THE RESULTS ARE IN! YOU'RE...

Your Industry’s Best-Kept Secret

You’ve got big dreams, so much value to offer… and now you need the right audience to share it with.

You, my friend, are in a really magical place in your journey where the motivation is high and the learning curve is intense. Even though things are challenging right now, you’re so hungry for success you can taste it. You know you were put on this planet to do something meaningful and are willing to do what it takes to make that happen.

Right now, you have an opportunity to do things the way I didn’t: smart.

I spent years playing small, figuring just having *any* clients was a good thing. This meant I’d undercharge, say yes to nightmare clients and projects that bored me to tears, and end up working crazy hours because it was the only way to hit my targets.

At this point, I was showing up like a freelancer. Zero marketing strategy, zero confidence to call myself a business owner, and zero growth from year to year (despite getting rave testimonials from clients).

It never really dawned on me that I could make more of my business. That I could charge a premium for my services and even have a waitlist of clients prepared to wait for me.

Long story short: I wasted a lot of time while I was hiding in the shadows, and if there was *one* thing I could do differently, it’s that I would have started building my brand from day 1.

But enough about me, let’s talk about you.

The first step to creating a plan? Know thyself. The following are a few little things to look out for so you can double-down on what’s amazing about this phase of your journey and anticipate some potential speed bumps.

Your superpowers:

You’re a blank canvas… AND you’re the artist. This means you get to build your brand from the ground up rather than having to adjust what’s already out there.
A small audience means less people watching while you’re learning and experimenting, so don’t be afraid to get messy and make mistakes!
And the most important one: you’re reading this which tells me you’ve got the curiosity, coachability and eagerness to learn and grow that it takes to make it BIG.
This is the beginning. Your motivation and energy are probably bursting at the seams, so harness that and put it to good use knowing that these things always ebb and flow!

Your potential struggles:

The overwhelm is real when you’re at this stage because it feels like you have so far to go, so many things you need to do, and don’t know where to start.
Imposter syndrome and self-doubt tends to be pretty intense when you first start setting out to build a brand. Thoughts of “Who am I to do this?” and “Is this even possible for someone like me” may be running through your head.
There’s no built-in momentum right now, so it can feel like your energy is all going out but you’re not seeing anything come back in. Views, likes, followers and - of course - revenue all may be on the low (and inconsistent) side which can be frustrating… even heartbreaking.

“Umm… Kat? You’re assuming I actually CARE about building a personal brand.”

Oops. I tend to get over-excited and put on my coach hat before getting permission. Sorry ‘bout that! 😅 Before we go any further, let’s have a quick peek at what establishing yourself as an In-Demand Brand could mean for your business (and life!)

REACH HIGH-QUALITY CLIENTS

If you want to land paying clients, you need an audience and they need to be the kind of people who have a problem you can solve. A visibility strategy + content that positions you as an expert will make that happen.

CHARGE A PREMIUM FOR YOUR EXPERTISE

No one is paying the big bucks for a jack-of-all-trades but when you establish yourself as an expert in a specific niche, you can charge a premium and they will happily pay it because they trust you!

ONLY DO THE WORK YOU LOVE

When you’re worried about where the next leads will come from, you say yes to everything (including crappy clients, misaligned projects and painful discounts) but when you own a niche, none of that is a problem

TURN FOLLOWERS INTO SUPERFANS

When you build a personal brand, your audience becomes loyal to you as an individual and they start to tell all their friends about you which means free advertising and a steady supply of leads.

ATTRACT DREAM OPPORTUNITIES

Podcast interviews, collaborations, features in publications, brand deals, speaking on stages… building a personal brand gives you the chance to do things you may never have dreamed of!

GET RECOGNISED FOR YOUR BRILLIANCE

After feeling invisible and like just another number when working for someone else (or hiding behind a biz brand), personal branding means you get to own all of the incredible work you do.

Long story short: better clients, more money, amazing opportunities – plus if you want, the chance to have an impact on the world.

Not bad, huh? Let’s talk about how to make that happen.

Where most people get stuck or off-track…

There’s no question you’re at a really exciting time for your business and I am cheering you on like crazy. But being the caring coach I am, I’d be doing you a disservice if I didn’t flag a couple of common mistakes I see from IBKSs (Industry’s Best Kept Secret in case you were wondering!) like you.

REASON oNE:

Shiny Object Syndrome

When you’re not quite confident in your ability to succeed, it can be easy to get tempted by the countless “foolproof” strategies the gurus are filling your feed with. Every day there are more webinars to watch, freebies to download and courses to buy… but think of it this way:

Let’s say you have exactly enough time and resources to build one complete bridge from A to B in a year.

If you were to start 5 different bridges at the beginning of the year, how many bridges would you have at the end of the year?

Yep. Nothing is more important than choosing a strategy and sticking to it. And the good news is there there is no single strategy to see the results you want, so you can ditch the FOMO and commit to something. Oh, and don’t think that a few weeks is long enough to know if it’s working or not! Your meaningful results will come from playing the long game.

REASON TWO:

Right Task, Wrong Time

Because we’re constantly bombarded by experienced entrepreneurs clogging up our feeds, it’s near impossible to avoid comparisonitis.

What’s more damaging is that we see them doing certain marketing activities (being on 3 different social platforms, creating courses, creating evergreen funnels, using Facebook ads) and assume that because it worked for them, it’ll work for us.

Remember that these people are at a different part of the journey to you. They have different resources (huge budgets and team support in particular!) and are focusing on scaling something they already have.

