The Power of Human Connection in B2B: LinkedIn Strategy, Personal Branding & AI with Matthew Wheeler-Barrett

People that are really starting to do well are genuinely showing

up on a much more raw and open level.

So not, you know, I believe there's the perfect strategy is

almost the wrong strategy on LinkedIn because when you are

this spanking clean personal brand and everything's like

correct to the last design, the last like leather, I think you

make yourself unapproachable because you almost seem like the

Super serious tight knit outfit that never basically makes a

mistake. And we're human.

We all make mistakes, no matter how smart you are and whatnot.

Like I'd make the stupidest mistakes that I just why would I

do that? But I do it because we're human.

Sometimes we get overwhelmed with things.

So I think that's the main trend that like the roar of contents

winning, but also people that really know how to position

themselves better. And because there's more fluff

on the feet, the people that can position themselves better and

actually create an offer that's simple to understand.

How do you feel would will win on LinkedIn in general?

Welcome back to the Take a Chance on the podcast hosted by

me, Alexandra Forsythe. Today I'm so excited to be

passing the mic to Matthew Wheeler Barrett, who describes

himself as being obsessed with human connection.

He's based in Cape Town, South Africa, and he's the founder of

Unify. Matthew, how are you doing?

Very good. Thank you.

Thank you so much for having me. I'm really looking forward to

diving into this conversation today.

Me too, because we share commonalities in terms of human

connection. So I think what might be quite

nice for the listeners is if you just give an introduction into

who you are and what you do. Yeah, sure.

Thank you so much. So yeah, Co founder of Unify,

which is AB to B personal branding agency and I'll be

based outside in in Cape Town, which is awesome.

Great talent out here, great potential, great people.

So yeah, we're really enjoying the fact that we're expanding

more into the international markets.

And yeah, that's the agency side.

And then on the coaching side, I'm working on one or two things

behind the scenes that you guys will hear about soon.

But yeah, also heavily involved in coaching and some other

creators, cohorts and communities on LinkedIn.

And from all of this experience, yeah, as as you mentioned, with

my obsession with human connection, I do find that this

world is moving very fast with AI.

But I am definitely going to be 1 to remind people that genuine

relationship and human connection is of utmost

importance for business. It is.

And I think the trends this year, people really want

connection. They really want to get back in

person, talking to each other, building community.

So it's not just you and I, I think it's universal.

I think there are a lot of people out there who are

struggling to possibly get past technology and embrace AI for

what it is, and I do keep saying that's what we should do, but

don't lose sight of the humanness.

Yes exactly, and I mean most specifically Islington.

I think unfortunately so many people get obsessed with the the

vanity metrics. Is my post doing well this and

that? Meanwhile, you got the DMS,

you've got people in your network.

Start building relationships, start having conversations.

What I found as you grow your personal brand and you show

consistently, it definitely gives you a greater sense of

leverage and trust. And that allows you also then to

meet up with people quicker in person.

So I like to always say your LinkedIn is a personal brand

development tool. If you show up genuinely human,

it actually allows you to move on the ground faster and get

into those rooms. It's not even pitching a client

or trying to get business, bringing learnings, bringing new

connection. I think it's so important that

we never lose the human elements to where this online world's

going because at the end of the day, yeah, human connection

Trump's all. And I think, I don't know, I'd

love to hear your thoughts on this too.

But I do feel like we're eventually going to go in

circles, like most things do in fashion and all sorts of things.

People going to get tired of the AI and the lack of connection,

and they're going to really then start seeking out for

communities and groups that generally do value the human

connection versus trying to just absolutely scale everything,

just get all the numbers high. It's not all about that.

It's all about, yeah, that connection.

So I'm happy to see also what comes of this chat and how we

just keep bouncing between ourselves with this.

The conversation flowing for sure.

I've written down a few points because you keep talking really

fast, but I'm love what you said about personal branding.

I would say longevity with a personal brand, it's not an

overnight. You can pivot your careers.

Don't worry too much about that. I started out in a corporate

setting and then slowly made my way through to creative.

But I still do a lot with technology.

So I've combined half a dozen different skills that I have.

So don't be afraid to do that. And then remember when you're

building your brand, start posting, talking about projects

that you're working on. But like I say, it's not an

overnight. And I know, Matt, we've spoken

about this before. Love what you mentioned about

DMS, warm leads. Never underestimate the power of

your existing network. It's not always about trying to

outreach to people who you may not know yet, but what have you

got within your immediate circle that you can benefit from

mutually together? And then obviously to your point

at the end about going full circle with AI, I mean micro

influencers and content creators who have communities, the

compounding effect of that, the relationship building, the trust

and rapport, Trump's possibly a community with 50,000 people in

and there's no real connection there or they haven't met up,

they haven't had an opportunity to see each other.

And I mean, I was joking about all this is yeah, I was on that

LinkedIn live this morning and part of that discussion, which

was really interesting on that conversation.

But, you know, with DMS, people are so, like, quick and rushed

to get to the end goal that people sense almost that

desperation. Like, you would never go up to a

random person on the street and be like, you know, let's go for

dinner. You need to like, at least like,

slowly but surely build a genuine relationship.

And you know, I could start with even just a compliment on

someone's content and slowly, you know, making your face more

recognisable in their content and then slowly bleeding it into

the conversations. But what I did encourage people

this morning to do is like send 100 messages, but don't have a

rushed endpoint for all of them. If some of them take two weeks,

cool. But eventually you're going to

constantly be having human conversations flowing to the

point that naturally certain ones will just start closing and

go in the direction you want. And I think another important

point that I really enjoyed you mentioning was especially in

B2B, and I've seen people post about it recently again, is

people get, oh, and you got 2000 impressions.

