047 Your Strong Personal Brand Playbook
A strong personal brand is built on authenticity, clarity, consistency, and visibility—so let’s break it down and make sure you’re showing up as you (but in the most strategic way possible).
*Please note that this podcast was previously called THE "Video Confidence Coachcast" and the "Do Video Podcast" previous to 2025. THANK-YOU FOR YOUR UNDERSTANDING AS I TRANSITION THE BRAND TO BE MORE CONSISTANT FOR YOUR LISTENING AND WATCHING PLEASURE.Quick Quiz Time 🥳
What is one of the key elements of a strong personal brand?
A) Posting on social media every day
B) Using a trendy logo
C) Having a clear and consistent message
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Answer: C – Having a clear and consistent message
Your Strong Personal Brand Playbook
Your personal brand isn’t just about you—it’s about how you show up for your audience, clients, and industry. In this episode, we dive into the five key elements of a strong personal brand: authenticity, a clear message, visual consistency, value-driven content, and visibility, so you can craft a brand that stands out while staying true to who you are.
Building a strong personal brand isn’t about being everything to everyone—it’s about showing up as you in a way that resonates with the right people. Authenticity is your best filter; the more you embrace your unique voice, values, and style, the easier it is to attract (and keep) your ideal audience. An example Zoë uses within this episode is that of friend and LinkedIn Super-Star Michelle J Raymond - check her out to see what Zoë means 👀.
Beyond just knowing who you are, clarity is key. A strong personal brand has a well-defined message that others can understand and share. From your website to networking events, consistency in your messaging and visuals makes you instantly recognisable and helps build trust with your audience.
And of course, a brand means nothing if no one sees it. Showing up—whether online, at events, or in conversations—is how you grow your brand’s visibility and credibility. If you’re ready to refine your personal brand and show up with confidence, let’s chat! Work with Zoë at VCC.Training to strengthen your brand and get comfortable in front of the camera.
What Was Discussed This Episode + Timecodes:
00:00 – What actually makes a strong personal brand? (And yes, this is a direct response to a networking frenemy.)
06:15 – Why authenticity matters—and why it’s okay to repel the wrong people.
12:30 – Crafting a clear message: how to define what you stand for and make it easy for others to share your brand.
18:45 – Visual consistency: how your colours, fonts, and personal style reinforce your brand identity.
22:19 – Quick recap: the five elements you need to strengthen your personal brand.
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Zoë Wood 0:00
What makes a strong personal brand? Come on. Zo, you're all about personal branding. Answer this one for me, that is the face and the sound of someone who I network with quite regularly, who's a little bit antagonistic. So I'm going to answer this question now that I had a bit more time to research, but also be able to give them a more concise answer, because I had time to prepare, like he does every time. If you're tired of the old cookie cutter marketing advice and want to take your personal brand to the next level with bold, actionable strategies that truly reflect you. You're in the right place. Let's untangle your marketing mayhem with zo the video confidence coach on the unborn, your brand podcast unborn, your brand was recorded on water, rung land. And do not worry that Blair was not for you, my audience, anyone who was watching us, do not worry that was not meant for you, and for anyone who was listening that sarcasm and spite was not meant for you. Sometimes, when you network with people in a smaller community, not a smallest community, but a small community, like a business community here in Geelong, sometimes you run across people, haha, exactly your friend who are a little bit your faux and when you brush up against each other, not in a nice way. So for to answer this friend of mine, and I'm going to call you friends, no matter how much you hate it, my friend, we are going to discuss a personal brand how? And that's the question that they gave me. So these, these key elements that I'm going to discuss in this nice, quick episode, is a way to strongly brand yourself and to resonate your resonate your brand with your target or target audience. Things are going we are going to cover today are authenticity, a clear message, visual consistency, value driven content and visibility. So what makes a strong personal brand? Let's get on with it. So to stand out confidently in your own personal brand, because the work that you're doing is not always about you. I know that seems a bit counterintuitive when we're talking about a personal brand, but you are ultimately selling yourself to sell products, services, who you end up aligning with or sponsored with. Your personal brand is who you are, who you bring yourself out to be. You always have the opposite the opportunity to change or update or pivot your personal brand, depending on what stage of life that you are, but your personal brand is very much who you are and who you bring yourself out to when it comes to the projects that you're working on. Now these projects may include your own business that you're working on, any events that you are co hosting or emceeing, or anything that you are aligning your personal brand with now, of course, there is a little bit of risk when it comes into that, because sometimes, and what I've done in the past is when I have worked with events or businesses or projects where I wasn't fully in control, or maybe I was a bit naive at the time, that has taken down some of my credibility in the work that I have done, and I kind of regret it, but that is in the past, and that's why we're here now. So talking on today's subjects, I wanted to