Trying to do what they do at the early stages of your biz is unrealistic and will unlikely lead to positive returns. Instead, focus on laying the foundations for your brand and trust that the time for scaling will come. And it’ll come faster if you stop trying to skip ahead 😉

BTW, IN CASE YOU WERE WONDERING:

In-Demand Brands don’t just “happen”

As much as you may hear the gurus say to “just be consistent” or “just be yourself”… those things on their own won’t get you to where you want to go. And they certainly won’t get you there quickly!

But the fact that you’re reading this right now tells me you’re ready to do the work that takes you to the next level. So I’m going to quickly give you a snapshot of the framework I use when working with my clients then give you a custom plan for where you’re at today.

The In-Demand Brand Blueprint

And those 3 different areas work together in order to help you become an In-Demand Brand.

Let’s break them down…

Self-Belief

You ARE your brand, so if you have stories running through your head about why you’re not good enough or you’re terrified of putting yourself out there, even the best brand strategy will be useless.

We need to make sure you fully own your worth, see your value and confidently show up as the best version of yourself so you become a client and money magnet.

Strategy

Now you’ve started to own your identity as an In-Demand Brand, we can build out a strategy to increase your visibility, establish your authority, and turn superfans into paying clients.

This is a 5 step process I created called “Get Clear, Get Seen, Get Heard, Get Paid, Repeat” and allows you to custom design a strategy that feels easy and aligned so you actually stick with it.

Support

This is not a journey you should be trying to tackle alone (unless you enjoy overwhelm, anxiety and burnout!) so at each stage, it’s important to create a support system designed to get you to your own next level knowing that we’re all different and one-size-fits-all solutions don’t work.

Support comes in all sorts of forms – from the training you need to up-skill and coaches to speed up your progress through to friendships and the team you’ll build.

All making sense so far?

Awesome! Now we’re on the same page, here are my recommendations for each area that will help you go from Industry’s Best Kept Secret to Personal Brand in Progress (and beyond!)

Your Self-Belief Focus:

You’re going to be tempted to want to wait until you feel ready. Wait until the website’s perfect. Until you know exactly what you’re doing.

Don’t.

The quicker you put yourself out there, the quicker you’ll develop the confidence, clarity and skills needed to build your brand and business. Imperfect action is the aim of the game, my friend.

Your dream clients are out there, desperate for your help. And the longer you put off launching/pitching/showing up, the more likely they are to find someone else.

Hot tip: It’s not supposed to feel comfortable or easy. You’re doing something that’s both scary AND hard, so embrace that feeling of terror and know it’s a sign you’re doing things right 😉

What it shouldn’t feel is inauthentic, overwhelming or stressful, however. So check in with yourself when you’re feeling triggered and try to understand the cause.

Your Strategy Focus:

Content creation, website copy, social media, networking… none of it will work if you can’t answer the following questions:

Who do you help?
What problem do you solve for them?
What is the positive outcome or transformation you provide?
How do you do it?
What makes you different?

If you’ve ever sat down to write a caption, email or page of your website and spent hours staring at a blinking cursor, it’s likely you were missing the answer to at least one of those questions.

See, even though as a personal brand your brand is you, what’s way more important is the role you play in your client’s journey.

Those rave reviews, the waitlist, the overflowing bank account will all be a result of the way you’ve made your clients’ lives better.

So figure out what that is, and suddenly everything else starts to fall into place!

Your Support Focus:

Entrepreneurship is so much more difficult when you’re trying to do it alone, so start connecting with like-minded people to share the journey with. People you can talk open and honestly with about the highs AND lows (imposter syndrome hates it when you talk about it as it loses its power!) as well as bounce ideas off and to get outside perspective from.

I know you want to learn everything there is to know about branding & marketing right now, but instead, focus on the essentials and filling gaps that are tripping you up right now. The advanced stuff will come soon enough, but you don’t need to know it all to get to the next level.

So avoid buying every $27 toolkit and template that comes your way, delete that giant library of PDFs you’re hanging onto, and when it comes time to up-skill, choose programs that will get you from A to B, not A to Z (and therefore make your overwhelm even worse!)

By the way… have we met?

Hi, I'm Kat!

I’m a personal branding coach + strategist, copywriter and closet nerd (from comic books to productivity software, I love it all).

From being a professional actor in commercial musical theatre (yet feeling like just another number) to working as a freelance copywriter and being too scared to up my prices… it took me way too long to realise that I needed to build a personal brand if I wanted to create a life and business I love.

I’ve now spent the last 5 years dedicating every waking hour (and dollar in my bank account) to learning everything about personal branding, trying the strategies out myself, and teaching thousands of entrepreneurs and creatives what I learnt.

Not just through giving you the brand & marketing strategy, but by also helping you work through all those limiting beliefs so you find the confidence to be seen and heard, and the self-worth to get paid a premium for what you do.

So if that’s what you’re hoping to do, you’re in the right place. Here’s to getting seen, heard & paid!

– Kat

Resources to turbo-charge
your progress

WORKBOOK

The In-Demand Brand Blueprint

PODCAST

Your personal brand & business timeline: what to focus on, when

VIDEO TUTORIAL

Personal Brand Photoshoot Planning from Start to Finish

PS: We're just getting started

I’m not gonna just dump you with a bunch of tips, tell you personal branding is where it’s at and then leave you hanging. I’m here to help you make your dreams a reality.

Keep an eye on your inbox cause I’ll be coming at you with more of my best advice, resources and tough love so you can become an in-demand brand (aka total client, opportunity and money magnet) without all the stress, overwhelm and exhaustion.

THE RESULTS ARE IN! YOU'RE...

Your Industry’s Best-Kept Secret