I'm like, OK, let's say the unique visits there are probably

about 1300 people, 1300 people. Imagine them all in a room that

would feel like overwhelming. Meanwhile, they're viewing your

content every day, right? And people need to realise like

the, the smaller communities, you have greater chance of

greater connection, which equals greater trust.

Greater trust allows you to have greater leverage, which builds

Better Business. So I'm very excited to see where

the B2B space goes. I mean, if you want me to, I

could share and and a bit some of the predictions I have with

community and where things I think are going.

But yeah, it's just genuinely All in all so exciting,

especially for the people and I. Look, I appreciate we all have

to put food on the table, we all have to pay our bills.

But when you can and things maybe are in a bit more of a

comfortable position, just slow things down a bit, focus on

actually building genuine relationships and you'll be,

you'll be amazed when you show up for others, they'll start

showing up for you. Absolutely.

I definitely want you to go into the trends in a second.

But it reminded me of how we first connected.

I think we've we've been connected for a long time.

Neither of us reached out to each other because I didn't feel

that we needed to at that time. OK, Now I'd like to speak to

Matt about XY and Z relating to events, etcetera.

So yeah, it's, it's organic. It comes at the time when it's

meant to. But like you say, if you rush in

when it comes to business, it can lose that bit of

authenticity. So I really like, I really like

that point. And as you say, it's trust

equals leverage trying to build. It's for me, it's always all

about authenticity, connection, trust, rapport.

You can get that right. Everything else should flow

quite nicely. And again, also really

interesting, I'm in the place that you're mentioning taking it

a bit slower, really building a solid foundation when it comes

to who I'm out reaching to, doing my due diligence.

What does 12 months look like with that brand?

I think business to business be to being.

You should be thinking more along those lines anyway.

I. Fully agree with you and to tie

onto your one point about also slowing down and even using the

example between our engagement and how it came to having this

conversation today is just by staying top of mind.

People need to remember that that's what you have to do,

especially for high ticket value items because they may not be at

the right time and you approach them in the place to purchase

your offer or for example need it.

But when they suddenly hit the fan and things go wrong and they

need someone to solve the problem.

Now if you do communicate in an effective way through your

content and showing up authentically, you most like,

you'll be one of the people that get a chance to let's say

picture offer or your services of how you can help someone.

But that only comes unfortunately with consistency.

It's like going going to the gym, you can't just suddenly get

all like, you know, shredded and in the best shape of your life.

You have to keep going back to the gym still.

Same with your personal brand. You can't just close one lead

and then think, ah, everything's just going to fall into my lap.

I almost feel like eventually personal branding will become

that because how are you going to stand out?

How are you going to show up on a human level when there are so

many things evolving on a technical level with AI and

whatnot. And I truly believe that people

genuinely, really do need to leverage AI in the right ways,

but also in the ways to build systems that unlocks those

pockets of time that allow you to be human with the things that

need to be kept human. Absolutely.

So going back to B2B trends, what's it been looking like for

you this year already? Any changes to 2025 and then

looking ahead where we're going? So just LinkedIn specific, let's

say, let's start there. And I'd say that because the

bars on the floor with content, you know, it's easy to just

quickly throw something in AI regurgitate your thoughts and

throw it on the feed. Whereas let's say Instagram, I

think it's a bit more challenging because the bars are

a bit higher. You have to create good video,

you have to add your subtitles and that takes time.

So the it's more effort to show up.

Meanwhile, everyone's just giving it a crack on LinkedIn.

Hey I created this Claude system comment Claude blah blah blah.

And you can tell. You can tell.

You really can. Bonkers mile away.

Anyone listening, if you see those posts go check their

experience and most of the time there will be people that have

barely works in the working world.

No offence to them. I appreciate the hustle, but

just be careful with who you listen to for certain parts that

you're going to implement into your business.

But where where in general LinkedIn I see going is the

people that are really starting to do well are genuinely showing

up on a much more raw and open level.

So not, you know, I believe there's the perfect strategy is

almost the wrong strategy on LinkedIn because when you are

this spanking clean personal brand and everything's like

correct to the last design, the last like leather, I think you

make yourself unapproachable because you almost seem like the

Super serious tight knit outfit that never basically makes a

mistake. And we're human.

We all make mistakes, no matter how smart you are and whatnot.

Like I'd make the stupidest mistakes that I just why would I

do that? But I'd do it because we're

human. Sometimes we get overwhelmed

with things. So I think that's the main trend

that like the roar of contents winning, but also people that

really know how to position themselves better.

And because there's more fluff on the feed, the people that can

position themselves better and actually create an offer that's

simple to understand, I do feel would will win on LinkedIn in

general. It's more so just showing up

more vulnerably, more authentically and not making it

as perfect as possible. It needs to be a bit of a messy

brand to a certain extent in a way.

And. Yeah, I agree.

Yeah, I'd say that's, that's mainly the trends I'm seeing on

the LinkedIn side. If I look at the podcast when I

first started, I always say it was so opposite to who I was at

the time in terms of a corporate background, very squeaky, very

clean. When it comes to the podcast,

it's always feels a bit ratty, and I quite like that because it

shows another part of my personality and also the focus

on the guest. I don't know whether you've read

the talent report that LinkedIn posted this year a little bit

earlier on, and they were saying the percentage of individuals

changing their bio to founder or entrepreneur has skyrocketed

this year because people want more autonomy over their

careers, which we're seeing anyway with the AI and IP,

especially in the creative industry, copyright

infringement, there's a lot of battles going on with different

artists. So it makes sense that that's

possibly where we're going. Yeah.

