How To Build A Successful Personal Brand: Masterclass with Landen Conner and Stephen Scoggins

What is it that you really, really want to see? When people see your visual media, is it a video? Is it a photo? What do you want them to feel? What do you want them to see? That question alone makes them sit back and think. When that transformation happens and you see that sparkle in their eye, you realize you touch the personal as well as the business at the same time.

Guys, help me welcome my good friend, Landon Connor. Man, what is going on, dude?

How you doing, man? It is going great. I can't even lie to you. I love everything that's going on with what your brand is doing. Really inspirational and keeping me going.

Yeah.

So I'm so happy to be here with a good brother of mine right now.

So. So you're saying we're. We're make. Together. We're making an impact.

Making an impact.

I love it.

So, you know. You know, I remember our first conversation. It was all business. Then the second conversation when we met.

Yeah.

And we both had a heart to serve people, and that was. That's what we connected.

Yeah. Yeah. Well, for those of you guys who don't know, Landon does a lot of different things. I can't wait to dig in a lot of that with him today. But one of the things he's done for us specifically is, is he's been the man behind the camera so many times at Ed, my book launch, at our own launch, our live events, he's done personal brand photography for so many thought leaders that I've brought through the doors. He's also taken the time to sit down and go. Go hand by hand with them through an impact branding strategy, which is one of the reasons I wanted to bring him on today, because he has unique perspective on how they actually get a true impact branding in a world full of noise and chaos. And, you know, how does a personal brand or an aspiring personal brand, you know, try to get themselves to be seen, valued, heard from the impact they're trying to make? So tell me a little bit why you found yourself into this imprint impact branding theology. Like, what. What drew you to it?

Truthfully, it was my clients. As a business owner, a lot of times we're so close to the business that we want the business to run and we neglect the most important part of it, which is the client. So in my.

It was impact. Branded was a more of a spin off from my headshot photography. In headshot photography, I would always get these stories back about them landing better jobs, getting spouses, so those type of things. And I started looking at it. But the most Thing, the thing that really stood out to me is that the person internally was transformed and healed. So I was like, maybe I'm marketing and branding to themselves first and then to the audience.

Yeah, no, that's awesome. Well, you know, now that you're doing it heavy, heavy and hardcore, what do you feel like that a lot of personal brands or aspiring personal brands get wrong when they're trying to come out of the gate strong?

I would say messaging and what. I mean, not your typical messaging, what you say. It's what people see.

Okay.

So if you don't mind, indulge in. Let's make it real and relevant.

Yeah.

When we're dating someone, let's just say we're dating somebody online. The first thing that attracts you is that image. So if you say you want to serve somebody, I come to your. Your website. Are you really serving somebody, or do I just see you all the way down when you want someone to connect with your story? And what was that light bulb moment where you went from, let's just say, stuck to unstoppable? Mm. Do I see that in your email message? Because I need you to stop. Because our attention spans are really short with so many dings and pings going on. So the image makes them stop. What has a story now? Do we have the words to get them hooked into the point that we're trying to make?

Yeah. No, that's good. You know, one of the things I've seen people struggle with a lot in trying and I. Well, I'll say I've seen others. I have been the person struggling a lot is, you know, my life has been so widespread, so many different things, things from business to life to all kinds of stuff, that I found myself wanting to communicate everything to everyone. Like every little nugget that I have. And, you know, in building a business or building a marriage or building a life or, you know, so on and so forth and, you know, it dawned on me that the more I did that, the less it actually helped me attract people who actually believed in what I believed and how I believed it and what I was going to do next and all this kind of stuff.

Yeah.

And it wasn't until we started really refining who was actually watching our content, who was consuming our content, who was listening to the podcast, who were coming to the seminars, who were. Who were messaging us through the DMs, like, who, like. And I learned it early on that all of them had one thing specifically in common. They're either an aspiring achiever or an early stage startup or an early stage entrepreneur, I should say. And those two things kind of surprised me because I spent my first year or two focused on the life mastery space because, you know, I'm a person believes that everything flows out of you. So if I can fix you, I can fix your business. What I didn't realize was, is the people didn't actually want to admit that their life was all messed up, but they had zero problem admitting that they wanted to build a bigger business or a better business, you know, so, like when we did an unstoppable startup, for example, I discovered that business is the concept, it's the vehicle that people want. And then I actually get to feed them business, but I also get to feed them life, which is exactly what they need, which is why people have powerful emotional experience as a result of that. And it wasn't until I actually went through some of the impact branding stuff with you that I actually really super got like super dialed in and clarified on that because, you know, I was spending a lot of time and energy basically aiming all my arrows in the wrong direction.

