Do founders need to be influencers in order to succeed? Personal branding vs. Being unknown
I recently came across a post by the founder of Chatbase, who described the situation: "If you want to make your business visible, you have to be a popular founder."
It's true that many companies have now taken off thanks to the cult of the founder (Jenni AI – David Park, Cluely – Chungin "Roy" Lee etc.).
Is it possible to build a company brand now without having to be an internet celebrity?
What would you start building first? A personal brand and then a company brand, or would you do without a personal brand?
167 views
Replies
From my personal experience, it's kinda possible and in a same time not. I was too naive with my first product that I will just make it good and people will like it and will naturaly rise, but I couldn't be more wrong. After few weeks I've realized that if you are not popular and you are not backed, you need to become chameleon and often switch roles, you will soon become sales person and even though it's not everyone's cup of tea, you would need to reach out people, make podcasts and etc.
In parallel you will become marketing guy that will hunt other famous people (because you are not) and you will try to pitch them your idea everday, eventually loosing focus on product itself. I've turned myself from deep coder to a podcast guy, and unfortunately it's needed when you are not famous ...
Regarding the personal/company brand - It's without a doubt personal brand, with personal brand you can build a strong connection with audience on a personal level, and basically you can pitch/sell them any idea, and not only 1 but many, you can try and fail with them and they will forgive, while building only company brand is a high risk of failure, not every product succeed and you might loose a time that you could put to a personal brand. With building strong personal brand you can launch today AI tool and tomorrow a hotdog stand and it will be most likely both successful.
@milos_mosovsky I feel you. When you are a business owner but have limited resources, you need to do things on your own. And when you ask for a job, HR-ists frame you as "not specialised, because you do a lot of things" so you are not the right fit for the role. But entrepreneurship is like that... you need to be a generalist.
So the only way to get out of this circle, is to really become successful and work on your brand (personal and also the company's).
Meet-Ting
Building philosophy: you need coders and creators. Coders to make the product, creators to bring the users. Really hard to get just noticed these days so having a founder or founding team that has a good command of the internet and social media is an advantage. Feels more rare to build something amazing that finds an audience without good founder comms and promo at the start unless you have a big growth and marketing budget or VC network that pumps it like YC.
@dbul many bootstrapped companies made it even with one founder, but such a kind of founder was very versatile, so there are very few individuals like that. And when someone is upskilled such way, it is easier to present yourself, your results (and get audience according to that).
@busmark_w_nika Did you link to the wrong post or just intentionally misquote someone?
To answer your three questions, you don't need to be an influencer or an internet celebrity to build a company brand or a successful business. Your company needs a strong brand more than it needs a founder with a strong personal brand (unless they are one and the same). While personally having a sizable amount of followers can be beneficial for founders, it can also just be a distraction if they're not the people your business needs to reach.
@william_zeidler I linked to the correct post, but I'm also referring to a slightly broader context. Many founders are now more exposed on social media, building an audience to make distribution easier for them. I see this concept quite often within the buildinpublic community and solo founders/builders (especially on X).
In my opinion, it is not necessary to be a famous founder, but it can be an advantage if you are also an influencer. Personal branding helps a product reach a wider audience and allows potential customers to connect with the founder on a personal level.
This creates a psychological effect, when buyers think of purchasing a product, the founder’s reputation can positively influence their decision. However, there are also drawbacks. If the founder engages in controversial or negative behavior, their damaged reputation can negatively affect the brand image and reduce sales of the product or service.
@nitin_joshi True, Elon Musk is a good example. Still do not know whether to hate him or love him. But his contribution to politics makes me sick about his personality.
If you start from scratch and if you are a solo founder, I think it is inevitable.
I wouldn't say necessarily an "internet celebrity," but especially focused on your domain, you need to have influence and be able to build an audience.
I think organically growing like this would lead to more persistent success.
Is it easy? Definitely not :) Struggling a lot myself as well but it is part of the job!
@ssoydan How long have you been building your personal brand?
@ssoydan What is your strategy for posting on X under a new account?
TBH, since I am building my personal brand, everything is complicated but easier at the same time:
Easier:
– get a support from companies
– people wanna interview me and that can indirectly increase my visibility
– have an access to lot of tools for free
Complicated:
– more people ask for my attention so it is not very sustainable long-term (I need to filter)
IXORD
I think it’s possible, but it’s important that there are meaningful moments involving the founder. It’s like personal branding, but not for the general public—rather, for example, participating in conferences, building networking, and connecting with more influential people.
@ixord Or visiting podcasts. I found it very crucial to show your presence at key events. Because it accelerates the growth, actually.
IXORD
@busmark_w_nika Yes, I agree with that :)
Yes, absolutely. You need to be able to represent your brand and a lot of customers these days look up the CEO/Founders of the company.
It is possible to build a company brand without having to be an internet celebrity. BUT you will need to start posting and bringing value to folks within your network if you want to start a company.
@anaempromptuai Do you have any good examples of such self-made successful entrepreneurs?
There are a lot of businesses out there that do really well under the radar, so it's hard to say that one could not build a business without being known online. But, having an audience should help so long as the audience you've curated is also your ICP.
I've been building a personal brand that's morphed into most of my following knowing me for Microsoft Excel. So, while I've got a decent following across platforms, being able to leverage that into the business I'm building will be a bit of a challenge I'm certain.
@mattbrattin Which platform is your strongest one?
@busmark_w_nika When I was really engaged with the content building a few years back I grew my tiktok to 175k and linkedin to 40k (YT is only 13k), but I've been posting very little these last few years so growth has stalled and getting back into it is a slow roll. Hard to say which is strongest, each of them bring a different mix of leads and interest in my old products, unsure what'll happen with the new.
@mattbrattin can you share the links? :) Id like to have a look.
@busmark_w_nika Unsure if link dropping is cool here, but since you asked :)
https://www.tiktok.com/@mattbrattin
https://www.youtube.com/@mattbrattin
https://www.linkedin.com/in/mattbrattin/
A stable personal brand for a founder isn't essential, but it's definitely a huge plus.
It makes distribution so much easier and helps cut down on advertising expenses.
@tetianavoronina TBH, I would rather go this way (time demanding), but long-term (cost effective) :)