And I think the way corporates going, when you just hear about

all these massive mass retrenchments, you know,

arguably think, especially now where we're moving and more and

more jobs are going to get replaced by AI, Arguably,

there's never been a time better to invest in your personal

brand. And like, once you build an

audience and a community that you trust, it's yours for the

taking in terms of, you know, how you monetize it, how you

perhaps leverage relationships to go into business with other

people. There's all sorts of angles you,

you can do, you know, I, I was even speaking with someone this

week about a similar topic where you could be really good at

scaling your own personal brand, which I've seen on LinkedIn,

people are, but then it sounds like in the background they're

struggling for clients because writing and doing it for someone

else is a completely different game.

And that's where it really shows who's got the understanding and

skills because personal branding and showing up as a human and

whatever you want to call it on LinkedIn these days is there

needs to be a strong understanding of strategy,

positioning, design, storytelling.

It's not just copy anymore. Copywriting also arguably not.

Is the new modern selling with content, how it's shifting.

So I think there's so many options.

But what I said, someone could even scale their brand and maybe

they they don't have luck with other clients, but they're very

good at telling a story through their eyes.

You know, it opens up the opportunities where let's say a

tech business that aren't really good at marketing themselves,

you could perhaps proposition them.

Hey guys, you aren't really good at doing social media.

And I know Cody Sanchez speaks about things similar things to

this as well. And like, give me a bit of

equity or stake in the business and like I'll tell the story.

I'll be the face of the business because I appreciate like

everything. I'm not into building websites

and I'm sure people aren't into building their personal brands.

I think I, I see that as being a trend where eventually there's

going to be individuals that have built such a strong

audience. I think that is like the sign of

where it's going, right? There's going to be one or two

strong voices that essentially act as the overall distribution

strategy. I love that and I think the idea

that if you aren't as comfortable building your

personal brand, however you'd like to do it for somebody else,

it's a win win for only yourself to have the experience.

But then for the company to elevate their positioning, both

business and personal, top level leadership also coming to the

table now and also saying, well, it's not enough for us to just

share content about the business.

We've got to actually walk customers through the process,

show them the product, show them the solution, us trialling it to

gain that trust. So I also see there's a bit more

of a storytelling that needs to be happening.

And I'd argue that if you're a startup or an SME, take the time

now to really build that funnel. And I mean a great example as

well to show people are hungry to learn from the people.

Even with the announcement of Tim Cook stepping down from

Apple and John. Yes, I saw he.

Didn't even have an optimised profile.

I saw a few people post about it, but there there's the proof

in the pudding. The rate at which his size of

his account grew made me upset for someone that's been trying

to grow it for three years. That.

Tripled my audience in like a day, but that.

Just goes he. Shows you like.

And by now, what's the point? I mean, depending on where he

goes and what he decides to do next.

But I do think obviously he spent so much time up on the

valuation of the company, the size that it's gone up in his

ten years, astronomical. They were going through some of

the figures and statistics. It's amazing what he's done.

I do think though, in terms of ROI metric for more of your,

your corporate personal branding people, let's say or Cxos, is

that the biggest return on investment we've seen with our

more, let's say hardcore corporate clients is talent

acquisition through the content. So there's one thing to have job

ads, there's another to have a standard company template off

Canva. Hey, new job of cool, but that

doesn't tell me anything about your company.

If I'm a young working professional, yes, I'm grateful

for any job opportunity. However, I probably still will

play between a few options based on where I think my trajectory

of my career is going to go in terms of learning and how's this

person going to help me grow more.

What am I going to get exposed to?

And I mean, we have a, a very big end of line automation

machinery company that spent like $3000 a month and it lacks

the human connection, right? $3000 a month on LinkedIn job

ads, not one hire. And they did it for I think 3

months. So $9000 in total.

And we did a few posts. We started getting going,

getting good traction on the CE OS account showing the factory,

the people, the values, 16 key hires with engineers.

So it's like people buy from. People, but I think.

There's so many diff how cool is that like?

And you now don't even have to go pay recruitment fees or

LinkedIn job ad sponsorships. Hiring, I will be going to see

what you're posting online in terms of your brand.

I don't necessarily mind if you if you don't have a website, but

what does your portfolio look like?

What are your opinions and have you done anything outside of the

job? But what are your interests

because that will also interest me.

OK. Exactly.

There you go. And then it's just you could you

could see it as a tool to LinkedIn, a tool to network at

scale. But if done right and a bit

slower, you can still go fast, faster than you could go on the

ground. I mean, you can only have so

many cups of tea or coffee a day.

I'll do the numbers on the ground, but you can use it as

you know you're tool to move on the ground as well.

And I yeah, I make LinkedIn my daily habit It I start my day by

writing my post every morning because it gets me focused.

It gets me excited. I'm the.

Complete opposite. I'm the complete opposite to

you. I love how you say it gets you

fired up. I think, oh, here we go again.

Here we go again, I've got to post it.

I got a reply to comments, which I love.

But at the same time, I think the anxiety in me because I'm

just, I do really treat it as a business, whether people agree

or disagree. For me personally, I'm on that.

I post and then I'm off within the space of 30 to 40 minutes

because I just love the in person interaction, the

conversations. The same with the podcast going

live, going in person. I just thrive on that.

Gives me the most inspiration, the most knowledge I can absorb

is through other people. I mean, our conversation, our

conversation today. I've already written down some

notes which are spinning plates in my mind.

That's what I need. But everyone's different.

Everybody is different. People have the same level

online. Yeah, exactly.

And that that ties into a good question someone asked me this

morning is like what, what content format do you think I

should post on LinkedIn on? Let's just say it's in general B

to B social media. And I was like, I can only tell

you so much. And also based on my experience

of what our clients and we've experienced ourselves, however,

the your audience is going to tell you what they want.

Like some niche may just prefer video more verse, let's say

carousel posted have a deeper dive into a method or

methodology or strategy you're working on.

So it's like you got a test and then where you find, like you

said, like this brings you the the energy or whatnot.

Like same with your audience, with what whoever you have to

make sure that like you test and so many people are so obsessed

with coming onto social media with the perfect strategy.

