Creating Your Personal Brand

Fundamentals

Question of the Week

Creating Your Personal Brand

Happy Friday, everyone!

It’s been a busy week here, and I imagine it is for you, too, if you’re wrapping up everything before the holidays. I have another stellar MDB episode for you to help you relax your way into the weekend.

I chatted with serial entrepreneur and SendGrid founder Isaac Saldana about his new venture, Memo, which helps people build authentic and trustworthy personal brands. In the episode, Isaac opens up about how his introversion initially made it difficult to sell his expertise online and how he’s now using his experiences to help other entrepreneurs and creatives effectively showcase their talents. He also gives tips for being a leader with your natural personality and using your values to navigate difficult business decisions.

Episode Highlights

Mission-driven businesses move mountains.

Mission-driven businesses share a motivation to make the world a little bit better. Issac says you know your level of motivation is right as a business owner when you have the passion to move mountains.

“If your motivation is big enough to move a mountain, then you’ve found the right motivation and the right mission,” he said.

 

Personal brands build new connections.

Establishing a personal brand on social media can help convey trust and demonstrate your knowledge. While some people think the purpose of a personal brand is to be popular online, Isaac sees its true value as building connections.

“If your purpose is to connect with other people, specifically new people that you don’t know, a personal brand could be influential,” he said.

 

Establish your company values early.

One of Isaac’s first things with his new company, Memo, was to establish a set of values that spell out the word HAPPY: humility, adaptability, peers, passion, and you.

Issac prioritized creating values for Memo early on because being an entrepreneur requires making decisions even when there’s no right answer. In those instances, he believes it can be helpful to lean on your values.

“You can’t go to Google or ChatGPT and ask them to give you an answer,” Isaac said. “You need something to help you make decisions, and values do that.”

 

Build a culture around your values.

Establishing company values can help with more than just making decisions. Building values into a company’s culture can lead to a more efficient and happy workplace, and conveying a company’s values online can help build trust and credibility with an audience.

“I can talk about values for a long time because I truly believe they make a huge difference,” Isaac said. “Many entrepreneurs don’t focus on that early on.”

 

Quote of the Week

“If your motivation is big enough to move a mountain, then you’ve found the right motivation and the right mission.” – Isaac Saldana

 

Task of the Week

I really enjoyed this conversation with Isaac and especially appreciate his openness and vulnerability. Listen to this episode and let me know what you think. Can you relate to Isaac’s insecurities? What strengths have you decided to lean into?

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