December 17, 2024 • 31 mins
Today we talk about personal branding and digital marketing with our remarkable guest, Neal Schaffer, a fractional Chief Marketing Officer, author of 6 books, keynote speaker, and educator. Neal is an influencer with an amazing personal brand that is in the top 1% of LinkedIn users.
Ever wondered how you can stand out in saturated industries? Neal shares invaluable insights on crafting a unique personal brand that aligns with your core values and passions. Drawing from his rich teaching experiences at Rutgers Business School and UCLA, Neal emphasizes the transformative power of mindset, passion, and continuous learning in achieving professional success.
Discover how you can leverage AI to revolutionize your LinkedIn strategy and personal branding efforts. Neal provides a nuanced perspective on using AI tools for ideation and content refinement, while maintaining the irreplaceable human touch in storytelling. Learn how to navigate the rapidly evolving digital landscape with purpose and creativity, as Neal discusses his book, "Maximizing LinkedIn for Business Growth," and offers practical advice for ambitious professionals aiming to establish themselves as thought leaders by 2025.
Be inspired by Neal's stories and innovative ideas as he encourages you to seize the present and make proactive steps toward your future success. The episode concludes with a powerful call to action, urging listeners not to wait for the perfect moment but to start their personal branding journey today.
Head over to Neil's website for access to his treasure trove of books, podcasts, and other resources that will empower and motivate you.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Eric Eden (00:02):
Today we are talking about personal branding and
growth from digital marketing,and we have the perfect guest to
help us talk through this NeilSchafer.
Neal Schaffer (00:11):
Welcome to the show Well, thank you so much for
having me, Eric.
It's an honor to be here.
Eric Eden (00:16):
So, neil, you're a fractional chief marketing
officer, you're an author, akeynote speaker.
Tell us a little bit about whoyou are and what you do.
Neal Schaffer (00:28):
I help companies with their digital marketing.
The term fractional CMO meansthat it's less of just pure
black box consulting, more ofbecoming, like you know, a
fractional employee for variouscompanies.
I tend to work with smallbusinesses, startups,
entrepreneurs, helping withtheir digital marketing.
I've also written six books,just came out with two new ones
in the last few months, do a lotof speaking, teach at some
(00:51):
universities, so I considermyself because consulting is a
big part of what I do I considermyself an educator, really,
really trying to help companieswith strategy and education.
And when I started doing thisback in January of 2010, I
thought to myself, what dobusinesses need?
And back then I was justfocusing on social media
marketing.
But I thought what dobusinesses need when it comes to
(01:12):
social media?
And I thought they need to beeducated, but they also need to
have a strategy, and for thepast 15 years, that's really
what I focused on those twoareas.
Eric Eden (01:23):
And what classes do you teach?
Give us a sense of that.
Neal Schaffer (01:29):
So I teach at Rutgers Business School.
I teach a module on socialmedia branding which is part of
an integrated marketingcommunication certificate that
Rutgers Business School has, andthen, closer to home, in
Southern California, I teach twoclasses at UCLA Extension one
on influencer marketing One ofthe books I wrote was
(01:50):
specifically on influencermarketing and the other one is
on personal branding how tobecome an influencer, which is
actually content I'm working onfor my seventh book, hopefully
next year, but really talksabout professional branding with
LinkedIn, all the way tobecoming a content creator and
focusing on building influenceand business on things like
Instagram and TikTok.
Eric Eden (02:11):
Awesome, and just to check all the boxes, you also
have your own podcast, right.
Neal Schaffer (02:18):
Yeah, I have my own podcast, your Digital
Marketing Coach.
I publish four posts a week onmy blog at neilschafercom.
I have a YouTube channel.
Video for me has always beenthe final frontier, so I need to
do more there, but I have aYouTube channel that I'm looking
to invest more in, especially,eric, I don't know how much
you've dug into generative AIsearch, but it seems that
YouTube videos and transcriptson YouTube is one area that AI
(02:42):
large language models love toconsume.
So another reason to get moreserious about video in 2025, my
friends.
Eric Eden (02:49):
Absolutely, and one of the reasons that I asked you
to join us in the show isbecause I think, when it comes
to personal branding and thoughtleadership, you probably have
built a following on LinkedInover the years.
That is what I would considerto be top 1%.
(03:10):
You have 48,000 followers.
It's not just about the numbersbut, like you said, you've been
at it for a number of years andI think you've put out a lot of
really great content acrossbooks and being a keynote
speaker content across books andbeing a keynote speaker.
So talk to us a little bitabout building a personal brand.
I'm very interested in thattopic.
On this show, I think it's abit controversial for some
(03:32):
people if they should do it, ifthey shouldn't, and I think some
people sort of are on the fenceabout just what they should do
and how much effort is it andthose sorts of things.
So we'd love to hear your story.
Neal Schaffer (03:44):
So the personal branding there's a lot of
different definitions is likewhere I like to start, and my
favorite definition is somethingthat Jeff Bezos, the founder of
Amazon, is attributed to saying, which is what do people say
about you when you're not in theroom?
Okay, now, that's really reallypowerful if you think about it,
because you want to be referredto jobs that might be of
(04:09):
interest or appropriate to you,or clients or whatever it may be
.
So stay on top of mind, I think, for every business
professional, especially insales and marketing, is very,
very important concept.
So the way to look at the valueof personal branding, once we
understand what it is and whyit's important, and it's digital
and it represents you 24-7because you're not always in
(04:31):
every room, right?
So it is this sort of importantthing that will describe and
you and will bring, or not bringyou, various opportunities over
the course of your career.
Another way I like to look atit, once we get past the
definition of the value of it.
So when I teach this course, Iask people okay, how many here
want to make like $100,000 ayear in salary?
(04:52):
And so everybody raises theirhand, right, I go, okay, so
let's say you graduate fromuniversity when you're 22.
And let's see you work untilyou're 62.
Let's see you work 40 years.
So 40 years multiplied by$100,000 is $4 million.
So when you're in a jobinterview or you're not even
looking for work, but you getopportunities right, you want to
be able to succeed in gettingthat job compared to everybody
(05:15):
else around you, and what'sgoing to help you do that is
your personal branding.
So let's say you invested alittle bit of time so that you
could raise that $4 millioncareer salary up to $4.1 million
.
$4.2 million, that is whatpersonal branding can do.
When you think about it thatway, it is extremely, extremely
valuable.
I would say there is a monetaryvalue to personal branding that
(05:35):
everybody should be wanting topay attention to.
Now the how of how you do it.
There's two differentcomponents here.
There's a static component andthere's an active component.
The static component reallycomes down to your digital
website, which for 99% ofprofessionals is LinkedIn,
unless you have a blog, like wedo or the top 1%, for most
(05:56):
people LinkedIn.
If people do a search for you,they're going to find you on
LinkedIn.
They're going to look at you onLinkedIn.
So it really comes down to yourprofile and understanding that
the LinkedIn profile today isvery different than it was like
a decade ago.
Specifically, there's a lot ofvisual elements and there's a
lot of extra areas where you canwrite content and better
(06:16):
describe yourself.