There's no such thing as a perfect strategy because it's a

constant evolvement. Work in progress, viewing the

transcripts, looking at the comments like what are people

saying so that I can refine it to give you what you're asking

for. Absolutely.

I think I mean LinkedIn, I'm quite surprised.

I post a lot of videos, clips of the podcast.

They do amazingly, especially kind of the follower to click

through rate etcetera. The ratio is just, it's all

organic as well. I just, I never boosted.

They said to myself, 12 months. I just wanted to see what would

happen. Because if you don't, if you

don't have a strategy behind boosting and marketing, it can

go wrong very quickly, I think because then you lose the

community that started interacting with you at the

beginning. So yeah, I'm quite surprised.

But video does very, very well. Whereas sometimes Instagram and

TikTok, not so much. So it's it just depends, as you

say, going back to that content being strategic, anything that

plan in place, distributing differently, one post on

LinkedIn will not resonate the same way on Instagram or TikTok

or YouTube or any other platform that you're using.

Sub stack is a lot to do with storytelling.

So long form posts do incredibly well.

So overwhelming. And then you've got to pick and

I do think so maybe a recommendation and we'll come to

recommendations is just pick one or two platforms to begin with,

one or two, stick to it six months and again create that

road map, that phased approach. Yeah, I I fully like, I'll

probably be after this focusing now on YouTube.

So I got the camera and everything now and then sub

stack. I also do like sub stacks.

Quite an awesome community for learning and just practising.

As you said, more of your storytelling and let's say more

creative thinking. Almost feel like I'm a Rick

Rubin when I'm writing on. What did somebody say?

They said that Sub Stack feels like the smoking area when you

go to a nightclub. Everybody's just chatting away

because it doesn't feel regulated at all and it's not

really you go on there and people just writing short form,

long form there. It's their thoughts and opinions

more so than hard and facts. I find people are just.

But it's respectable. Yeah, I do.

I don't spend enough time on there to be honest.

Maybe I should have a think about that.

But YouTube having its moment, short form content really

recommend doing that. What do you what are you doing

for YouTube? Your coaching?

So yeah, I'll do some videos where off the back of some of

our landing pages will get people deeper into the content

funnel, like just to take them on a bit of a journey through

some emails just to build greater levels of trust while

we're waiting to get them on a sales call, for example.

And then on the coaching side, yeah, it'll be more of my my

quick coaching learnings. I'm probably going to start

doing testimonial coaching sessions with the clients that

are willing to do it so that everyone can get access to that.

Because like I said to you beforehand, anyone can scale

their own brand. But when you can display how

you're very good relating to someone else's situation and

getting them results, you can't replicate that kind of content,

especially your competitors. But I think also touching on

when you, yeah, I agree with you, stick to some platforms.

I think for me, it's quite easy where I want to go further, like

let's say Instagram and what not, but I'm lucky where I have

the resources now to invest in that to get people to actually

help me on like let's say a consultant bases.

But for me, as well as feels like a lot of a safe investment

because I've truly seen the power of a personal brand and

I'm obviously in the industry, but I think for people that are

in it's so much easier just to like know that like the the long

term growth mindset is so key for the psych.

It's I'm not here to quickly try build something with or vibe

good something. It's like, you know, get it out

there in six months. Like I'm here for the for the

long haul. I have to what you're going to

do when you sell a business anyway, you're going to get

bored. So I'm enjoying the journey.

I'm in no rush to hit any milestone or agenda as long as

we're screwing steadily but strongly and the tends getting

better and like relationships are getting better.

Like happy days. Like one of our clients base

said it like I don't believe in work life balance.

I have a work life blend and for me I don't mind doing a bit of

work on a Sunday. And like, you know, I'm chaotic.

I work all the time, love it. And if you love what you do and

you're passionate about it, then I, I think do whatever makes you

happy. I'm no judgement from me.

Yeah, exactly. Obviously if one post does

really outperform, that could be a strong indication that that

story is resonating. So possibly then put another

post out and talk about it more. Yes, yeah.

Like in the end of the day, B to B to somewhat form is just smart

repetition. And I think you also need to

overcome the fact that you you may sound like a broken record

or stuck record but at the end of the day like half of people

don't even see the 1st post you post like it's I don't even

remember what I posted. I haven't even seen your post.

I haven't even seen the algorithm.

If somebody at Linkedin's listening, I'd like to

understand a little bit more about the algorithm this year,

because I'm not seeing anybody's post at all, only the one.

Yeah, so I got a bit of assumption.

There you go. Bit of assumption tested tested

as well and I think I have proof to to my my assumption and I'm

sure hopefully when we posted some people are commented in the

comments. So commented in the comments,

but basically keywords. So keywords on your profile,

let's say now I'm targeting coaches and I want to like help

coaches tell their personal stories, build their brand

better so they can build better pipeline.

So if I start speaking directly to their pains, like, you know,

you keep posting stuff, but meanwhile you're posting, let's

say AI photos or Cheat Sheets like hello, like you're a human,

people are buying you, you need to show more of yourself and

tell stories, etcetera. And I started doing more of

those post to test things for some other projects I'm working

on other than the agency. And naturally from just shifting

that content I just had probably in one day, I had 29 coaches

just from that one post. So what I'm thinking is

happening now, audience size isn't as relevant on LinkedIn

because we've seen our smaller client accounts now with certain

content that's very niche specific go viral.

So like a post, an account with 450 followers is getting over

700 engagements on a very niche specific post.

I think it's distributing it to the people that are actually

needing to see your content based on what you're selling

with the keywords. So audience size arguably is

going to become less of a thing. And This is why I get so

frustrated with people listening more to your LinkedIn gurus and

like audience this or I grew by this many impressions.

Who cares? Like just write for your

audience and you and have more DM conversations.