Yeah.

You know.

Give me one of the most transformational stories that maybe of one of your clients that you've already worked with that that kind of helps you, man.

I think the one that stands out the most, it's a few, actually, but the one that stood out the most was I was working with this. I was working with a church, a fellow church member, and he asked me to come in and do some behind the scenes photography. And I said, sure. This is in the early stages of my startup. I said, if you can let me do headshots for the whole crew so y' all can attract the clients y' all want to attract. He said, sure. But the actress was like, nope, I don't want to do it. Just shut me down.

I was like, okay. I'm like, ma', am, if you give me five minutes, just five minutes. If you don't like it, it'll never see the end of day.

So she gave me five minutes. The headshot was, of course, phenomenal, but that's when I was more focused on a product. She called me back four days later and was going off in a good way and said something. She's like, lana, you don't understand what this did for my life. I posted this on Facebook, got over 100 reactions within eight hours, and it was all people saying how phenomenal I looked. I was like, okay. But she also said something that really made me stop when I was driving, which was, you don't Understand, I was the ugly duckling. I was talked about. I was beat up verbally and mentally, and you just showed me who I am. Fast forward a couple of years later. I just met this guy that's based in North Carolina. South Carolina. I think that's what Clemson is. Yeah. And he called me the next day after a session. He said, bro, I don't think you know what your value is. I'm like, what do you mean? I'm at the high end of Orlando.

Yeah, yeah.

He said, bro, you don't understand all the crap that I've been through, all the stuff that I've been through. Everybody saw me as just an athlete that was going to the next level. You showed me where I'm going.

Yeah.

And when that transformation happens and you see that sparkle in their eye, you realize you touch the personal as well as the business at the same time.

Yeah. Yeah. That's awesome. Why is personal branding, like, even important and relevant nowadays? Like what. What are you seeing in the marketplace?

I think personal branding is a little different. A lot of people is. They give you the basic definition of what you say about a person, about your business. Truthfully, I believe that personal branding is everything from what they say to the paraphernalia that they pick up to the emails they open, to the YouTubes you watch. So something must be different about your. It's about you that's going on that makes me want to sit and watch it. That makes me want to sit and entertain. Okay. If I'm going stuck to unstoppable.

All these people getting breakthroughs, I just need to plant to see is, what if I get a breakthrough?

Yeah, no, that's really good, because I. I do feel like. I think there's really two ways to do, or maybe even three ways, but two ways specifically that I see personal branding done. The first way is superficial.

Right.

It's about maybe the stuff that you own or the stuff that you want to show off and all that kind of stuff. And then there's the person who's intentional about what they're trying to communicate and how they're trying to communicate in the world. And the crazy part is, on the first one, that person launches out there with no problem, but then quickly drops off because there's no. There's no depth, you know, to. To the perceived value.

Yeah.

The other one. The other one's a bit more like a rubber band. Right. There's. It. It seems like they. They. In some cases, they feel like they're not getting progress or not getting Progress, not getting progress. And it's because they're trying to get refined and clearer and clearer and clearer and clearer. And then all of a sudden you, you snap that rubber band back and that person is like catapulted forward. You know, that's a lot of what happened with our, with, with what we've been doing behind the scenes. You know, we went through this process for probably three or five years of really trying to really hone in and get super clear on, on who we are, what we're about. Why, why does it matter who we're actually called to serve? And I think every person is like, I'm called to serve everybody. You're really not. I've had to learn that the hard way. Not everybody actually cares necessarily about taking their life to another level or business another level or whatever. So there's all these different attributes that I see consistently. But it seems like, it seems to me that the people that spend the most time trying to figure out the personal brand, trying to communicate with consistency, tend to do pretty, real, pretty, pretty well. The tricky part I ran into is when you're trying to be consistent and you've got team members working for you or working with you to help you. You know, I was, I was telling you off air that, you know, I've been in my big business now, like feet first, head down and stuff for months because of some big things we're doing. And you know, most of the audience wouldn't have any clue about that because my team is out there. They're, they're, they're, they're cutting up the snippets we already recorded and they're posting stuff as we already did it and all this kind of stuff. But I will tell you, it's taken me almost a good four years to find one social media technician specialist that can actually speak in my voice.