first touch on authenticity, being able to embrace your true self in your brand and showcase that out to your potential customers, specifically the type of people that you want to bring on board, because my authenticity and my true self does not gel well with all the white men who do not like women. That's just a tip from me. So when it comes to like authenticity, your unique values your personality and the experience that you have throughout your life, also the experience that you have in the industry, shine through and make it easier for your ideal customers to connect with you and ultimately trust you, not just to work with them, but to work with their friends, to work with their family, to work with their clients, because that authenticity goes a long way to be able to get people to give you positive word of mouth. Now, of course, that authenticity, as I mentioned just a second ago, is not always going to work well with everyone. Sometimes you might rub the wrong way, and that is okay. You are not for everyone, neither is your personal brand for everyone. Speaking of which clear message define what's, what you stand for, what your values and what your mission is, in regards to your personal brand, your life, whatever project you're working on at the time. Right? And make it easy to understand, not just for your target audience. So I'm not talking just acronyms here, but make it easy to understand for anyone who is associated with your target audience, no matter how niche, no matter how tiny, tiny, tiny your target audience is, they are people at the end of the day, and these people have family, these people have friends, these people have colleagues, these people have mates, these people are connected with other people. And for you to be able to clearly and articulately demonstrate your message so that they these people on the you know, periphery of your target market. Could then go to your target market and say, Hey, I saw this person. Zo, she does, you know, video confidence and getting people in front of the camera. I think that's what you need. And to be honest, that is where all my long standing clients come from, word of mouth that's bounced around through couple of different people, and then they Google me, do a bit of research on me, and then reach out to me. That is all because I have a very clear message of who I work with, why I work with them, and also what I stand for. Because my personal brand may be the video confidence coach, but it's also zo we would the video confidence coach. So that's why it is important not just in my motto or in my my mission, my mission, or my mission and my motto were very much the same. Thing is to connect the dots to illuminate your personal brand. It is a nice TA. It is a nice like motto that I have that pretty much clarifies what I work with, people. It is also my core message that reflects the What sets me apart from other people who may be in my industry, or even people who are adjacent to my industry, that people think that I'm fighting against. For example, a lot of people think that when I communicate with them at networking events, they believe that I am enemies with marketers because I am myself a marketer. And I say no, honestly, I work more with marketers. I don't really have anyone that I combat against, because the work that I do is a little bit left to center. It's not always a very straightforward job, like our plumber or a teacher or, again, those are examples of people that have been, you know, a really set, defined row of roles, and also having this clear message and labels me to clarify for clients why they want to work with me in the first place, because my personal brand with everything that we're going to discuss later on for this podcast episode. I did say it was going to be short. It's not going to be short. I'm already my apologies if I lied to you with saying it was going to be a short episode. In my mind, I thought this was going to be a short episode. It is not. So. Here we go. But yes, the clients that would want to work with me, showing this clear message and authenticity, and the type of person that I am will be able to repel or to attract the people that want to work with me, and I enjoy the people that I work with, and for people that I don't enjoy working with,
Zoë Wood 8:15
I have other marketers I can push you towards. That is why they're not my enemies. They are my friends and I promise I don't do it so they have to deal with a difficult client. Not at all. It's just, you know, sometimes you don't work well with people, and that is okay, because people are, people are at the end of the day, and you have to be able to send people off to a place where they can get more help. I digress. The next thing I want to touch on is visual consistency. Now I'm not talking just about the, you know, the type of posts that you put on social media. This is your all over the color palette of you as a person, and the way you show up, as you can imagine, for people who are watching me right now, I have a fair few visual consistency clarifiers that I do with my business and my brand. I wear dark, bright blue. So I always wear like, a blue shirt or a blue dress. That makes me stand out. I usually have very large hair because I don't like to brush it, and it just gets very big. I always dye the ends of my hair blue. So again, that goes with the blue consistency of my visual appearance. And when I go out and put makeup on, I usually have a heart shaped lipstick, and usually, and to be honest, over the past year, dramatic eye makeup and colors and gems and glitter and everything like that. And that goes with my entire of my authenticity and my clear message, because it communicates to the people who are attracted to that type of stuff. And they go, cool, you look fun. They see me at a networking event or at an event in general, and they go, I want to talk to you. You are my type of person and awesome because you are my type of client. Come on board this also can demonstrate