You don't need to worry about that because would you rather

have a full bank account or loads of impressions that make

you feel good for a few minutes and then you're back to your

normal life? Like it's brutal truth, but

like, that's it. Like that's the game.

Now it is. I've spoken to a few people in

my network and they've gone viral on TikTok but it's very

short lived. They have a day where the

dopamine hits and the endorphins are running high.

But then after that it's well, I didn't monetize because you have

to have a number of viral posts in order to do that.

As you say, you end up going back to your quote unquote

normal life and I don't know, maybe a little part of you is

lost along the way as well. But I love what you mentioned

about keywords because I didn't know this and I've been

struggling this year to understand what's going on.

I still posted the way I normally post.

It is what it is. I'm posting a lot more about the

podcast and I think that's shifting things, but it's also

shifting the audience for me. And a six months time, hopefully

it'll all come back full circle. But I am seeing a shift which I

knew would happen because I was posting a lot about

cybersecurity in the podcast last year.

This year it's just for long creative content.

So yeah, that that's that's the benchmark.

So don't worry. I think also when you make your,

your users or your guests the hero of the stories, it just

tends to just bring better vibe All in all.

And when I, when I'm watching people like just show me their

work through other people, that builds so much more trust and so

much more engaging and interesting because that's the

what we're in the game for on LinkedIn.

Everyone has a business on LinkedIn and you know, you know,

and I do appreciate it's hard sometimes for smaller people to

get more case studies to make the person the hero of the

story. But then there's also, you know,

take a client, they've got 5 pain points when they came to

you. Change the hook for each pain

point, but tell the same story. But like hook different people

in with that pain that they may be also experiencing and like

recycle your content. I think so many people upset

I've posted this now I can't and it's it's just smart reputation

and learning of what's going on in the conversations.

And I'm sure what's great for you with this too and why also

Joy personal branding so much is just like this format we're

doing now. We do that with our clients and

the amounts of wealth we've accumulated in all these

different industries just from chatting to arguably also people

that are at the best at their game because, you know, they

obviously have the resources to get agencies to help them and

tell their stories and all this. And it's so cool.

Like you learn so much just through conversation and

community. And once again, like you said,

slow things down. Like there's no rush and people

can feel when you're trying to rush the process.

And I think it's a beautiful place when you get to that point

where there's some consistent revenue.

Now you can still be very consistent systemized things,

but you can just slow things down at that right pace and

actually it will result in Better Business and.

Relationship, absolutely. And I think less is more.

So don't feel that you need to write every single thing that

you know in a post. And I struggled with that last

year. I used to write my posts used to

be so, so long. This year I try and do as

minimal as I can. Try and get the key message

across. Sometimes they still feel a

little bit lengthy, but less is more because you want people to

come to you and say, oh, I really resonated with that point

you just raised. Tell me more.

I think so also how the algorithm's acting is it also

now I think measures success of a piece of content by the amount

of downtime it uses spending on your post too.

It's like we, we even look into things now, like never tag

someone in the first few lines because arguably like a website,

they'll bounce off the post to the other page and then they

won't have that increased downtime on your post.

So then we'll always, for example, like tag people at the

bottom. There's like small things on

LinkedIn that are always changing.

They will always forever change, change as all platforms evolve.

You just got to keep testing different things.

And as you know, like I'm never I no one knows exactly what's

happening. Like do LinkedIn even know

what's happening with the algorithm?

All I do know is though that like your message, what you do

for other people never, never will change and e-mail, you have

maybe a chance of someone responding.

A few emails may bounce, but once you have someone in your

network and LinkedIn, there's 100% success rate that they get

that in the inbox. Yes, they may not respond on the

first or second time, but I know some coaches and the, the one

coach I'm friends with Matt Lakayev, who's in Australia.

He's got an awesome community. He's got a massive following and

yeah, he's done the numbers and I, I trust him because he's

proven it. And he says on average it takes

about the 5th or 7th message to of a follow up to get somewhere

with someone because perhaps they're not ready at the time.

Doesn't mean they don't like your content.

Same with us. We had each other in our

network. We enjoyed the content.

That doesn't mean that it's end all like it could just result in

happening maybe six months, a year's time.

So it's just a consistency game. This LinkedIn, it's like SEO

over. Websites, oh God, SEO on

websites. I mean, I've cracked it now, but

God, that took me a year. That was definitely trial and

error. I think for me, I don't really

like just sending a message to say, hello, thanks for

connecting. There's got to be purpose there.

There's got to be a reason why I'm reaching out and we talked

about so much already. Can you give your

recommendations so far? I want to talk more about the

coaching and agency side and how you managed to get into that

role, the process, the story behind that for the listeners,

Maybe we touch from B to B, personal brand and that human

connection community. Is there anything the listeners

can take when? Also, in my mind, I'm thinking

if you're a startup or an SME, you're just starting out and you

don't necessarily have budget, what can you do as well?

Sure. I'd say the the main thing as

well with LinkedIn and the profile and the keywords we

mentioned, I think the biggest thing people get wrong as

they're positioning they, they try be a bit too salesy, let's

say on their profile that then when you send people connections

that are if I accept this person, they're definitely going

to pitch slap me or something. So we've, we've learned through

our clients, played a bit softer with the overall positioning.

And like for any marketeers listening to this who know like

the whole framework with message house and ensuring that like,

you know, it's very structured from the top down to the bottom.

Your your LinkedIn profile, your content on there almost needs to

follow a similar thing with the positioning of the profile, the

content and what you actually are speaking about and what you

offer. And I think it's arguably just a

quick banner change and the copy on your profile.

And everyone can do that also with AI now.

And that's, that's amazing things that the knowledge gaps

closed, But use that, use that to get some insights.

What are people saying? Like, I do think that could

perhaps tie into this. This, this third thing is also

with LinkedIn to become better at it.