Right.

So you talk about brand consistency. The people I had doing it before, it was inconsistent with who I was or how I was being perceived or come across.

Yeah.

So I'm interested to know how, how does somebody find consistency and, or communicate consistency, especially if they have a team.

I would say I'll flip this question back to you. What does a leader mean to you? Give me, give me three, three one word answers.

To me, a leader is someone who is willing to take the chance on the front end knowing they're going to create leaders on the back end.

Yeah. So if I had to submit it and I always ask this question, did I never get this answer? I started to think about what does a leader do? You and I both are followers of Christ and I always, and I started to think about it, he always submitted to the Father. So I look at, if I'm going at a team to get that consistency, can that person submit to learning, most importantly, listening?

Yeah.

Because you and I have a background together and I've seen you in action. A lot of times you're submitting, trying to build these people's lives up. So if you submit and can listen, they can speak consistently in any voice.

Yeah.

So that's what I found is the most critical thing, listening to what's going on to that person's life. Okay. How can we talk to this person to get them to believe in themselves and then the business follows. Because now I believe I can do anything.

Yeah, yeah, no, that's good. That's good. How does your, how does your particular process actually work? What kind of stages do you take.

People through when they first book? I have to speak with them in a one on one. The reason being, let's take an example. When we first met, you didn't say this to me at all. When we first met on Zone, we were just like, we need to get this product done. We're going to get this, this done. And we talked about a lot of business. But in the back of my mind I heard something. If I could take this headache or this pain off of his plate with something he doesn't have to worry about and I can serve him in excellence, then this dude can breathe. Now you saw the product and the product was, you love the product, but the product was secondary to me serving you. So how can we make this event venue on the, on the east coast better than anybody, any experience that anybody ever had. So acting like it's my own.

That'S how that whole process goes. And then asking those questions, what is it that you really, really want to see? When people see your visual media, Is it a video? Is it a photo? What do you want them to feel? What do you want them to see? And it makes it, that question alone makes them sit back and think.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Well, I think the other thing that one of the other things that I've seen you do, which I thought was pretty cool, was, you know, one of, one of our mutual clients needed to have some photography done. So we did the photography, which was great. And then he said, you know what? One day I want to be a speaker. And I was like, why not today? What are you talking about? I said, well, you're standing in front of a Stage do get on stage.

Right.

And then you and I proceeded to try to unlock his hidden potential. And before long, he was, he was confident, he was up there, he was shouting, he was speaking, he was being passionate and all kinds of stuff. Do you find that a lot of folks really haven't really discovered really what they have hidden inside, even at the personal brand level?

Yes, yes. And I would go a little deep. I think they're afraid. And you and I've talked about this, what success may actually look like. And it's a lot of excuses. We tell ourselves we have those hard days where it's like, I'm not, I'm overweight, I don't feel confident on stage. There's no way I can do this. Like just being in those, that mutual client that we're talking about.

Yeah, yeah.

Just watching you do that with him inspires me and you in some type of way because this person overcame like one day, that one day turned into this next second.

He didn't know that was the day. But hey, it worked out.

It works. It works.

No, and you look, you know, we're, God willing, he's, he's doing amazing things. He's a great dude. I mean, he really is. And you know, I think that's, at the end of the day, that's what we both want, want out of people. We want both. We want people to find out who they really are and do the thing they're really called to do.

Yeah.

Because I, you know, as bins, I've been, I've been, I've been broke, obviously, 100 homeless and the whole deal. I have been a person of means where I've had quite a bit at my disposable income level to dispose of, so to speak, or whatever. And it, but it wasn't until I actually got really hyper, since hyper focused on the value that I brought to other people that I actually began to be fulfilled.

Yeah, right.

