and they're ready to take action.

Absolutely decisive decision making. It's one of the number one things I have running throughout my training is imperfect daily action. It doesn't need to be perfect. Just keep doing something. Let's talk about transformation. What's the biggest transformation you've ever been able to give to a client?

Well, not that I'm all about self promotion or anything here, but absolutely the biggest transformation I've ever given to anyone is my own mother. It's kind of a cheat because I certainly put a lot more hours into working with her or years than a typical client. But she went from an author of a book, it had sold in a very big New York publisher's auction, but we went from that to over 2 billion views in the media in one year.

So.

So it was quite the process. What we did is we built a platform around my mom's story and my family's story about building our own house using YouTube videos. She wrote the book to continue that platform. She started doing speaking and then when we shared the story with the media because of the platform we built, because we had the websites, because we had the social media presence at the time, I think on Twitter alone, my family had over half a million followers combined. So we had a big. We had built that platform. So when the media did come, we were able to leverage it in a different way and on a different level. That allowed our story to go viral, very viral, very quickly, with over a thousand media outlets in two weeks in 65 countries and 35 languages that later grew to 75 countries. And honestly, it's impossible to track because of translation issues on the Internet. But it. That doesn't happen without building that platform, which is what I help other clients do. It just, you know, it Works really well when you can invest yourself full time into it for a few years for a family member who has to listen to everything you say.

And I'm sure she's very appreciative of it.

She is. Hence why she's letting me borrow her beautiful library for this interview today.

Well, tell her thank you for me because I do like the background. And let's talk about your background with politics and working with the politicians in the past. How did you segue that and transition it into personal branding for entrepreneurs? What are the similarities and the differences?

Yeah, I mean, ultimately, when it boils down to it, working with any sort of public figure is very similar. So I started off working in politics in Arkansas, which is a whole different political climate if you've ever been involved in politics in, in any other state. I was 17 when I first started. I started working on campaigns with local candidates. Before I knew it, I had worked for an intern for President Clinton and then 14 plus US Congressmen in Washington D.C. so I got a really quick introduction, quicker than most people into the world of these public figures. Who, you know, most people, when you think of a pup, when you think of the word public figure, you probably think of a politician. That's probably one of the first people that you think of after you hear that word. So it was a, it was a more natural transition to start working with entrepreneurs doing personal branding, because that's what I was doing. For politicians, they are the ultimate brand builders. They have their political signs, their campaign buttons, their campaign stickers. It goes beyond that, of course, but no one else in society has permission to be self promotional in a way that politicians do. And that's one of the things that I'm able to uniquely help people do because of my perspective there. Most people with personal branding have a corporate, corporate background, working with corporate brand identities. And regardless of political feelings here, corporations are not people. So most people who are helping people build personal brands are turning them into a company, which is kind of crazy because we have thousands and thousands and thousands of years of history of public figures, of queens, of kings, of conquerors, dictators, whatever style you want your brand to be, who have set a precedent of how to be a successful figure, of how to grow a cult like following, of how to do this whole being in the public eye thing. So, so that is who I look to and that is how I have developed my programs and my systems based around actual public figures.

So the background for the politicians, you're saying, is similar to entrepreneurs. But do you tell the entrepreneurs that. Do you ever specify like we're going to do online only or offline only? Because with politicians, I think it's cool that you're doing both. But is it the same for everyone?

What do you mean, online only or offline only?

So what you're saying about the campaign buttons in the door hangers and all the political swag, do you recommend that? Is that part of your system for safety?

I like it.

As far as. Do you recommend it to all clients all the time, or is it case by case? Because I know with politicians, you know, we've all seen it, they got the cool things and I love direct mail and I love offline stuff, especially now because so many people are focused on email only and Twitter only and this, that the only other thing only they forget. You can send someone a handwritten letter or they send them something in the mail, you know, whatever the case may be. And you're cutting through that. Twenty years ago, that wasn't the case. But it's. I feel it's come full circle. How do you handle that?