And you don't need anything fancy.

You do need consistency, but small things like just send

yourself more voice notes on WhatsApp.

I have a WhatsApp group with myself.

I didn't have a clawed brain. I've set up, and how I set that

up is loads of transcripts from conversations like this with my

clients. Any emails that I took like a

long time to go through to articulate a process, I'll build

that all into my brain so it sounds more and more like me.

And then literally at the end of the day, I just play all my

voice notes into my brain and there I've.

Got my so smart but I don't like listening to my voice.

Well, yeah, that's I agree with you.

I don't, I'm not that type of some people.

Some of my mates listen back. Oh gosh, what are you doing?

Hit a button and I can just speak to my device with

WhatsApp, with Claude, with Google Docs, anything, you name

it. And I've actually started

commenting on people's posts on LinkedIn now by doing that, it

basically just speeds up if you were to type it out, but it

literally dictates it. It's I'm very impressed with how

how well it listens to your voice and notices patterns,

grammar pause. Everything it writes it, it

writes it out as as if you were that.

She's an English teacher writing it.

Out I'll definitely link the, the resources you've mentioned.

It's the digital download at the end of the day.

So for listeners, I think that's, that's really useful.

Some of your notes or how the day's gone and then summarise

what's going well, what hasn't, who do I need to reach out to,

follow-ups, etcetera. Because I mean, if we talk about

pipeline, it's never ending really.

The the problem with the content creation though is when most

people stare at a blank page, it is so difficult to get going.

And by just putting it through that I'm not, I don't copy and

paste it suddenly straight into LinkedIn, but I've already got a

few very good lines and the angle of the post already that

now I can humanly go into it and edit it.

So my overall ending advice for those those three things you

went with is focus on building systems that help you analyse

the right data that allow you to save time with things that are

remedial and actually don't need the human effort.

So that in turn, it results in you having more time to keep the

things human that need to stay human.

Like simple as that. And the more and more, yeah, you

show up authentically, your content's going to get better.

You're going to get better insights from your clients.

You're going to start signing more professional because you

understand how to really like position yourself better.

And it, you have this whole LinkedIn game brings you so, so

much clarity and allows you to sell and speak so much better

because you're just constantly at working at refining.

How do I come off to my potential clients or how do I

build my network? And I just think it's, I wish

every young person these days and university was forced to

build a LinkedIn profile. Like I'm actually, I got one of

my interns that's working with us, that's at the University of

Cape Town. And I thought, flip, you know

what, I'm going to put myself in an uncomfortable position today.

And he spoke to his lecturer and I'm doing a lecture at

university because I want want to encourage young people to

build their brands because from him building his brand with us

for a year, he's already had five job.

Opportunities. I love hearing success stories

like that, especially for young people, for students.

I mean, the workforce trying to get in there now is crazy.

Just post one or two things about the projects you're doing,

because you never know who's going to see him.

I fully agree with you. And it's so positive for me that

like, because I still think we're early days of LinkedIn and

like people like, oh, Matthew worried that there's going to be

so many LinkedIn agencies and AI, right this.

And I'm like, no, like there's a billion users on there now.

That's like 1/7 of the population.

Surely a few more billion will eventually be on there because

people will need to stand up more as a human.

ACV won't cut it just like that anymore if I'm looking for

talent. Now 100% look at their personal

brand because when personal branding, like you want someone

that believes in it, you want someone to preach the company

they work at and enjoy it as much as you enjoy it.

So yeah, it's just super exciting.

It's still early doors, I feel. So I think the people though

that are willing to be a bit more patient, a bit more human,

they will may all come out on. Top, absolutely.

I think talking more on your agency and coaching side, how

did you get into it? I graduated in 2017 with my

marketing honours and I worked for one of my friends who was in

an online property space similar to let's say Purple Bricks in

the UK where it was the first online property company in South

Africa. He was a year older than me, so

at the time he was about 25. I was like no way is this 25

year olds got this company. All this.

I want to work for him, I want to learn from him.

And as a student I wasn't very studious.

I didn't do much of the student part but did the fun parts of

being a student. But most of the time I spent

working going for coffees with men get.

Older now, can't do it now. And I, yeah, I didn't.

I didn't want to learn from someone regurgitating A textbook

from me. I wanted to learn from someone

that's actually running a business because that's what I

wanted to do. So eventually work there.

Then after eight months of working with him, I had an idea

to almost create like the the D pop comparison in South Africa,

which was called Reware. So used to resell some high end

second hand fashion. I think I looking back now, I

still think I was quite immature in my business sense, just also

as a as a young guy and he's like early 20s and I just felt I

wasn't mature enough looking back now.

But it brought great learnings. I made a great network there and

that really spurred me on for like entrepreneurship.

Then went over during COVID to the UK because I'm originally

from the UK so I could get a repat flat flight back bumped

into one of my uncle's mates, worked at his agency at the

time, was a startup and I was the first one to join.

It's crazy that she started with like part time work, helping

with the odd job and like come few weeks later like full time.

And I was so fortunate to work under my boss at the time, under

him for like the hold of COVID. So I absorbed a tonne for

agency. Then unfortunately just with the

the life of lockdown still and minimal social interaction and

everything, my mental health got really bad.

So I went back to South Africa. And then of course, because of

the war in Russia and when that kicked off and the living

expenses in the UK, they wanted me back there, but I wasn't

willing to. So I did lose my job.

So yeah, also looking back on that, never took it personally.

It was a business decision on on their side.

They reached out to me and we're looking at potentially doing a

partnership now and like me helping them with the LinkedIn

side of things. So I think the that All in all,

is the the the story of how I I got into it.

But I think, yeah, I've got a very aggressive persistence and

grits that I've used to taking the hits.