So really, with intent, we don'twant people to say what they
want to say about us when we'renot in the room.
We want to influence what theythink about us when we're not in
the room to say, oh, eric is aleading podcaster, or Eric is a
leading CMO, or Eric is a greatguy, whatever that is, whatever
we want people to think about us.
(06:37):
Same with corporate branding wewant to control the narrative
and we do that through what weput on our profile, both
visually and textually.
With intent, I mean even thatprofessional headline.
So when I do these socialselling trainings there, I'll do
.
You know, I train a lot ofinsurance salespeople, so I'll
look up a term, like you know,umbrella insurance and I'll show
(06:58):
the top people that appear inLos Angeles, for instance, and
just those headlines are very,very different and will attract
different people.
I urge you to do this foryourself.
Do a search for, not your name,but do a search for your title
or the sort of title that youwould like to get in your next
job or whatever that isObviously if you're a small
business owner, an entrepreneurwhat sort of the keywords that
(07:21):
clients have put in to find you,and compare those headlines
that appear in the searchresults and how they attract or
repel certain people.
It's a really fascinatingexercise, but a lot of this you
can really DIY with a little bitof time and with AI it now
becomes your best friend becausenow you can test ideas and ask
for ideas right to help youimprove that.
(07:41):
So the static part is you setit once.
You forget it I mean everybody.
After listening to this podcast,I just wrote a new book called
Maximizing LinkedIn for BusinessGrowth.
It's a $4.99 ebook on Amazon,but it goes through all my
advice on how to do that profilecreation right and a little bit
more.
But you only need to spend, Ithink, an hour or two to get it
done, get it out of the way.
(08:01):
Maybe every few months you takeanother look at it, right, but
beyond that it's the active partand this is where professionals
are like I don't want to bespending an hour a day on
LinkedIn and it comes down thelast chapter of this book I
wrote.
I talk about a LinkedIn playbook.
Right, you need to have thisset defined of things you do on
a daily basis, and that makes ita lot easier for you to be
consistent.
You don't even need to publishcontent daily to be active.
(08:24):
But really, how your personalbrand grows on LinkedIn is
through the art of, either one,publishing content or, number
two, engaging with other people.
And if you don't want topublish content, you don't have
any original ideas or what haveyou.
Just engaging alone andcommenting can bring you
followers, can get people torecognize you.
But really I talk aboutinfluencer marketing and
(08:48):
personal branding and how tobecome an influencer.
The thing that unifies all ofthem is the fact that all of
these people, every influencer,is a content creator.
They could not becomeinfluential I could not become
influential without creating acontent, whether it's a podcast
or a blog or what have you.
So, on LinkedIn specifically,it does come down to actually
publishing your own content.
If you really want to be known,right, and build your personal
(09:12):
brand, accelerate the buildingof it and even if you want to
become a thought leader, evenmore so it really comes from
that content.
So, once again, ai can give uslots of ideas for content that
we can create on our own.
There's also some other toolsyou can use, which I list in the
book, but there's lots of toolsout there that can really help
you develop your own ideas andflesh them out into content to
(09:34):
help you become more consistenton LinkedIn.
And then the engagement engagingwith people in your network,
finding new people to engagewith and if you were to spend
the content creation piece isthe hardest.
Maybe, let's say, you justcreate something once a week and
maybe you spend 15 to 30minutes on it, let's say, but
every day I would hope you're inLinkedIn engaging with 5, 10,
(09:54):
15 people.
You know, put a timer on 5, 10,15 minutes a day.
That's all you need to do tokeep in touch with your network,
but also find new people toengage with that are aligned
with your personal brand.
So, once again, we're trying toincrease our lifetime salary,
right, so it's not asking a lot,but the benefits can really be
(10:18):
a lot and you're not going tosee the benefits overnight, but
it really comes when you're upfor a promotion or a company
reaches out to you becausethey're interested in maybe
hiring you because they foundyour content and they went to
your profile and the brandaligned with what they were
looking for.
What have you?
Or it might be a speakingopportunity, it might be a
podcast interview opportunity.
Whatever it is, I do think overtime you see more and more of
these opportunities come yourway, and that's sort of the ROI
(10:39):
of this, because it becomes thena tumbleweed effect Once you
get on one podcast.
The very first podcast I wasinterviewed on was Michael
Stelzner's Social MediaMarketing Podcast, which is like
a top 10 social media marketingpodcast.
I didn't know what podcastswere, in all honesty, and after
he interviewed me he says Neil,there's going to be a bunch of
people reach out to you askingyou to be interviewed on their
(11:00):
podcast.
So get ready and lo and behold,that's what happened.
And the next podcast I was onwas Entrepreneurs on Fire, john
Lee Dumas.
Now, all this started because Iwrote a book called Maximize
your Social about social mediamarketing strategy that Michael
Stolzner wanted to interview meon.
I could have written blog postsabout it, which at some time I
(11:20):
could have repurposed into abook, but it all comes from
content, right?
But that tumbleweed effect onceyou get going, once you get
onto one stage, it gets easierto get invited onto more stages.
What have you?
So?
I know this is a very, very longdescription to a very, very
simple question, but I like toadd the context, the why, the
how.
They're both important, but Iwould encourage every one of you
(11:41):
, after listening to this, justgo to your LinkedIn profile,
does it say, but you could evencut and paste it into a chat,
gpt, and say hey, what does itsay about me?
How would you define mypersonal brand based on my, on
my own profile?
And then, if I want to changemy personal branding to be
better known for a, b or C, whatchanges would you suggest I
make?
And that's a great way to getstarted.
You could DIY the whole process.
Eric Eden (12:04):
Yeah, I think that's great advice.
People hire and want to workwith people that they know,
trust and like, and I think theway that you get to be known,
trusted and liked is the twoways you said is by putting out
content that you're an expert onor that you have opinions on,
and by engaging with peopleright so that they know you and
(12:26):
they like you and theyultimately trust you.
I think that those are wheresome of the magic comes to life,
you were saying.
But the one thing I've noticedis that it seems like there's
this bell curve in corporateAmerica where if people are
rated in performance on a scaleof one to five, they say like
(12:47):
80% of people are a three rightand I would say a lot of the
people I've seen that invest thetime to create a personal brand
are those that are probably onthe bell curve, like the top 10%
.
They're like fours and fives,those people who are what I like
to call professionallyambitious, because a lot of
(13:08):
people, I think they just sortof want to go through the
motions and do what they have todo.
But there's a lot of greatexamples of people who produce
great content that put in extraeffort, because this is extra
effort, right, like you're notrequired to do it.
But when people put in extraeffort, that's generally what
puts them into the top 10%, andthey do it because they want to
(13:32):
get to the next level, they wantto take their career to the
next level.
That's what I've observed.
Have you seen that?
Neal Schaffer (13:39):
Yeah, if you're just putting in the motion just
for the sake of the paycheck andyou don't really enjoy doing
what you're doing, you're notgoing to invest in your personal
branding and you're probablynot going to do a good job,
right?
So it really comes down tomindset.