A lot of us do all the chasing, chasing, chasing, chasing. And, and if you, if, if you have that element of service, then service ends up taking you to a whole nother level anyway. And it's almost like you get all the things you want by doing all the things you should be doing with other people to help them win. Right. Kind of scenario. Talk to me about impact branding. What, what separates impact branding?

So this client, this is personal. I'm gonna talk to you about this client. So we're in another event. What separates impact branding is how can I impact my client more than just an email, more than Just a call. So listening to this guy talk, he went up on stage, and I've heard his story many times. He talked about the mentor, the mentors he had in his life. He asked me to do a personal branding session when I was up there in North Carolina.

Yeah.

We went. So this guy took me to a bridge.

And then from that bridge, he told me the story. So I thought that would be a cool shot. And then I'm thinking about, if he reaches out to the client, what can a mentor do in your life to stop you from jumping?

Yeah.

Have you had those hard. Now we're into marketing. Have you had a hard day where you just want to quit and give it all up?

Yeah.

So next I see him speaking, I see the lady that's the mentor. I noticed a shot that's gonna mean the world to him. I see the people who inspired him, his mentor, his. Who was it? The godmother?

Yeah, I was. I think it was a girlfriend's. It was a girl, a past girlfriend's mother, but just happened to be like a mother role to him.

Huh. And then his future wife. Those three images I know all mean the world to him. I would be a fool not to get those images.

Yeah.

Now the spin off was he has an instant reminder of what not to give up.

We have a reminder of what. Now his wife. Now wife sees. The spin off was that we didn't know was the wife actually put up all the images to set up those reminders. So it acted as a reminder not only to my client, but to his spouse and now to his. His clients.

Yeah.

So impact branding, what it does is connect that person with what they really want, and now they have a visual of what they want.

Yeah. Yeah. I would say it this way, as being someone who's done some stuff with you specifically, I feel like you do a really good job of capturing the soul of the personal brand and positioning in such a way that it can be easily shared through the concept of visual identity.

Yeah.

Whether that be through photography, whether that be through color selections or color choices or, you know, fonts and all kinds of stuff, you have a really unique eye for the soul of a human being. Right. And I feel like that. That's. That's. That's really powerful because one of the things that I've. That I've struggled with people is they may be clear on what they want to do, they may even be clear on why they want to do it, but they're not clear on how they're uniquely positioned to do it.

Because it doesn't sound attractive. Yeah, it doesn't sound attractive to say I'm insecure. Hey, I called you one day, bro. You ever felt stuck, like you don't want to do something today, like man. Yeah.

Yeah. And that's the thing is being authentic with yourself and what makes you unique because there's an audience or a market out there that's going to embrace your uniqueness and not let you feel alone.

Yeah.

But society has taught us that being alone or independent, doing it all by yourself is macho, is great, but nobody really gets it alone.

Yeah, I mean, I just, I was sharing with you off air that, you know, I just got back from San Diego where I was at a, a high end mastermind. So a lot of folks in the room, nine figures plus earners and of course they're sharing tax strategies on everything from buying airplanes to like. I didn't realize that apparently you can write, you can depreciate the vast majority of an airplane purchase off. I was like, I've never thought about buying an airplane, but now I'm considering it, you know, like, you know, it's like kind of thing, you know, but to be around that environment, you're, you're very. I was telling somebody this at, at that mastermind.

Here. When I'm in this environment.

Right.

And you're in your environment down in Orlando.

Yeah.

When we're in our environments, we, we oftentimes because we're so busy doing our thing that we're going and going and going and going and going that we forget that we're actually not alone.

Yeah.

You know, and so I walk into this, this room for two and a half days with Grant Cardone and some other people and whatnot. And, and over, over the course of these two and a half days, I just remember going, my people.

These are my people. They get me, they understand me. Because as an entrepreneur, as a serial entrepreneur. Right.

Yeah.

A lot of people don't get me. Like even my own leadership teams for, from time to time, they, they don't, they don't see things the way I see them, which is fine. I mean, that's, they, I, you know, I need them to see things the way they see them and like, they need me to see things the way I see it.

Yeah.

You know, but in doing all of that, if you go long enough and hard enough. Right. In that isolation mode, you're, you're inevitably stuck.