Yeah, whether I'm looking at politicians or entrepreneurs or authors, I look at it on a case by case basis. But overall, when you're building a brand around yourself, when you are trying to become a public figure, you're doing the same things. You are establishing your credibility online with the website, you're establishing your credibility in person with some sort of swag, whether that looks like campaign buttons for a politician or oven mitts for a cooking expert. You have branded swag. So, yes, it definitely is different in terms of the specific swag based on your industry. But I don't think that anyone can have a successful personal brand just on the Internet or just in person, not in 2019. I think that it's a. It's a multifaceted approach there.

I love that we're gonna quote that part. That is powerful right there. So let's talk about video, because I know you love video and everything we had to do to set this up. So how has video helped your business over the years?

I think that going live, showing up on video, letting people see who you are on camera, letting people see your personality is essential in 2019 and going forward in 2020. It is the way that you connect with people. And reality TV is ultimately, I think what changed that in society and what gave us permission to be real and to not be a.

Boring old.

Scripted TV host or TV show. So I think the reality TV talk shows, those all have given us permission to show up the way that we should these days with our personal brands on video. So for me, I think that video has.

It'S been a challenge because I have been banned from video for a while because of other contracts with reality tv. But being able to show up now is just so vital to letting people get to know the real you, whether it's on an interview like this or whether it's in the bloopers from an interview like this when everyone gets to see you as a complete mess. So it's just that it shows different facets of your personality in a way that nothing else can. Also, it's the easiest thing for people to consume. There's nothing more lazy than consuming video content. You have to press play. You can close your eyes, you can listen to it, you can have it on mute, you can watch it. There's literally no other type of content that requires less interaction to absorb.

Very succinctly put, video, I would say is a lot of fun and.

Video is fun. Technology for video, ugh, not so much.

All right, well, we're gonna go to the imperfect action round. But first we're gonna thank the sponsor. Instead of trying to get your prospects attention, why not be so captivating they can't look away? That's a quote from my book, Video Marketing for business Owners that I created as a reminder for both my clients and myself for success on camera. And that's why I use Wirecast Pro for my professional productions. And I advise you do as well. Get your 30 day free trial today at eainterviews.com wirecast and start filming your show professionally the way your brand and audience deserves. Once again, that's eainterviews.com forward/wirecast. And we're back with Hope Brookings. Hope, are you ready to take imperfect action?

I am, I am.

So guess what the first question is. No clue. Awesome.

I did not review this.

That's fine because I actually like surprising people and it makes it more interesting. And I'm gonna ask you, so what is the fastest path to the cash you'd recommend?

Service based offers, whether that's events, high end coaching, Getting in and offering something that is an instant thing for people is always going to be the fastest way you can make money. Building a platform is a long term game. It will make you more money long term, but it's not going to make you tons of money up front.

In your experience, what, what do you find it takes? Should people expect a Couple of months, 6 months, 12 months to build a.

Platform or to make money to build A platform ultimately is going to take you years. It's something that I help you start doing. It's something that you can do a spectacular job on in two weeks if you a lot. But long term, building a platform, building credibility, building a reputation is not an overnight thing. And I think that that's. There is no such thing as an overnight success.

So that's the biggest thing that people want. This isn't a pill that you take magically and you've lost £60. You have to put in the work and do it.

I love that you talk about that because so many people go oh, overnight success. And it's like if one of my favorite things to do growing up was look at celebrities and, and movie stars and when you start hearing about them, go to IMDb and look when they started and it was generally 10, 12, 15, 18 years prior.

Yeah, when I look at my family and the movie deal, we've been talking about this for a decade now. It's just now finally been optioned and they're attaching actresses, etc. So it's not. People think it happened overnight, people think we went viral overnight. But there was a platform before, there were years and years of work before that made that all happen, that set up the infrastructure so that could all happen.

Well, I'm glad you touched on that because it's right. You don't need to take years to make money, but realize the difference between short term game plan and long term game plan. So.

Right.

Solid gold nugget hashtag. So the second one, imperfect action number two is what is the biggest issue problem.

Challenge you see with your prospects? What are they doing? That is a repetitive theme. And what's the fastest way they can fix it?

They aren't being on brand and they need to define what their brand is in order to be on brand. That's the quickest thing anyone can instantly do after a single phone call is start being more intentional about the way they're showing up and the way they're presenting themselves and making sure that that's something that represents their long term goals.

Can you give me one example? What do you mean on brand? So when you're saying show up online, offline, in person.