I consider myself a lifelonglearner.
I love learning about newthings.
So do you have that sameattitude towards life or not?
(14:01):
I think is one thing, but theother thing definitely is
ambitious.
Do you love doing what you'redoing?
If you love doing what you'redoing, then you probably love
learning new things about whatyou're doing and you probably
want to do better.
So there definitely aredifferent personality types,
different things that motivatepeople.
I've always wanted to enjoywhat I do from nine to five
because it's a big part of mylife, right?
(14:22):
And if you're not enjoying it,then maybe you should be doing
something different and personalbranding can help you align
yourself with a differentdirection if you want to go.
But I do agree there is a lotof mediocrity.
I remember when one of myfractional CMO clients was
actually a Grammy award-winningmusician and his assistant was
in charge of the marketing andshe was like, well, we're going
(14:45):
to do a giveaway.
I'm like well, what was theidea of the giveaway?
What are you going to give away?
How are you going to run it?
What's the objective?
And well, she said, I foundthis blog post and it looked
really good.
And I think that there's a lotof people who just they find
random things in the internet orchat GPT, and they just go with
it without really fundamentallyunderstanding things on a
deeper level, right On a morestrategic level, and for this I
(15:08):
think the internet does not havethe answers.
I think your experience andlearning from your mentors at
work does have the answers,because what is applicable to
one company, one industry, mightnot be applicable to another,
especially if you work in B2B Iknow we both have experience in.
So there comes a point whereyou really do need to think at a
deeper level than what appearsonline, I think is really the
(15:32):
best way to say it.
There's so many things whereI'm looking for advice on
something and the information'snot online.
People are just not talkingabout it because it's at that
level.
People tend to talk about thesimpler things.
Online is what I find vis-a-vismarketing, so it's really going
to come down to you.
You know, learn reading books,sometimes podcasts, but also
(15:54):
just going to conferences,getting to meet people right in
your company, in your industry.
Don't wait for life to come toyou, go get it.
Eric Eden (16:03):
Absolutely.
One of the things you mentionedis that how do you stand out
when there's so many people thatlook just like you on social
media, on LinkedIn you gave theinsurance example.
There's probably a millioninsurance agents out there.
How do you stand out?
How do people say you're one ofthe best out of the million?
(16:25):
Same thing for realtors or evenchief marketing officers.
There's 10,000 chief marketingofficers out there.
How do you and I stand out?
You do the things that you'vedone.
You write great books and youdo keynote speeches and you're
on podcasts and you have a viewon things, right.
I think that that's really howdo you stand out when there's so
much saturation out there?
Is that a big part of it?
Neal Schaffer (16:50):
So, working again on this book, I've defined that
there are 15 different elementsof personal branding and some
of the things like perspective,definitely one of the elements
right.
Niche is definitely anotherelement.
But things like story right.
Like, well, what's your story?
Because everybody has adifferent story and often why we
do what we do and how we do itis defined by these stories of
our past in our life.
(17:10):
So for me, the first part offiguring out your personal brand
and standing out is reallyintrospective.
It's really brainstorming allyour experiences, all your
passions, all your stories, whatare your values, what's your
why, and really from that,everybody has a unique brand.
So the niche I think when wetalk about realtors and
insurance people, their niche isoften their location.
(17:32):
But even within their location,maybe some focus on luxury
homes, some focus on singlefamily first homes, young
families there's lots of nicheswithin niches and when you put
that in your personal brand,this is exactly what I do within
niches and when you put that inyour personal brand, this is
exactly what I do.
I tend to be very general, butif I was to say fractional CMO
(17:55):
for startup e-commerce brands inthe fashion space, that alone
is a very, very definitive brandas to who I help and it's
definitely going to attract.
If that person who works for afashion, e-commerce and startup
happens to see my profile,that's a match right.
When I don't say anything, whenI just say fractional CMO, it
makes it harder for people tounderstand what I do and it
makes it even harder for peoplein my network to refer me to
(18:17):
potential business.
But the more I niche down, theeasier it is for people that
don't know me to understand me,but also people that do know me
to be able to understand whenit's a good time to reach out to
refer things.
So you know, I think theeasiest way to start is with the
niche right.
Once you get through the niche,what differentiates you from
other people?
What are those unique skillsthat you have, unique
(18:38):
experiences?
And, I do think, the storyright.
How many times have you been toa presentation and the person
on stage starts with a story ofhow they got to doing what
they're doing?
Sometimes they're tragicstories.
You don't need to be overlydramatic, but we all have
business stories of why we dowhat we do and I think tapping
into that's going to help youcreate something really, really
unique.
Eric Eden (19:00):
I think that's great advice.
I liked your idea for helpingpeople get started, if they
don't know where to get started,of using AI to give it your
LinkedIn profile URL and tell it.
You know you're a LinkedInmarketing and personal branding
expert.
Analyze my profile and tell mehow I can make it better.
If these are the things thatI'm trying to do, and I think
(19:25):
it'll give you some really goodsuggestions for that.
I've also done fun things likehave a rewrite my LinkedIn
profile and the voice of Homer's, iliad and the Odyssey.
I don't necessarily recommendthat, but it's a little fun.
If you want to make personalbranding a little fun, you can
also upload your LinkedInprofile picture and tell it to
roast you if you want a goodlaugh.
(19:46):
But in all seriousness, I thinklike AI can can help you get
going in this era of AI.
My question is what do yourecommend for people to specific
to building their personalbrand and being an influencer?
Neal Schaffer (20:02):
It's sort of a different time we're entering
here than the past five years,let's call it that's funny, as
you were saying that I wasreflecting on.
So I published this bookMaximizing LinkedIn for Business
Growth on September 17th andI'm really sort of testing the
market for it and I've got greatfeedback and I'm now going to
expand it to include a paperbackand I'm expanding three
(20:23):
different chapters which I thinkare really really elemental,
which are really reallyessential for growth on LinkedIn
.
But the other one is on content, because the way that people
publish content and the way thatpeople consume content on
LinkedIn has changed over time.
So if you haven't publishedsomething on LinkedIn recently,
really spend five, 10 minutes aday on your feed to understand
(20:44):
what you're seeing, what thealgorithm is serving you.
And the third section is AI andhow it can be used.
So I don't like to overly relyon AI.
I think that AI is great whenyou have a use case scenario for
it, when you can use it as autility.
I think really you don't needAI to get started on this, right
, but definitely, you know, Iwould say that just like oh well
(21:05):
, let's get on the internet anddo a Google search.
You know, 20 years ago, ai hasvery much become something
similar not just search, but wecan ask it for ideas.
Bounce ideas off it.
So I'm not going to say, hey,create your personal brand and
all your LinkedIn content.
You know, with AI, because AIlacks stories, it lacks emotion,
it lacks uniqueness, because itliterally just regurgitates
(21:26):
everything in its large languagemodel.
But for ideas, when you'restuck, getting started with
something on your canvas versusa blank canvas, will help you
finish it sooner.
And that's really the greatestthing about AI is you'll never
have a blank canvas.
Ai will always shoot outcontent.