Right.

Stuck with, with the person that you think you are rather than people reminding you of who you're Called to be. And I think that's one of the reasons why I love your work so much, is because you're constantly reminding people, constantly, this is who you're called to be. Yeah, this is who you're called to be. This is who you're called to be. Now, is that something that happens at your level? Meaning is that something that you. You naturally tell yourself on a regular basis? Are you naturally reminding yourself of how. Who you're called to be? Or do you need other people pouring into you to do that?

Everything you just said, just market it to me.

Because it. When you think outside the box, like both of us do, and even I had a buddy of mine, we shared this a couple of months ago walking out of church. Some days you do feel alone, but when you actually can sit there and you have to remind yourself or you're paying attention to cues that God is giving you daily. Like, no, I called you to do this, but it's hard, but I called you to do this. You're adequately equipped because I'm equipping you. That's when you have to wake up and challenge yourself every day. It happened this morning. I've been up since 5 o'. Clock. Looking forward to this.

I'm. Thank God you have power, so. Because I know Florida got. Florida got nailed. I noticed. Was it Southern? Was it Southern? Southern.

Naples and southwest of me, Southwest Florida.

Man, they got nailed. God. God in prayers to those guys for sure. But, yeah, I was glad you actually had power so we could do this.

Yeah, man. It's every day you do have to look at something. And like I say, last week, I didn't feel like showing up for this young lady. I showed up, this lady was three hours late, man.

And I'm like, God, I just want to cancel the session. She came in, she needed it. She needed imagery to become a doctor. And she. She kept saying, I want to look like everybody else. I'm like, why? What makes you unique? We did this session. We got one image. Like, I finally saw who you are. And I talked to her and she said. I said, don't ever forget this person in a smile.

Yeah.

And she called me two days later. She's like. She sent me a booklet of text. She's like, I keep thinking about what you said. Don't forget the person who I am. And she called me and asked me what she should do with her career. I say, everything you're talking about in California, your voice changes. Go to California and chase your dream. Don't be afraid to do that.

Yeah. Wow.

And she's going to California.

No, I think that's good. You know, it's funny, everybody used to refer to me. This is a long time ago. It doesn't happen as much as it used to, but as a little Dave Ramsey with, with heart or something like that. Something along those lines. Or something like that, you know, because I'm short and stocky and loud and, and, and can be bold and brash and whatever. But yeah, you know, we. At the, at the unstoppable startup event we did when we did the live taping back In August of 2022, what was really interesting was, is that was the first time I actually started using the handful of props. And I came out on stage with a big, massive cinder block on my shoulder, you know, and I put it on this table that I had in front. And then I put my, my. I had a tool belt that was actually my tool belt. All the construction days that I've, you know, been doing construction back in the day, put it on my shoulder, set it on the ground, grabbed my hammer out of it and did an entire teaching on focus to this day. That one little snippet on Instagram that probably has more views there and TikTok than anything else I've done. And it was like, that is uniquely me. I can talk about life, business, relationship all through the lens of.

Some type of constructionary infographic or information presentation or whatever. Right?

Yeah.

You know, so for example, you know, there's there's a, there's a. There's an old saying that if you, if you want to build something amazing, you have to go deep before you go wide.

Yeah.

What people don't tell you is that when people go to build a skyscraper, they'll go just as far underground as they will above ground in many respects, or at least 25% of it. And then they also build the foundation to move with tectonic plates, with wind, all kinds of stuff where you would think that no, it's, it's concrete, it's not supposed to move. They actually discovered that the more rigid it was.

The more it would stand a chance of breaking apart and fall into pieces. So they literally put bits and pieces of rubber inside of concrete mix to make sure there was flexibility because they learned that if the building was able to flex with the conditions, then it was able to like stand the test of time and become like a straight up a skyscraper. So the moral of the story is, like, you're going to have to go deep inside of you to Become the flexible version of you and an effort to actually change and transform somebody else's life through your unique experience and lens.

Absolutely. You know, man, I told. I heard one of the greatest sayings I ever heard in my life recently from Mike Tomlin, the Pittsburgh Steelers football coach. He said, if you want unique results, then you got to do unique things.

Yeah.