in the way that you show up online. On the way that you show up when you're not physically in the room. So this can include things like color palettes, fonts, the style in your visuals, in social media. But this is not just you as how you present as a person, how you communicate your letterheads, how your logo looks, how your website looks, how every way that you market yourself, other than just talking at a person in a room, everything outside of that needs to be visually consistent and needs to create a recognizable look and feel that clients, potential clients and leads, can associate with your brand when they scroll on their social media and they're able to see a video that has a bright background, a pseudo window. So it's a it's essentially it's a, imagine a Microsoft or an apple window, like the thing that contains whatever you're looking at, and it's got the x and the minus, the expand the window and the close the window button on that side. Yeah. So that thing, and then you see my face. You pretty much got all the context clues of, hey, this is a video confidence coach post. Will I watch it? Yes or no, that is entirely up to you, but if the algorithm is showing it to you, there's a good chance you might want to see me. So here we are regardless. So you can be able to see that I still have a lot of flexibility when it comes to that visual consistency, that I can, for example, dress in a different color, and people can see me, and they have art on the street, they can see a different color, they can recognize me, but they didn't clock me straight away. Why? Because I am off duty. I am not at work. I am in my normal person mode, therefore you can still talk to me. I'm just not in turned on work mode, and not turned on in that way. You freaks. But when it comes to the visual consistency of your brand, you're able to have a lot of flexibility, because you've already established with your brand, with the work that you do, and with the colors that you use and the font that you use, that you can then be able to make changes and say, for example, in a post, you're able if you're someone who's fairly colorful, and then you post something that is black and white, that is noir, That is dark, that is moody, that has harsh contrast and shadows. People are going to pay attention to that. Why? Because it's out of the norm for you, and it breaks your visual consistency. So you can inform them of something incredibly important. Thank you so much. Michelle J Raymond for that example there, she's a good person to follow. And thank you for letting me steal your example. The next thing I want to get on to is value driven content. And let me hear that. Oh yeah, we're doing it right now, on the podcast, on the live stream. We'll look at us going right now. So value driven content is sharing your knowledge, your tips, your insights, to help your audience solve their own problems, or with your guidance, help them solve their own problems, being able to position yourself as a go to expert, while also building your credibility to be able to stay top of mind. That is what your brand is doing, and that is what your personal brand is doing, because you want to keep on top of the awareness of what people need and seek out from you. And to do that, you need to be able to educate people on your specific topic or niche or the area that you want to focus on. There's a reason. There's a very tired trope that says, niche down, niche down, niche down or niche down, depending on who you speak to, and that still holds true, but I like to take a slightly different perspective on it, and I like to when communicating with people who may be are new to building their personal brand. Again, everyone has a personal brand. It's nothing new. It's just sometimes it takes a while for you to acknowledge your personal brand, but then also take time to invest in it, which is why changes, especially dramatic changes, happen in such a short time for some people. So instead of being able to say niche down, niche down, niche down, I like to say people think inside the box, not necessarily outside the box, but think inside the box. This gives you the opportunity to focus your thinking, focus who you actually want to help. Now, of course, you can help people outside of the box, but focusing on the people inside the box allows you to be able to continue to have a strong personal brand, and in the event that, say, for example, I've worked with a couple of clients who started off in fashion. They're very they were very much zo lists, working with older women who were in so they, I think specifically, they were working with people who were in early menopause, menopause. And post menopause like these are the type of people that they're working with, and that was their brand. That was their brand for decades. And then it got to a point where, not that they got tired of it, because, of course, they still wanted to help their clients, they wanted to branch out. They wanted to do something new, and their personal brand allowed them to do that. Now, of course, they would still be known for the area that they started off in, but then they slowly moved towards architecture, to room dressing. I have the word for it. It is in my head somewhere. It is, I know you're gonna yell at me. If you see this, or you watch this, you listen to this, you're gonna yell at me. I'm so sorry, but it's where, it's what it's called, when you are designing a room, a room designer, architectural designer, it is, again, it's in that same realm of fashion, but fashion for a room, fashion for a house. How does a room feel when you walk into it? How does it sit into it? Is it comfortable? Is it not supposed to be comfortable? That type of rhetoric, which can seem quite far from her initial niche that she was, that she was in in the first place, but when you think about the box that she's in, not really her personal brand was strong enough to be able to go to that new area of interest for her and people