Even when it shouldn't beshooting out content and it's
(21:46):
hallucinating, it will stillgive you content, whether you
like it or not.
So you still need to have thatcritical thinking skills to
first say, hey, is this factualor not?
And then, two, will it reallyresonate with my audience or not
?
But yeah, I mean I would say AIis your sidekick, your partner,
your co-creator, your intern,your assistant, whatever you
want to call it.
At every step you can beconfirming things with it.
But at the end of the day, thecreativity and your core content
(22:10):
I would not really rely on AI.
What AI does really well withcontent creation going a little
bit deeper here is if youalready have ideas and stories.
You already know what you wantto talk about and you feed that
into the AI.
It can help you repurpose thatinto shorter little bits.
It can give you ideas of whereyou might want to expand upon
certain ideas or change theordering of things, but you
(22:32):
don't want to start fromabsolute scratch and ask AI to
write you the content.
It always is better when youhave your own content, asking it
for ideas about hey, I'm afractional CMO and I'm looking
to engage with these types ofclients and I want to be known
as a thought leader in thisindustry and my personal
branding is about this, this andthis.
(22:53):
Please give me 10 ideas forcontent that I should publish on
my feed in LinkedIn and it'llgive you great ideas.
And from there you need to takean idea, flesh it out yourself
and then, if you need help atdeveloping that content, that's
where I'd use AI.
So you know, ai is great forthe functional content and AI is
great for ideation.
And then AI is great at takingwhat you already have and
(23:15):
helping you refine and improveit, but not just from scratch.
You know, letting AI outputsomething and cutting and paste
that right.
So it's a distinction.
That's really, really important.
But everything outside of thatAI can be used to various
degrees and when I started withAI, I was using all these
different third-party toolsbecause I'm like a marketing
(23:35):
technology tool geek.
But these days I've really goneback to ChatGPT because all
these tools just integrate withChatGPT.
There are some who say thatClaude is better, is more human.
There are sites like Magi Ithink it's M-A-G-A-I where you
can compare various outputs andfind the large language model
that best serves you.
Obviously, google is anotheroption.
I just use ChatGPT.
(23:56):
I pay $20 a month for the paidversion.
I train it to better sound likeme and, yeah, I mean that's
really the only tool I think youreally need.
There are some additionalLinkedIn tools that I cover in
my book that are like AIenhanced tools, that have like
preset recipes for some of thesethings, but I think you
developing your own promptingand revising that prompt and
(24:18):
custom GPTs for your own work isprobably the best way that I
would recommend that you manageyour time with AI today.
Eric Eden (24:26):
I think that's great advice as we're going into 2025,
what are the top two or threethings that you would recommend
to those who are professionallyambitious, that want to build a
personal brand, want to be athought leader and an influencer
?
What should they focus on inthe next year?
Neal Schaffer (24:50):
Well, number one perfect your craft.
Learn what you need to learnabout what you do.
Consume podcasts, books, go toconferences, right.
Influencers become influentialbecause usually they're really
good at something and they'veperfected their craft over time.
So that's something that goeswithout saying.
Number two is really invest incontent creation.
(25:13):
Start getting your ideas out.
In my class, I bring out aconcept called the story bank
and it's a concept that otherprofessional speakers talk about
, but it's really documentingall these stories or case
studies, right, of things thatyou've done that have had impact
in your career, in yourpersonal life, or just things
that you think about that helpdefine you, whatever type of
(25:36):
story it is, by putting those insome sort of a database.
It could be Notion, it could bea Google Sheet that will really
help you in developing thatpersonal brand, but from those
stories then you could begin tocreate really, really unique and
original content.
So, investing in contentcreation whether it be LinkedIn
posts, I would start withLinkedIn posts, but if you feel
(25:57):
confident, you can then startthinking about well, maybe I
want to do a podcast, maybe Iwant to do LinkedIn video, maybe
I want to do more writing andstart a blog or write a book,
but really the LinkedIn post isthe easiest way to get started.
But try to challenge yourselfOnce a month, I'm going to write
something, or once a week I'mgoing to write something, and if
(26:17):
you could publish every day,monday to Friday, you're
publishing more frequently thanI am and I've written three
books on LinkedIn.
So you definitely do not haveto do it every day, but once a
week, crafting something reallyunique.
And I would recommend, if it'sgoing to be a longer piece of
content, just start a newsletter.
I did an analysis of my poststhat I've been publishing on
LinkedIn over the past almosttwo years and the newsletters
(26:40):
actually got the mostimpressions.
You know, the newsletter isbasically, instead of writing a
post, you write an article.
Once you get a hundred, I thinkonce you get a hundred
subscribers, you can name it andpeople you know will subscribe
to it, and LinkedIn really doeslike to keep people on the
platform and a newsletter is agreat way of doing that.
So that would be myrecommendation is really just to
start a newsletter where youknow, once a week, share a story
(27:03):
, right, that is aligned withyour personal brand, that shares
your expertise, that helps youbuild your personal brand.
So the last part is AI.
Just spend time experimentingwith AI.
Whatever you don't use AI for,try using it with it, because
it's really going to help withyour efficiency, with your
consistency, with yourcreativity.
(27:24):
It's like the internet itself,right, it's like electricity
itself.
It's going to help you in many,many different ways.
And we are still at the very,very beginning of the very, very
tip of the iceberg when itcomes to generative AI.
So really experiment more withit.
Yeah, I mean, always have itopen, always be thinking of
different ways of using it.
Try to find better ways ofgetting the information you want
from it.
So those would be my threethings that I would recommend.
(27:47):
Obviously, craft, become alifeline learner there are so
many ways to learn right now,offline and online and then
build that personal brandthrough, ideally, writing
content about your stories oncea week through a LinkedIn
newsletter would be myrecommendation today.
It might change if thealgorithm changes, but that's
what it is today.
And then the third part would bethe AI, and the extra credit
(28:07):
would be, once you seem to get alittle bit of engagement and
success with the newsletter, ifyou could then put that into a
15 to 30 second or maybe 45second video and really test
LinkedIn videos, because we areseeing people get really good
success with it Not everybodyand it's very random, but those
that are successful are reallysuccessful.
(28:27):
Another way of using AI hey,here's an 800-word LinkedIn
newsletter.
I'd like to create a 30-secondvideo script that covers the key
points, that would be engagingand has a strong hook.
Can you create one for me?
And then, boom, you have acanvas, you have a rough draft
of something that you couldcreate a video for, and then
creating the video is as simpleas just as simple as your iPhone
(28:47):
and recording yourself,bringing it into CapCut on your
phone or on your computer,putting a title, adding captions
, maybe doing a little bit ofslight editing and you're done.
And I think video is the finalfrontier for me as well, and
there's this mindset thatprevents us from doing more with
video.
But once you get going, I thinkit's really easy to do and it's
(29:09):
another way.
If you really want toaccelerate the growth of your
personal brand on LinkedIn,definitely video.
And once you do that, I meanyou could take those LinkedIn
videos, you could put them onYouTube, youtube Shorts, you
could put them on Instagram,tiktok.