He said you can't do ordinary things, and that's treating people ordinary and expect unique results. It just doesn't happen like that.

Yeah.

So, like, one of my wife asked me one time, are you gonna sit there and say the same thing to everybody every time? If it. If that's what it takes to be uniquely different and to get this person to see and experience the best of themselves, then I'm serving that person in excellence. And that's why I think a lot of people drop the ball. We don't serve in excellence.

Well, I don't think people intend to serve at excellence.

Yes, you.

You intend to serve at excellence.

And it's not. And I've developed a mindset of grace because maybe they just don't know how to say.

Most people don't know what they don't know, which is what's holding them back. And almost every k. Every single person I talk to, business, life, they all don't know. Literally, they are where they are today because it's all they've allowed themselves to be, and they're allowing themselves to be there because they don't. If they knew better, they would do better.

So it goes back to that word. Can you submit to someone? Can you submit to a plan?

Yeah.

And when you submit to those things, then you can see excellence.

Yeah.

Now, like, when you tell me how to do a business. And you started out at what, 17, 18?

I was 22 when I started from homelessness, but I was in the construction industry from all the way from 13 years old up.

And I thought it was really cool when you told me, like, bro, this is how you do this, this is how you do that. This is how you do this. You got feed the game and you serving me in excellence. I know you're going through some hard times right now. This is what's going to happen. If you put a little bit of effort and work into it. How can I get a small win in this person's life to make a big change?

Ooh. Small win to make a big change. I dig that. That's good. That's good.

So that's how I look at it every time I. If somebody deals with impact Branding, can we get you a small win to build that momentum so you can get that snowball effect?

Well, let me ask you this. I think that's amazing. I just. What? I. I struggle with this myself. Early on, when I was first getting started, I expected.

You know, I have a powerful story. It's a true story. It's a real story. It's ultimately taking me from where I was to where I'm at now. Therefore, people should care, therefore my brand should explode. Right?

Yeah.

And what I've learned is that is not how branding works. Branding works with the first step, followed by the next step, followed by the next step, followed by the next step, followed by the next step. I think what you do differently that I've seen you do differently than anybody else that I'm aware of is the intentionality in which you pursue the soul of that person to bring that soul to the surface.

Yes. But the biggest thing is I've taught myself how to look at my client's client. So all of us have stories. How can I tell my story.

In you branding? Are you marketing?

Yeah.

That's the key. Because if I use the word, that one little word that turns people off, I, I, myself, myself, I, me, myself, and I, that's when I stop listening.

Yeah.

But if I tell it in you format and how you can do this and you can achieve, like, Eric Thomas was one of the people that I think did that. Well, this is what you can achieve.

Yeah.

And even before he spoke at the In My Life conference, I asked him, I said, man, what do you want to see in your images? He's like, nobody's ever asked me that.

Yeah.

He's like, I want that passion. I want that fire. I'm like, okay, I need you to bring that online. He brought it. Same thing with you. I paid, like, paying attention to how you are on stage. I know I'm get fired. I know I'm gonna get passion. I know I'm gonna get energy now. It's hard to keep up with sometimes. I might get you jumping off stage, but bring it. That's who you are. Embrace that uniqueness.

Well, dude, I've loved hanging out with you as always, man. You. You always feed my soul every time we hang out. Where can people find out more about you and Impact Branding and get to know you a little bit better?

You can give me a call at 504-905-2249 or go to www.impact-branding.com. and we can do if they book through you using your name, we'll do a free one hour branding review on that. On that material.

Thank you, man. I appreciate that, man. See, it always pays to listen to Stuck to Unstoppable right there.

Because a lot of transforming from Stuck to Unstoppable. Like I told you, I'm not blowing smoke. It's one of the best podcasts out there.

Oh, dude, thank you so much. Well, you know, it's. It goes back to intention, right? I. I intend to try to get the best information out of the guests that I have on, not just to showcase their thought leadership, but also get the best out of them to then serve the audience that's watching and listening. Right? Because it only takes one idea, one idea to change your entire world.

That's it, you know?

So, dude, thank you so much for coming on, man. I always love you and appreciate you big time.

You're a brother to me, man. I love it when we hang together.

All right, dude, take it easy. See you.

Thanks, bro.

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