Why Trying to Sound Professional Is Hurting Your Brand

There’s a perception when you start your business that you need to suddenly become a ✨Business Owner✨ and sound in a particular way, or act in a certain way. It’s simply not true. You don’t have to change anything about yourself when you start a business, and to do so can seriously hurt your brand.

I say this because I did it. When I first started my business, I heard the phrase “treat your business like you’re an MD”, so I interpreted that as I needed to show up as this super-corporate persona. The trouble was, showing up that way every day was exhausting.

It was unnatural to me. It was like wearing someone else’s skin.

And worse than that, everyone could tell that it wasn’t truly me. It just didn’t match the person that they were meeting when out networking.

I also found it really difficult to keep the consistency up when I was putting on the mask of “sounding corporate”. It wasn’t me, so it was difficult to regularly show up as that person.

For those of you reading this who know my backstory, you know that living that corporate life and career killed me inside. My mental health was never worse than when I was pretending to be corporate. No wonder it almost killed my business to be back in that place, pretending to be something I’m not.

The truth is, you don’t need to be corporate to be professional.

That was a lesson I had to learn the hard way. Because when I decided to put myself through the coaching I take my clients through, I realised that I had done everything for my business that I tell my clients not to.

When I first start working with my coaching clients, I take them through an in-depth process to uncover their brand. We work deeply within the sense of self to really understand it. After all, a personal brand is not something you build; it’s something you uncover (see my last blog for more on this).

I worked with myself to uncover my brand and realised that my brand was far more quirky and personal than what I had been portraying on social media. So I needed to stop the awful habit I had developed in trying to sound super-corporate.

I started posting the stuff that I would say in networking meetings.

I started posting about my archery, my axe throwing and air rifle shooting…

I started posting about the beer festival and Scouting activities I do…

The real me. Showing up as me.

And do you know what happened?

My views and popularity on social media drastically improved. My engagement with my audience shot up. Not because of any algorithm hack, just by simply being my chaotic self.

I still have the old posts visible on my social media, and when I get stuck on what to post, I like to look back over them and see if any of the corporate tips and tricks are still relevant and I can say them again, only this time as me.

Of course, if you are a super corporate person, your social media pages should absolutely sound like that. Because that’s you. But if it’s not your style or way of talking, you absolutely need to cut that habit now before it destroys your brand and your business.

Doing it can damage your brand, and that’s not what we want. We want you to fly on social media, as your authentic self.

Need more help understanding where you are losing clients from your social media? Drop me a message and let’s see where you can improve and flourish online.