So I know that was extra credit, but that's a huge one for
those that really want to beambitious and go the whole way
in 2025.
Eric Eden (29:34):
I'm loving it.
I recommend everyone beambitious and embrace all of
those ideas.
Neil, thank you so much forbeing with us today, sharing
your stories, your advice andyour ideas.
I'm going to link to yourwebsite so people can check out
your books and your podcasts andall of your great content and
get in touch if they'd like tolearn more about all the great
things you're doing.
Really appreciate you being onthe show today.
Neal Schaffer (29:53):
Thank you.
Oh, it's been my pleasure and Iwish everyone the best of luck.
And you know the future's now.
Don't wait another day.
Get started today.
Make 2025 the best year ever.
Today we are talking about personal branding and
growth from digital marketing,and we have the perfect guest to
help us talk through this NeilSchafer.
Neal Schaffer (00:11):
Welcome to the show Well, thank you so much for
having me, Eric.
It's an honor to be here.
Eric Eden (00:16):
So, neil, you're a fractional chief marketing
officer, you're an author, akeynote speaker.
Tell us a little bit about whoyou are and what you do.
Neal Schaffer (00:28):
I help companies with their digital marketing.
The term fractional CMO meansthat it's less of just pure
black box consulting, more ofbecoming, like you know, a
fractional employee for variouscompanies.
I tend to work with smallbusinesses, startups,
entrepreneurs, helping withtheir digital marketing.
I've also written six books,just came out with two new ones
in the last few months, do a lotof speaking, teach at some
(00:51):
universities, so I considermyself because consulting is a
big part of what I do I considermyself an educator, really,
really trying to help companieswith strategy and education.
And when I started doing thisback in January of 2010, I
thought to myself, what dobusinesses need?
And back then I was justfocusing on social media
marketing.
But I thought what dobusinesses need when it comes to
(01:12):
social media?
And I thought they need to beeducated, but they also need to
have a strategy, and for thepast 15 years, that's really
what I focused on those twoareas.
Eric Eden (01:23):
And what classes do you teach?
Give us a sense of that.
Neal Schaffer (01:29):
So I teach at Rutgers Business School.
I teach a module on socialmedia branding which is part of
an integrated marketingcommunication certificate that
Rutgers Business School has, andthen, closer to home, in
Southern California, I teach twoclasses at UCLA Extension one
on influencer marketing One ofthe books I wrote was
(01:50):
specifically on influencermarketing and the other one is
on personal branding how tobecome an influencer, which is
actually content I'm working onfor my seventh book, hopefully
next year, but really talksabout professional branding with
LinkedIn, all the way tobecoming a content creator and
focusing on building influenceand business on things like
Instagram and TikTok.
Eric Eden (02:11):
Awesome, and just to check all the boxes, you also
have your own podcast, right.
Neal Schaffer (02:18):
Yeah, I have my own podcast, your Digital
Marketing Coach.
I publish four posts a week onmy blog at neilschafercom.
I have a YouTube channel.
Video for me has always beenthe final frontier, so I need to
do more there, but I have aYouTube channel that I'm looking
to invest more in, especially,eric, I don't know how much
you've dug into generative AIsearch, but it seems that
YouTube videos and transcriptson YouTube is one area that AI
(02:42):
large language models love toconsume.
So another reason to get moreserious about video in 2025, my
friends.
Eric Eden (02:49):
Absolutely, and one of the reasons that I asked you
to join us in the show isbecause I think, when it comes
to personal branding and thoughtleadership, you probably have
built a following on LinkedInover the years.
That is what I would considerto be top 1%.
(03:10):
You have 48,000 followers.
It's not just about the numbersbut, like you said, you've been
at it for a number of years andI think you've put out a lot of
really great content acrossbooks and being a keynote
speaker content across books andbeing a keynote speaker.
So talk to us a little bitabout building a personal brand.
I'm very interested in thattopic.
On this show, I think it's abit controversial for some
(03:32):
people if they should do it, ifthey shouldn't, and I think some
people sort of are on the fenceabout just what they should do
and how much effort is it andthose sorts of things.
So we'd love to hear your story.
Neal Schaffer (03:44):
So the personal branding there's a lot of
different definitions is likewhere I like to start, and my
favorite definition is somethingthat Jeff Bezos, the founder of
Amazon, is attributed to saying, which is what do people say
about you when you're not in theroom?
Okay, now, that's really reallypowerful if you think about it,
because you want to be referredto jobs that might be of
(04:09):
interest or appropriate to you,or clients or whatever it may be
.
So stay on top of mind, I think, for every business
professional, especially insales and marketing, is very,
very important concept.
So the way to look at the valueof personal branding, once we
understand what it is and whyit's important, and it's digital
and it represents you 24-7because you're not always in
(04:31):
every room, right?
So it is this sort of importantthing that will describe and
you and will bring, or not bringyou, various opportunities over
the course of your career.
Another way I like to look atit, once we get past the
definition of the value of it.
So when I teach this course, Iask people okay, how many here
want to make like $100,000 ayear in salary?
(04:52):
And so everybody raises theirhand, right, I go, okay, so
let's say you graduate fromuniversity when you're 22.
And let's see you work untilyou're 62.
Let's see you work 40 years.
So 40 years multiplied by$100,000 is $4 million.
So when you're in a jobinterview or you're not even
looking for work, but you getopportunities right, you want to
be able to succeed in gettingthat job compared to everybody
(05:15):
else around you, and what'sgoing to help you do that is
your personal branding.
So let's say you invested alittle bit of time so that you
could raise that $4 millioncareer salary up to $4.1 million
.
$4.2 million, that is whatpersonal branding can do.
When you think about it thatway, it is extremely, extremely
valuable.
I would say there is a monetaryvalue to personal branding that
(05:35):
everybody should be wanting topay attention to.
Now the how of how you do it.
There's two differentcomponents here.
There's a static component andthere's an active component.
The static component reallycomes down to your digital
website, which for 99% ofprofessionals is LinkedIn,
unless you have a blog, like wedo or the top 1%, for most
(05:56):
people LinkedIn.
If people do a search for you,they're going to find you on
LinkedIn.
They're going to look at you onLinkedIn.
So it really comes down to yourprofile and understanding that
the LinkedIn profile today isvery different than it was like
a decade ago.
Specifically, there's a lot ofvisual elements and there's a
lot of extra areas where you canwrite content and better
(06:16):
describe yourself.
So really, with intent, we don'twant people to say what they
want to say about us when we'renot in the room.
We want to influence what theythink about us when we're not in
the room to say, oh, eric is aleading podcaster, or Eric is a
leading CMO, or Eric is a greatguy, whatever that is, whatever
we want people to think about us.
(06:37):
Same with corporate branding wewant to control the narrative
and we do that through what weput on our profile, both
visually and textually.
With intent, I mean even thatprofessional headline.
So when I do these socialselling trainings there, I'll do
.
You know, I train a lot ofinsurance salespeople, so I'll
look up a term, like you know,umbrella insurance and I'll show
(06:58):
the top people that appear inLos Angeles, for instance, and
just those headlines are very,very different and will attract
different people.
