New Year, New You! How Personal Branding for start up founders, can make the difference in FY27.
Back in the day I was an influencer, before there were influencers. My personal brand helped me gain Angel investment funding, clients and partnerships for my various businesses. But as we reach mass AI marking in 2026/7 is personal branding and influencer marketing still a relevant strategy for founders of new businesses?
In circa 2014, was approached by Lenovo to help promote their brand in Australia based on my personal brand. I met Kris at an event and she after we connected on LinkedIn, she approached me to represent Lenovo. Mainly because I use to work at HP and IBM so had some credibility and a large network in the IT space, plus I had 100k followers on Twitter. They flew me to London to attend their launch event, gave me a plethora of free products to review and I attended several local events including one in Sydney where this photo was taken.
Back then influencer marketing was just starting and there was no AI, so to write content about products, you needed to hire people who knew about the topic. I was interested in learning more about how influencer marketing worked and liked the free stuff. I also had a keen interest in tech and was testing many start up ideas after completing my Masters of Entrepreneurship at Swinburne University (2010).
Back then, there was enthusiasm in the Australian market for new ideas and loads of money for start ups. So I did a lot of pitching and new idea generation. My top ideas were: MeeTooYoo, which was an Apple AirTag product which failed as I couldn't get the RFID tech working. At uni we pitched AltVend, vending machine advertising, at the Venture Cup and won $10k, but that partnership dissolved and we didn't launch it. Plus, I came up with the idea to match influencers to brands, which became Tribe Digital. This went well, but I sold out to Jules Lund to focus on Social Star, which was focused on building a personal branding platform. I tell you this as all of them relied on my personal brand and pitch quality.
Fast forward a decade and the business confidence in Australia has dropped dramatically, funding is hard to gain, even if you have an AI pitch that is remarkable and scalable. It's hard to cut through the noise so what do you do?
I have been asked this question recently by many new businesses and my advice is the same now as before, build your personal brand. It matters. Perhaps even more than before.
When the market is tight, people who have money to invest or spend gravitate to those they trust. Trust is developed over time by those they see making an impact in the market with their ideas and achieving results. If you are building amazing tech, awesome! But where can I read about it. Just solved a huge problem for a client, fantastic! Where is the case study? Reached a company milestone, great! Is that on your company newsletter?
The point is, with all the AI content flooding various social platforms, people still buy from people. To get any major funding, sale or partnership - you will be face to face with another human to make that deal happen. E-v-e-r-y t-i-m-e. So who are you and why would they meet you? Give them a reason, make it compelling and ensure you are considered worthy of spending the time to meet.
Let me you in on a little secret. Back when I started my Twitter account I bought some followers - ouch! But in my defense, my strategy, was to replace them with real followers by creating great content over time and cycling out the bots. It was a short term strategy to get me started and it worked. Fake it until you make it some would say.
Our personal branding strategy now is to position your brand as strategically as possible, within the bounds of the truth, but in a way that makes you compelling for your client. It's perception, but that's reality. The luxury brand companies have this nailed. Let's learn from them and apply it to you. Then you have at least a chance to wow them with your tech and knowledge.
So my top 3 tips are:
Build your brand on LinkedIn and other socials. Aim for 10-20k followers and have a newsletter. Share weekly long form content.
Focus your attention on 1-2 core markets. You need to generate a reputation in a market and have others talk about you. Referrals is still gold standard to deal making.
Talk big and get over your imposter syndrome as it's going to hold you back from going for the big prize. Need $1m funding? Go for $20m. Pitch big.
My own journey of building my personal brand has proved valuable time and time again to gain access to key people. Digital is an important signal to get your first meeting, but then you need to deliver to keep your brand solid. If you do that time and time again, you will have influence - not an influencer per se, but one that can be influential which is what every start up founder needs.
If this resonates and you need help on your personal brand get in touch with me as I'm happy to help.
Andrew