followed. Why? Because she had a strong personal brand that built trust, that had a clear message, that Val that had consistent visual appeal, had value driven content and what was authentic and it was okay. It went from the different particular niches that she was working with, because you're inside that box that's given you and given her something to focus on when she's moving into that part of her life, and she's honestly so much happier about it. Why? Because she was able to bring those people who are interested in what she does with her, and for the people who wanted her old stuff, her old website was still there. She just wasn't going to be able to help or serve people in that direct way anymore, and that is okay. Your personal brand should grow with you as you grow throughout your life. And the last thing I want to touch on, as you can probably guess from everything that we've discussed so far in the podcast today, is visibility showing up regularly on the right platforms to increase your reach. This means a mix of social media, blog posts, videos, events, where your ID, where your ideal clients are looking for answers. Now, of course, I did mention a, I did mention a crap ton of digital options there, but there are in person ways of doing that too, being making that you actually appear at events, markets, wherever you want your ideal client to be because, yes, as I've mentioned at the start of this podcast episode, your personal brand may be of you,
Zoë Wood 18:08
but you're not doing it for you. You're doing it for your customer. You're doing it for your ideal target market. You're doing it for the type of people that you want to help at the end of the day. And yes, this very much impacts how you show up. What are you doing after you showing up? After you're showing up, you're helping people. After you're showing up, you're serving people. After you brought attention to the area that you're focusing on. You are then serving people. You are being in the community. You are helping grow, you're helping maintain. You're helping diminish, hopefully, a negative thing. By the way, whatever your goal is and whatever you're doing, you want to be able to keep your ideal target and your ideal customers in mind whenever you do something that also includes your personal brand. So let's quickly go over all of these points that I mentioned today in this much longer episode than I initially planned. Wow, spite is a good motivator, isn't it? The key elements were authenticity, clear message, visual consistency, value driven, content and visibility, the last one is quite important, actually showing up where people are going to see you, and maybe also not where they think they're going to see you. But you're actually needed, and of course, very much with your own personal brand that will determine how you show up, hopefully, in today's podcast episode and the blog and the video, however you're consuming this content, I hope that you feel a lot better about your own personal brand, or maybe now, with these key elements in mind, you're able to see other people's personal brands a lot more consistently. To. Able to figure out, okay, this is what they're doing. They're not actually. They may only realize afterwards, or maybe if you bring it up to them, they only realize, oh, right, that's actually what I'm doing, because I'm not showing up purely for myself, showing up to show for others. And I hope that's answered your question, mate from the networking event that I attended. I love you. We just do not get along, and we fight a lot. So do not worry, I don't hate you. So sometimes your words are not very clear, and then you put me on the spot and but now I've had time to think about my answer as to what makes a strong personal brand, and I've answered it here. And now I'm going to tend to trans transcribe this, my friend. I'm going to send it right to you. Thank you again, for everyone who has watched, listened and consumed this podcast episode, be it in a blog format or in a listening or video format. Make sure you check us out at Vcc dot training for everything personal branding, especially with the power of video. And I can help you whatever you need. I'm always up for a chat. Have you hope you have beautiful time. Look forward to seeing on the next one or hearing on the next one what you're hearing me, I really need to figure out a way of ending things. Bye. Thank you for listening or watching. Unloring your brand. You can find detailed show notes with tools offers and episode transcriptions. Just click the first link in the description or go to Vcc dot training slash podcast. Get involved and ask me anything about personal branding, video strategy, or just a friendly Small Business chat via my email, g'day at VCC, dot training, that is G, D, A, y at V cc, dot training, the video confidence coach, would like to acknowledge and pay my respects to the wadaw people of the Kulin nation, the traditional custodians of the land on which I record my podcast, I pay my respects to their elders, past and present, I stand with the traditional custodians of these lands and working towards a more equal future. Always was, always will be Aboriginal land. Look forward to me chatting at you next week. Superstars.
The above livestream episode description and transcript were generated together human knowledge + ai.
Who is your host?
Feeling stuck trying to build a personal brand that actually turns heads? Women and non-binary super-stars deserve more than just a cookie-cutter approach to their worries. Zoë Wood the Video Confidence Coach untangles your marketing mayhem, helping you own the camera, craft killer video strategies, and connect with your audience like never before. You’ll leave with the tools to show up, stand out, and smash your goals.
Find out more about how to grow your personal brand with the power of video right here on vcc.training
Smashing Your Marketing Mayhem With Killer Video Strategies 🧡
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