I urge you to do this foryourself.
Do a search for, not your name,but do a search for your title
or the sort of title that youwould like to get in your next
job or whatever that isObviously if you're a small
business owner, an entrepreneurwhat sort of the keywords that
(07:21):
clients have put in to find you,and compare those headlines
that appear in the searchresults and how they attract or
repel certain people.
It's a really fascinatingexercise, but a lot of this you
can really DIY with a little bitof time and with AI it now
becomes your best friend becausenow you can test ideas and ask
for ideas right to help youimprove that.
(07:41):
So the static part is you setit once.
You forget it I mean everybody.
After listening to this podcast,I just wrote a new book called
Maximizing LinkedIn for BusinessGrowth.
It's a $4.99 ebook on Amazon,but it goes through all my
advice on how to do that profilecreation right and a little bit
more.
But you only need to spend, Ithink, an hour or two to get it
done, get it out of the way.
(08:01):
Maybe every few months you takeanother look at it, right, but
beyond that it's the active partand this is where professionals
are like I don't want to bespending an hour a day on
LinkedIn and it comes down thelast chapter of this book I
wrote.
I talk about a LinkedIn playbook.
Right, you need to have thisset defined of things you do on
a daily basis, and that makes ita lot easier for you to be
consistent.
You don't even need to publishcontent daily to be active.
(08:24):
But really, how your personalbrand grows on LinkedIn is
through the art of, either one,publishing content or, number
two, engaging with other people.
And if you don't want topublish content, you don't have
any original ideas or what haveyou.
Just engaging alone andcommenting can bring you
followers, can get people torecognize you.
But really I talk aboutinfluencer marketing and
(08:48):
personal branding and how tobecome an influencer.
The thing that unifies all ofthem is the fact that all of
these people, every influencer,is a content creator.
They could not becomeinfluential I could not become
influential without creating acontent, whether it's a podcast
or a blog or what have you.
So, on LinkedIn specifically,it does come down to actually
publishing your own content.
If you really want to be known,right, and build your personal
(09:12):
brand, accelerate the buildingof it and even if you want to
become a thought leader, evenmore so it really comes from
that content.
So, once again, ai can give uslots of ideas for content that
we can create on our own.
There's also some other toolsyou can use, which I list in the
book, but there's lots of toolsout there that can really help
you develop your own ideas andflesh them out into content to
(09:34):
help you become more consistenton LinkedIn.
And then the engagement engagingwith people in your network,
finding new people to engagewith and if you were to spend
the content creation piece isthe hardest.
Maybe, let's say, you justcreate something once a week and
maybe you spend 15 to 30minutes on it, let's say, but
every day I would hope you're inLinkedIn engaging with 5, 10,
(09:54):
15 people.
You know, put a timer on 5, 10,15 minutes a day.
That's all you need to do tokeep in touch with your network,
but also find new people toengage with that are aligned
with your personal brand.
So, once again, we're trying toincrease our lifetime salary,
right, so it's not asking a lot,but the benefits can really be
(10:18):
a lot and you're not going tosee the benefits overnight, but
it really comes when you're upfor a promotion or a company
reaches out to you becausethey're interested in maybe
hiring you because they foundyour content and they went to
your profile and the brandaligned with what they were
looking for.
What have you?
Or it might be a speakingopportunity, it might be a
podcast interview opportunity.
Whatever it is, I do think overtime you see more and more of
these opportunities come yourway, and that's sort of the ROI
(10:39):
of this, because it becomes thena tumbleweed effect Once you
get on one podcast.
The very first podcast I wasinterviewed on was Michael
Stelzner's Social MediaMarketing Podcast, which is like
a top 10 social media marketingpodcast.
I didn't know what podcastswere, in all honesty, and after
he interviewed me he says Neil,there's going to be a bunch of
people reach out to you askingyou to be interviewed on their
(11:00):
podcast.
So get ready and lo and behold,that's what happened.
And the next podcast I was onwas Entrepreneurs on Fire, john
Lee Dumas.
Now, all this started because Iwrote a book called Maximize
your Social about social mediamarketing strategy that Michael
Stolzner wanted to interview meon.
I could have written blog postsabout it, which at some time I
(11:20):
could have repurposed into abook, but it all comes from
content, right?
But that tumbleweed effect onceyou get going, once you get
onto one stage, it gets easierto get invited onto more stages.
What have you?
So?
I know this is a very, very longdescription to a very, very
simple question, but I like toadd the context, the why, the
how.
They're both important, but Iwould encourage every one of you
(11:41):
, after listening to this, justgo to your LinkedIn profile,
does it say, but you could evencut and paste it into a chat,
gpt, and say hey, what does itsay about me?
How would you define mypersonal brand based on my, on
my own profile?
And then, if I want to changemy personal branding to be
better known for a, b or C, whatchanges would you suggest I
make?
And that's a great way to getstarted.
You could DIY the whole process.
Eric Eden (12:04):
Yeah, I think that's great advice.
People hire and want to workwith people that they know,
trust and like, and I think theway that you get to be known,
trusted and liked is the twoways you said is by putting out
content that you're an expert onor that you have opinions on,
and by engaging with peopleright so that they know you and
(12:26):
they like you and theyultimately trust you.
I think that those are wheresome of the magic comes to life,
you were saying.
But the one thing I've noticedis that it seems like there's
this bell curve in corporateAmerica where if people are
rated in performance on a scaleof one to five, they say like
(12:47):
80% of people are a three rightand I would say a lot of the
people I've seen that invest thetime to create a personal brand
are those that are probably onthe bell curve, like the top 10%
.
They're like fours and fives,those people who are what I like
to call professionallyambitious, because a lot of
(13:08):
people, I think they just sortof want to go through the
motions and do what they have todo.
But there's a lot of greatexamples of people who produce
great content that put in extraeffort, because this is extra
effort, right, like you're notrequired to do it.
But when people put in extraeffort, that's generally what
puts them into the top 10%, andthey do it because they want to
(13:32):
get to the next level, they wantto take their career to the
next level.
That's what I've observed.
Have you seen that?
Neal Schaffer (13:39):
Yeah, if you're just putting in the motion just
for the sake of the paycheck andyou don't really enjoy doing
what you're doing, you're notgoing to invest in your personal
branding and you're probablynot going to do a good job,
right?
So it really comes down tomindset.
I consider myself a lifelonglearner.
I love learning about newthings.
So do you have that sameattitude towards life or not?
(14:01):
I think is one thing, but theother thing definitely is
ambitious.
Do you love doing what you'redoing?
If you love doing what you'redoing, then you probably love
learning new things about whatyou're doing and you probably
want to do better.
So there definitely aredifferent personality types,
different things that motivatepeople.
I've always wanted to enjoywhat I do from nine to five
because it's a big part of mylife, right?
(14:22):
And if you're not enjoying it,then maybe you should be doing
something different and personalbranding can help you align
yourself with a differentdirection if you want to go.
But I do agree there is a lotof mediocrity.
