Personal branding is the process of creating an authentic image of yourself. Just like companies use branding to market their products, you too can learn how to share more about your values, views & co.

I thought long and hard about if I should immediately write a newsletter about HOW to create a personal brand online. But then I looked around on Linkedin and realized that we don’t have enough biodiversity heroes on the platform that use their voices to their fullest potential.

So my guess is that it is not clear to everyone how powerful and important personal branding is.

In this article, I give you 10 reasons why you should start branding yourself today.

Personal branding 10 reasons to start now

1. Connect with like-minded biodiversity heroes

Fixing the biodiversity crisis can be a very alienating task. The challenge is so massive, and sometimes you might feel like giving up.

If you start posting and connecting online, you will slowly build up your tribe of like-minded biodiversity heroes that work on the same issue.

This helped me immensely to reduce my eco-anxiety because I realized that others work on inspiring projects to fix this mess too.

👋 Looking for the best tools and resources to make your organization thrive?

Download our free Biodiversity Hero OS and discover the best support materials available!

2. Build up your authority

Now there are plenty of solutions out there, not enough, but still plenty. Why should people care about your approach to restoring and protecting nature?

With the help of personal branding, you can show that you know what you are talking about. We are all good at something, so just start sharing more about your daily work and how you are tackling the biodiversity crisis.

3. Increase your sales/donations

Now I only started a couple of months ago. So, for this reason, I asked some senior biodiversity icons of mine if personal branding influences their companies’ sales.

Good news. Personal branding for them had a massive measurable impact on their nature business. They shared that their personal branding is responsible for >50% of their sales.

Obviously, this highly depends on your nature NGO and biodiversity business, but the excellent aspect of personal branding is that it is easy to measure. So after some time, you can calculate the apparent Return On Investment (ROI).

🦩 Discover the three non-negotiable ingredients to make a sale!

4. The bad apples don’t shut up

If you swipe around social media these days, you quickly get the idea that humanity is seriously messed up. But that’s just not true. The vast majority of us are good.

Inspiring people like you are often just not as vocal as those who spread fake news and hate.

Our social media feeds should be filled with stories of hope and actions that we can take to restore nature. Please be a part of that movement.

5. Inspire others to follow in your footsteps

Talking about inspiration, many people do not know that protecting and restoring nature can be a career path.

By sharing your stories, obstacles, solutions, etc., they will be inspired to follow in your footsteps.

Let’s build up an army of nature lovers that dedicate their careers to the biodiversity cause.

6. Become a good AI parent.

Now this might sound a bit weird, but elaborating on the previous bad apple point. Artificial Intelligence will change our human direction of the next decades to come.

AI is constantly learning from us humans and everything it can find on the internet. If only misinformation, hate, and consumerism are displayed on the web, guess what AI will learn.

To use the power of AI for something good, we need to become good parents, so we need to fill it with stories and actions of hope. Showing the true face of humanity.

🤖 If you are interested in this topic, check out this podcast episode from The Diary of a CEO with a leading voice in AI.

7. Increase awareness of your nature issue

If you are reading this, there is a good chance you care about a particular nature issue. It might be plastic pollution, rewilding, coral restoration & co.

Outside of our biodiversity fan bubble, unfortunately, many people still don’t know about the nature tippings points and all the great solutions we have to combat them.

Investing in your personal brand will help to spread awareness, which is the first crucial step for people to take action.

🐋  Do you want more kicking hacks like this to improve your organization strategy?

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8. Differentiate yourself from other biodiversity heroes

As mentioned, there are still far too few of us, but there are still a couple of thousands, maybe even millions?

So what sets you apart from them? Your humor, your knowledge, your communication skills, your innovative approach?

Showing up online will help everyone to understand what you are all about.

9. Forge powerful partnerships

I am a tiny fish, yet I have already managed to get partnership proposals about podcasts, magazine articles, company collabs, etc.

All these partnerships push the other 8 reasons even further. If I can do it, I am certain you can pull this off too.

“One of the few marketing techniques that doesn’t cost money”, Oliver.

10. It doesn’t cost a penny

One of the few marketing techniques that doesn’t cost money. So this approach is perfect for nature projects that lack financial means for marketing campaigns.

However, don’t forget that your time also has significant value. So, still, balance it against your other commitments.

🌿 Do you think helping nature is enough as a value proposition? Unfortunately not, discover why in this article.

Your turn: time to put the 9 reasons to start acting on developing your personal branding

5 actions to start your personal branding journey

1. Block yourself 30 minutes to reflect on this newsletter. What do you think about it? Is this something you can envision?
2. Write down things that you would like to share with people. E.g., your values, your story, your daily actions, etc.
3. Choose a social media to start building your personal brand. Ideally, one that you are already on and actually like using. It doesn’t have to be Linkedin. Twitter, Instagram, Tiktok, Youtube, etc. work too.
4. Commit yourself to posting X times per week. Start low and go from there, but show up regularly.
5. Set up a 30min free call with me if you struggle with developing your personal branding and we can do this exercise together.

Cheat sheet to learn more about personal branding

In a nutshell: Personal branding is the key to promoting your nature venture and boosting it to new levels.

Best practices: Choose your social media and post daily. Quantity beats quality at the beginning, especially until you find your voice.

Best Online Course: Justin Welsh Linkedin Course or if you prefer real people interaction Gilles Linkedin Bootcamp

Best in class: Justin Welsh, Alex Hormozi, Dan Koe, Ruben Hassid

Before you go, if this newsletter provides any value to you, I would love to ask you for a favor. Please share it with 1 nature enthusiast that could benefit from this content too.

This will help me massively to keep on providing this content for free.

Personal branding is not only important because it’s one of the most affordable marketing techniques, but as it is also one of the most powerful ones.

Now go out there and show the world how you plan to bring back nature.

See you next week. Have a wild one!

Oliver

🦧 Whenever you are ready, there are 2 ways we can help you:

1. 1-to-1 business consulting. Detailed and personalized consulting to double the impact of your biodiversity venture in the shortest possible time. Not sure how to build your personal brand? Let me help you in designing it.
2. Wild Business Mates in Action. Wild Business Mates help you execute in areas you are struggling with. Tech, Marketing, Sales, Communication, etc.