Once you get addicted to that entrepreneurship feel it's it's

it's hard to love it down at so the agency kept growing and then

eventually met like I forgot Oz reached out to me two years ago

and I I coached for for him in his community and I still do to

presence. I've been doing it for two

years, but the the first year in four months, I was so excited

that I was like, no way this guy's wanting me to coach and

he's cohort. This is awesome.

I didn't even think about looking at the details.

I just said yes, sign me up, I'm doing it.

Go back and look at the our difference.

Oh boy, it was Monday from midnight till. 2:30 AM.

But I still I, yeah, but I did it for a year or a year and a

half almost. And I'd go to sleep, I'd set my

alarm, I'd get up, do some push ups, get the blood flowing and

I'd do the coaching. And I'd, I think arguably that's

when it really unlocked my passion for coaching because I

had so many different SMEs coming on, so many different

problems. And what's quite tricky and

difficult on a live coaching session when someone's in the

community is if they're all at different stages of the course,

it's very hard to give overall advice to people.

So you have to be quick on your feet with giving people

individual advice on the call while someone, perhaps you know,

wants to ask more technical questions.

Someone's shame is getting like a bit overwhelmed over there

because they've just come on the call and really just helped me

sharpen my sword for asking the right questions, giving them

real time examples and trying my best in real time to give them

essentially like the best advice that's relatable to them.

I finally got a morning slot on my side, so I need to do it at

10 in the morning now, thank goodness.

So I was very grateful for that when that slot came open.

And yeah, eventually I'm getting more and more into coaching now.

It's I definitely think it's more of my passion.

Like you say when you're on these calls, you know, you write

down so many things. It ignites your creativity,

your, your human connection. Yeah, there.

You guys love to see it, love to see the classic notebook.

I think as well, I think I'll always do it.

I I I know people have flash cards and they tend to have

everything typed out so it still feels the same.

But I love a notebook. Honestly, honest, honest, honest

truth. The guests say so many great

things. I want to remember it because I

know the listener will love to hear it.

So I have to write it down. So what you've just told me now

that's what people need to do for their business to tell their

stories to their clients, right? And that's where I think just

document every single idea. And I think naturally that will

help people as well. So yeah, I'm hopefully I get to

help many more people now with going on to the the coaching

side. I had my first call yesterday

with a few people and yeah, just absolutely vibrating on the

energy. I definitely share your, your

feelings there. It's a amazing feeling and

especially also having younger people on there and you being

able to positively help them with the the right trajectory of

their life are super rewarding. Think it should be a crime with

what teachers and people educators get paid in.

In some countries they are literally the responsible for

the future. But at the same time, I do

unfortunately think especially with business universities are

far behind in terms of not really a cupping the modern day

business person with the right skills and the right

understanding. So one of my B hat goals that

say is I eventually do want to compete with tertiary education

and the NBA as well. Just think they are missing the

main learning is they don't teach you properly how to

network, how to let's say barter with value exchange with people

to actually use that as a way to learn something first trying to

just get money all the time. And my biggest learnings come

from people because at the end of the day, those courses still

are made for a group of people continuously, whereas business

is forever changing and you know it.

An MBA will never be specific to 1 niche, like really deep into

one niche. Like maybe there is certain

ones. Like I've heard some new models

of how the MBA is coming out too, which is really cool.

There's one now I think online where instead of like spending

hours in the evening or what not, you just do a little bit

every single day. So the time like it comes to the

end of that you've almost completed it because you're

consistent with rather micro bits of doing it first trying to

cram in between like work and free time.

So it's very interesting. I'll try find it and send it to

you. But I just think All in all,

I've learned my greatest learnings through just

networking and learning from other people because they're the

actual people that have gone out and done it.

And that's it's also way it's way more fun to learn that way.

Way more fun than sitting at a desk and looking at paper.

I had a guest come on recently. He's in Toronto, Canada, and

he's the founder of Wayfinders, a big community of

entrepreneurs. A friend was really into breath

work but hadn't trialled it with anybody, but knew that's what he

wanted to do. He wanted to be a breath work

coach, so he trialled it with two or three people and exactly

the same as yourself had got such a buzz and with so much

energy afterwards that he just knew that was the pathway for

him. But started small.

And I think we've mentioned that already, started with two or

three people, trialled it out, see how it goes, get the

feedback. Because it is beta testing,

isn't it really if we go back to kind of our own products.

So it's the same thing and you've mentioned it as well.

Don't rush too much. No, not at all.

And that's where I one of my predictions for for B to B and

I'll put in my post tomorrow. But just like you've said now

starting small, your initial users are that focus group to

better the product, better the journey, equal better results.

And let's say, for example, now I have a community of let's just

call them engineers are wanting to show a bit on LinkedIn and do

their personal brands. Now if I suddenly have 50 very

engaged people that trust me as a thought leader and educate

them on their personal brand and they engage in my community and

the trust is there. Imagine if you could partner and

leverage your community and be like, Hey, there's this new SAS

tool that's come out for engineers.

Hey company. So and so I can put you in front

of 50 of them where they may use your tool.

So either maybe through my community, we do a discount and

a free trial to like get them testing or you pay me to like

come on to a few sessions where you get to almost use them as a

focus group to improve your, your product.

Like I eventually think when people have an audience and more

specifically a community in it, you could let you have 20

people, but if they're all earning 6 figures, like you

could get quite a good like deal out of all of them.

Or, you know, show value and, and build enough trust to be

like, Oh yeah, this is a, this is an easy purchase.

Like I, I have someone, I, I coach and I met her through

other communities and then we just kept in touch on LinkedIn.

And then eventually she said like, you know, do you have any

other offers? I'm like, yeah, I'm thinking

about doing this. She's like, she like, sign me

up. And then I had another guy

that's been following me for two years and he, he, he actually

got a whiff of that content change.