I remember when one of myfractional CMO clients was
actually a Grammy award-winningmusician and his assistant was
in charge of the marketing andshe was like, well, we're going
(14:45):
to do a giveaway.
I'm like well, what was theidea of the giveaway?
What are you going to give away?
How are you going to run it?
What's the objective?
And well, she said, I foundthis blog post and it looked
really good.
And I think that there's a lotof people who just they find
random things in the internet orchat GPT, and they just go with
it without really fundamentallyunderstanding things on a
deeper level, right On a morestrategic level, and for this I
(15:08):
think the internet does not havethe answers.
I think your experience andlearning from your mentors at
work does have the answers,because what is applicable to
one company, one industry, mightnot be applicable to another,
especially if you work in B2B Iknow we both have experience in.
So there comes a point whereyou really do need to think at a
deeper level than what appearsonline, I think is really the
(15:32):
best way to say it.
There's so many things whereI'm looking for advice on
something and the information'snot online.
People are just not talkingabout it because it's at that
level.
People tend to talk about thesimpler things.
Online is what I find vis-a-vismarketing, so it's really going
to come down to you.
You know, learn reading books,sometimes podcasts, but also
(15:54):
just going to conferences,getting to meet people right in
your company, in your industry.
Don't wait for life to come toyou, go get it.
Eric Eden (16:03):
Absolutely.
One of the things you mentionedis that how do you stand out
when there's so many people thatlook just like you on social
media, on LinkedIn you gave theinsurance example.
There's probably a millioninsurance agents out there.
How do you stand out?
How do people say you're one ofthe best out of the million?
(16:25):
Same thing for realtors or evenchief marketing officers.
There's 10,000 chief marketingofficers out there.
How do you and I stand out?
You do the things that you'vedone.
You write great books and youdo keynote speeches and you're
on podcasts and you have a viewon things, right.
I think that that's really howdo you stand out when there's so
much saturation out there?
Is that a big part of it?
Neal Schaffer (16:50):
So, working again on this book, I've defined that
there are 15 different elementsof personal branding and some
of the things like perspective,definitely one of the elements
right.
Niche is definitely anotherelement.
But things like story right.
Like, well, what's your story?
Because everybody has adifferent story and often why we
do what we do and how we do itis defined by these stories of
our past in our life.
(17:10):
So for me, the first part offiguring out your personal brand
and standing out is reallyintrospective.
It's really brainstorming allyour experiences, all your
passions, all your stories, whatare your values, what's your
why, and really from that,everybody has a unique brand.
So the niche I think when wetalk about realtors and
insurance people, their niche isoften their location.
(17:32):
But even within their location,maybe some focus on luxury
homes, some focus on singlefamily first homes, young
families there's lots of nicheswithin niches and when you put
that in your personal brand,this is exactly what I do within
niches and when you put that inyour personal brand, this is
exactly what I do.
I tend to be very general, butif I was to say fractional CMO
(17:55):
for startup e-commerce brands inthe fashion space, that alone
is a very, very definitive brandas to who I help and it's
definitely going to attract.
If that person who works for afashion, e-commerce and startup
happens to see my profile,that's a match right.
When I don't say anything, whenI just say fractional CMO, it
makes it harder for people tounderstand what I do and it
makes it even harder for peoplein my network to refer me to
(18:17):
potential business.
But the more I niche down, theeasier it is for people that
don't know me to understand me,but also people that do know me
to be able to understand whenit's a good time to reach out to
refer things.
So you know, I think theeasiest way to start is with the
niche right.
Once you get through the niche,what differentiates you from
other people?
What are those unique skillsthat you have, unique
(18:38):
experiences?
And, I do think, the storyright.
How many times have you been toa presentation and the person
on stage starts with a story ofhow they got to doing what
they're doing?
Sometimes they're tragicstories.
You don't need to be overlydramatic, but we all have
business stories of why we dowhat we do and I think tapping
into that's going to help youcreate something really, really
unique.
Eric Eden (19:00):
I think that's great advice.
I liked your idea for helpingpeople get started, if they
don't know where to get started,of using AI to give it your
LinkedIn profile URL and tell it.
You know you're a LinkedInmarketing and personal branding
expert.
Analyze my profile and tell mehow I can make it better.
If these are the things thatI'm trying to do, and I think
(19:25):
it'll give you some really goodsuggestions for that.
I've also done fun things likehave a rewrite my LinkedIn
profile and the voice of Homer's, iliad and the Odyssey.
I don't necessarily recommendthat, but it's a little fun.
If you want to make personalbranding a little fun, you can
also upload your LinkedInprofile picture and tell it to
roast you if you want a goodlaugh.
(19:46):
But in all seriousness, I thinklike AI can can help you get
going in this era of AI.
My question is what do yourecommend for people to specific
to building their personalbrand and being an influencer?
Neal Schaffer (20:02):
It's sort of a different time we're entering
here than the past five years,let's call it that's funny, as
you were saying that I wasreflecting on.
So I published this bookMaximizing LinkedIn for Business
Growth on September 17th andI'm really sort of testing the
market for it and I've got greatfeedback and I'm now going to
expand it to include a paperbackand I'm expanding three
(20:23):
different chapters which I thinkare really really elemental,
which are really reallyessential for growth on LinkedIn
.
But the other one is on content, because the way that people
publish content and the way thatpeople consume content on
LinkedIn has changed over time.
So if you haven't publishedsomething on LinkedIn recently,
really spend five, 10 minutes aday on your feed to understand
(20:44):
what you're seeing, what thealgorithm is serving you.
And the third section is AI andhow it can be used.
So I don't like to overly relyon AI.
I think that AI is great whenyou have a use case scenario for
it, when you can use it as autility.
I think really you don't needAI to get started on this, right
, but definitely, you know, Iwould say that just like oh well
(21:05):
, let's get on the internet anddo a Google search.
You know, 20 years ago, ai hasvery much become something
similar not just search, but wecan ask it for ideas.
Bounce ideas off it.
So I'm not going to say, hey,create your personal brand and
all your LinkedIn content.
You know, with AI, because AIlacks stories, it lacks emotion,
it lacks uniqueness, because itliterally just regurgitates
(21:26):
everything in its large languagemodel.
But for ideas, when you'restuck, getting started with
something on your canvas versusa blank canvas, will help you
finish it sooner.
And that's really the greatestthing about AI is you'll never
have a blank canvas.
Ai will always shoot outcontent.
Even when it shouldn't beshooting out content and it's
(21:46):
hallucinating, it will stillgive you content, whether you
like it or not.
So you still need to have thatcritical thinking skills to
first say, hey, is this factualor not?
And then, two, will it reallyresonate with my audience or not
?
But yeah, I mean I would say AIis your sidekick, your partner,
your co-creator, your intern,your assistant, whatever you
want to call it.
At every step you can beconfirming things with it.
But at the end of the day, thecreativity and your core content
(22:10):
I would not really rely on AI.
What AI does really well withcontent creation going a little
bit deeper here is if youalready have ideas and stories.
You already know what you wantto talk about and you feed that
into the AI.
It can help you repurpose thatinto shorter little bits.