Showing up everywhere, first of all, showing up, showing up almost means more of fully encompassing that thing. Now back to.

How they do that or what it means to be on brand is they need to have their message, they need to have that bigger overall specialty. Like we talked about earlier, whether that's communication or like my specialty for example, is Self promotion. It encompasses all of the things I do. They need to have that thing defined so that every time they show up, whether that's at a local chamber of commerce networking event, on an interview, on their own Facebook page, wherever they can tailor what they talk about to that topic.

Love it. Absolutely love it. Because so many people don't get that they put on one face in person. I feel they do another one online. Heaven forbid they're speaking. Then they go into speaker mode and it's like just I tell people, be yourself, like who you are. Just show up that way. Because now it's less work too. Oh, this seems like a lot of work. Well, be congruent.

I want all of their faces to be them. I want all of their faces to be authentic. And it's actually really hard to be authentic. So.

Showing up as yourself and with your message is a harder thing than most people realize.

Well, I'm glad you touched on it. So the last thing I want to ask is customer lifetime value. How do you maximize it in your business? So that way, you know, if you're working with someone today, how do you extend that ongoing. So that way it's, it's not just like revolving door.

Right, Right, absolutely. So for me, what's really great is I'm helping people build a platform. I'm helping people build this thing that they can become known for. And then I take on a handful of select clients, usually after they've been through that process, for publicity services and for PR services. So not only do I help them build the platform, but then long term, I help them get really good high value media attention for that platform. So they always want more media attention. So that's, that's a great way to keep them coming back. And most clients, when they start working with me on the first call, they say, I know I need to define my platform now, but long term, I need publicity help too. They know they want to be in the media. That's not a surprise to them. Once they're done developing their brand platform, they know that before they've developed their brand platform. So usually people already have that in mind. It works out really well.

Very good. So where can people find you?

Yeah, people can go to hopebrookins.com and find me and my social handle on literally every single social media platform is ookens.

One last thing before I let you go. What is one book that has made the biggest impact on your life that you'd like to recommend?

I am obsessed with every book that Robert Greene has written. So I would have to say that the 48 laws of power is a favorite. If you don't want to read a book that big, then go with his the 50th law, which is kind of a follow up to that one, but much shorter.

Very good. Well, it's been an absolute pleasure. It was a lot of fun and I am excited to go back and re listen to this myself because you were seriously sharing a lot of good information and I got a lot out of it myself. So thank you.

Thank you so much. I hope we can do a bloopers reel of all the fun we had before the episode.

We should be able to.

Not a problem at all. Thank you for helping me create it.

It was truly a pleasure.

All right, Hope, have a great rest of the day and I will look forward to seeing you again. You're already successful, You've worked hard to get where you are. We both know it wasn't overnight and hasn't always been easy. No doubt you're the expert on your subject matter, but do your prospects in your marketplace think of you first as their go to trusted advisor all the time? ExpertAuthorityChecklist.com is 100% free and reveals the 21 steps to determine if your prospects view you as the expert and authority of your marketplace or if it's just all in your mind. Important required steps like do you have a process in place for prospects to self identify if they qualify for your time and expertise or not? Does your current offer have the seven components of an irresistible offer required to make it a no brainer for your prospects? Do you have a real life paperback book showcasing you as the subject matter expert you can actually hand someone? Get your free Checklist now@expertauthoritychecklist.com Once again, expert Authority checkl to make sure you have the 21 steps covered. It better not be more, but don't leave those one or two things you may have missing go any longer. Visit expertauthoritychecklist.com and make sure you're being seen as the expert in authority today. Once Again, that's expert authoritychecklist.com get your copy now. Congratulations, you got started with your cell phone and I welcome you to the live streaming game. Now you're comfortable on camera and going live regularly, but I caution you don't get stuck in startup mode. This is why I stepped up my game with Wirecast Pro and advise you do too. Get your 30 day free trial at eainterviews.com forward/wirecast. Thanks for listening to the episode. I hope you got a lot of value out of it. Let's continue the conversation over in the community. Expertauthorityworld.com we can have discussions, talk about the episodes, and I'd love to get your thoughts on it once again. Expert authorityworld.com.