I was testing with the keywords and he's like, do you have

another offer now? Like what's going on with your

content? And I told him in two lines,

like, sign me up. The work was done.

Like I, I'm not down playing Also that it, I've been doing

this for three years and showing up and it's, it's, you need to

get that consistency. Once you get this, it's like,

that's awesome. There's like so much potential

out there. Now.

I really want a gun for more coaching, more community,

because it'll also allow it to be more accessible.

Whether someone can't afford the live session or the course

that's in real time, maybe at least they can get my resources

for a cheap expense with some videos.

So I do want to eventually cater to a wide audience.

All in all, it's just when you really know you can help

someone, you see the results and you see the reaction of their

face on a call, like nothing can beat that.

Like you're such a cool feeling, like the real, like fulfilment.

And feeling good, but also it's it's acts of service, it's

impact. I'm exactly the same.

I thrive off watching other people's faces, their

expressions, how well they're doing think can be them in terms

of helping other people, which I love.

Thank you for obviously mentioning the mental health and

I do want to kind of circle back on that part of it.

Anything else you want to add? Well, I guess it's more the

therapy side of things or the anxiety.

So I think what that allowed me to do, which is quite nice is

help me work on more so my emotional intelligence and I and

just like also empathy, but using it in the right way and at

different levels. And I think especially in the

agency world, agencies a lot to do with people managing

expectations, whether it's from a supplier side to how that's

going to affect the enrol or finish date for the client side

that you have to deal with all these expectations.

It allowed me to work inward and like be very grounded and OK

with myself. Generally just want to help

people and some people don't like that or whatever.

That's fine. But I do think from doing that

process and going through the really bad anxiety, I find it a

lot easier to resonate with people that have been through

those things that allows me maybe to coach them or equip it

in a way that keeps makes them feel more comfortable.

Because you'll you'll struggle, very much so with personal

branding and helping people when you don't create an environment

for them to feel comfortable and to give you the Nuggets of

information that actually allow them to have influence when

creating their content. I really appreciate you opening

up about that because I mean, I have anxiety as well.

I'm so open about it and I think it's it's a difficult one

because it's a catch 22, obviously for me.

I don't really like opening up too much online.

I'd rather do that in person. But I resonate with what you're

saying. Sometimes you do have to throw a

bone out there once in a while. Otherwise you end up becoming

this robot in a way. You're just putting out content.

Yes, it sounds great and you look like you're doing very,

very well, but what's underneath them?

So I think for the listeners, for the listeners and for

clients that you're coaching, it'd be really nice to him hear

that you you go through the same challenges and we all go through

similar experiences regardless of the we are in the world and

age etcetera. We are similar to humans.

And especially for coaches and consultants, you're dealing with

the person and you're not just investing in what they're good

at doing. You're also investing on, you

know, their past experiences. Perhaps they actually did go

through a few similar difficult situations like you that allows

you to let them see themselves in your story and that already

builds greater trust and they feel more comfortable with you.

Because I can actually speak to this about so and so because

they they've been through it. So I don't have to be perhaps as

embarrassed about it or struggle to bring it up because they

genuinely admitted they went through it.

So that makes me feel like, oh, this person is more

approachable. I like practical that strategic

authenticity. You can go like as deep as you

want, which makes you feel comfortable.

At the same time, I open up about it in a ways.

It just shows like I am here. I've been through that and I get

you like happy to speak about it.

Got the confidence of actually posting about it sometimes more

so on LinkedIn and then also just at the end of the post

saying my DMS are open if anyone wants to chat with me.

And I, I ended up having some great conversations, like some

of those people today still support my content.

And all it was is like, sometimes some people just need,

yeah, sound board or someone to speak with.

And I, I know we're all busy and here and then everywhere, but

there's some nice parts that I enjoy about LinkedIn.

They have nothing to do with business.

You generally just meet some generally nice people that just

share some common beliefs as you.

It's really interesting because when I first started started

talking about burnout, during my speeches, the amount of nods

from the audience, all I had to say was burnout.

And it was, Oh yeah, I've heard that and I've gone through that

before. And then afterwards, people just

coming over in waves. Oh, as soon as you said that, I

resonated. So I ended up saying to myself,

I can't believe it took so long to talk about it because I've

only really started doing that the last 2-3 months.

I think for me, it's a lot to do with, I do have this exterior

that everything's great and it's shiny and when I'm doing

fantastically, I'll take it at your own pace.

Don't talk about things you don't want to talk about just

just because you feel you have to.

But when the time's right, you'll know.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly. Unfortunately, it's just the

pressures of society as well. I think it's so sad to see

people becoming people they aren't even, that's not even

them, but they're trying to like, you know, fit in or get

approval. And I think it's it's quite

liberating when you reach that point.

Any last words for the listeners?

Touched on the show. Many different things today, but

anything you'd like to leave them with?

Hard to say, yeah, just focus on showing, showing up daily.

But like, you know, showing up could be in the form of an 2

hours and it's OK some days that it's not going as fast.

I think we just like this world's moving so far, so we

expected to achieve XYZI think just get really comfortable with

the setting goals for yourself in the day.

It's you verse you. There's always going to be

someone above you or doing better than you, and you just

need to accept that and rather, yeah, just set your own goals

for yourself because once you really start doing it for you,

for you, it becomes a whole lot more enjoyable and natural.

And better and like I said, it's flow and you start attracting

the clients that you want, the business that you want.

It starts with you, definitely. Isn't exactly exactly looking

forward to coming on next year on episode 2.

You can come on. Well, not next year.

I mean, you'll be in London soon, so we'll figure that out

for sure. Yeah.

We'll figure something out for sure.

And I think that comes to the end of the episode that you're

making me not you're making me go off scrim.

But that was not talking about unify, hustle, branding,

community, growth mindset. And I will speak to you all at

very, very soon.

Game Plan