It can give you ideas of whereyou might want to expand upon
certain ideas or change theordering of things, but you
(22:32):
don't want to start fromabsolute scratch and ask AI to
write you the content.
It always is better when youhave your own content, asking it
for ideas about hey, I'm afractional CMO and I'm looking
to engage with these types ofclients and I want to be known
as a thought leader in thisindustry and my personal
branding is about this, this andthis.
(22:53):
Please give me 10 ideas forcontent that I should publish on
my feed in LinkedIn and it'llgive you great ideas.
And from there you need to takean idea, flesh it out yourself
and then, if you need help atdeveloping that content, that's
where I'd use AI.
So you know, ai is great forthe functional content and AI is
great for ideation.
And then AI is great at takingwhat you already have and
(23:15):
helping you refine and improveit, but not just from scratch.
You know, letting AI outputsomething and cutting and paste
that right.
So it's a distinction.
That's really, really important.
But everything outside of thatAI can be used to various
degrees and when I started withAI, I was using all these
different third-party toolsbecause I'm like a marketing
(23:35):
technology tool geek.
But these days I've really goneback to ChatGPT because all
these tools just integrate withChatGPT.
There are some who say thatClaude is better, is more human.
There are sites like Magi Ithink it's M-A-G-A-I where you
can compare various outputs andfind the large language model
that best serves you.
Obviously, google is anotheroption.
I just use ChatGPT.
(23:56):
I pay $20 a month for the paidversion.
I train it to better sound likeme and, yeah, I mean that's
really the only tool I think youreally need.
There are some additionalLinkedIn tools that I cover in
my book that are like AIenhanced tools, that have like
preset recipes for some of thesethings, but I think you
developing your own promptingand revising that prompt and
(24:18):
custom GPTs for your own work isprobably the best way that I
would recommend that you manageyour time with AI today.
Eric Eden (24:26):
I think that's great advice as we're going into 2025,
what are the top two or threethings that you would recommend
to those who are professionallyambitious, that want to build a
personal brand, want to be athought leader and an influencer
?
What should they focus on inthe next year?
Neal Schaffer (24:50):
Well, number one perfect your craft.
Learn what you need to learnabout what you do.
Consume podcasts, books, go toconferences, right.
Influencers become influentialbecause usually they're really
good at something and they'veperfected their craft over time.
So that's something that goeswithout saying.
Number two is really invest incontent creation.
(25:13):
Start getting your ideas out.
In my class, I bring out aconcept called the story bank
and it's a concept that otherprofessional speakers talk about
, but it's really documentingall these stories or case
studies, right, of things thatyou've done that have had impact
in your career, in yourpersonal life, or just things
that you think about that helpdefine you, whatever type of
(25:36):
story it is, by putting those insome sort of a database.
It could be Notion, it could bea Google Sheet that will really
help you in developing thatpersonal brand, but from those
stories then you could begin tocreate really, really unique and
original content.
So, investing in contentcreation whether it be LinkedIn
posts, I would start withLinkedIn posts, but if you feel
(25:57):
confident, you can then startthinking about well, maybe I
want to do a podcast, maybe Iwant to do LinkedIn video, maybe
I want to do more writing andstart a blog or write a book,
but really the LinkedIn post isthe easiest way to get started.
But try to challenge yourselfOnce a month, I'm going to write
something, or once a week I'mgoing to write something, and if
(26:17):
you could publish every day,monday to Friday, you're
publishing more frequently thanI am and I've written three
books on LinkedIn.
So you definitely do not haveto do it every day, but once a
week, crafting something reallyunique.
And I would recommend, if it'sgoing to be a longer piece of
content, just start a newsletter.
I did an analysis of my poststhat I've been publishing on
LinkedIn over the past almosttwo years and the newsletters
(26:40):
actually got the mostimpressions.
You know, the newsletter isbasically, instead of writing a
post, you write an article.
Once you get a hundred, I thinkonce you get a hundred
subscribers, you can name it andpeople you know will subscribe
to it, and LinkedIn really doeslike to keep people on the
platform and a newsletter is agreat way of doing that.
So that would be myrecommendation is really just to
start a newsletter where youknow, once a week, share a story
(27:03):
, right, that is aligned withyour personal brand, that shares
your expertise, that helps youbuild your personal brand.
So the last part is AI.
Just spend time experimentingwith AI.
Whatever you don't use AI for,try using it with it, because
it's really going to help withyour efficiency, with your
consistency, with yourcreativity.
(27:24):
It's like the internet itself,right, it's like electricity
itself.
It's going to help you in many,many different ways.
And we are still at the very,very beginning of the very, very
tip of the iceberg when itcomes to generative AI.
So really experiment more withit.
Yeah, I mean, always have itopen, always be thinking of
different ways of using it.
Try to find better ways ofgetting the information you want
from it.
So those would be my threethings that I would recommend.
(27:47):
Obviously, craft, become alifeline learner there are so
many ways to learn right now,offline and online and then
build that personal brandthrough, ideally, writing
content about your stories oncea week through a LinkedIn
newsletter would be myrecommendation today.
It might change if thealgorithm changes, but that's
what it is today.
And then the third part would bethe AI, and the extra credit
(28:07):
would be, once you seem to get alittle bit of engagement and
success with the newsletter, ifyou could then put that into a
15 to 30 second or maybe 45second video and really test
LinkedIn videos, because we areseeing people get really good
success with it Not everybodyand it's very random, but those
that are successful are reallysuccessful.
(28:27):
Another way of using AI hey,here's an 800-word LinkedIn
newsletter.
I'd like to create a 30-secondvideo script that covers the key
points, that would be engagingand has a strong hook.
Can you create one for me?
And then, boom, you have acanvas, you have a rough draft
of something that you couldcreate a video for, and then
creating the video is as simpleas just as simple as your iPhone
(28:47):
and recording yourself,bringing it into CapCut on your
phone or on your computer,putting a title, adding captions
, maybe doing a little bit ofslight editing and you're done.
And I think video is the finalfrontier for me as well, and
there's this mindset thatprevents us from doing more with
video.
But once you get going, I thinkit's really easy to do and it's
(29:09):
another way.
If you really want toaccelerate the growth of your
personal brand on LinkedIn,definitely video.
And once you do that, I meanyou could take those LinkedIn
videos, you could put them onYouTube, youtube Shorts, you
could put them on Instagram,tiktok.
So I know that was extra credit, but that's a huge one for
those that really want to beambitious and go the whole way
in 2025.
Eric Eden (29:34):
I'm loving it.
I recommend everyone beambitious and embrace all of
those ideas.
Neil, thank you so much forbeing with us today, sharing
your stories, your advice andyour ideas.
I'm going to link to yourwebsite so people can check out
your books and your podcasts andall of your great content and
get in touch if they'd like tolearn more about all the great
things you're doing.
Really appreciate you being onthe show today.
Neal Schaffer (29:53):
Thank you.
Oh, it's been my pleasure and Iwish everyone the best of luck.
And you know the future's now.
Don't wait another day.
Get started today.
Make 2025 the best year ever.
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