I've always been on the personal brand side. More and more founders are building it now (sometimes even before the product is ready while it's still in development, before seed fundraising). The CEO builds their position so the product sells more easily at the official launch.
But I have experience with people who built the product, scaled it, and only then did we discover who was behind it.
Honestly, with the first approach, I'd be concerned that people invest more in me as a person than in the product. People would idealise the founder and overlook the product's flaws (which could hurt development and constructive feedback).
+ I noticed the most common mistake that many people who started building a personal brand first, connected their product to their personal accounts (emails, social media, etc.) and started having a problem selling these things, because they cannot "give someone keys" to their personal profiles.
Let me start from the creator s perspective: I personally don t have a product (apart from hiring people for creative work or offering personal consultations).
But as a creator, I constantly share content, insights, and information, value that helps me build trust (for free). Based on that perceived expertise, people eventually decide to work with me (a paid service).
Everyone perceives entrepreneurship completely differently, and the weight of certain challenges varies from case to case. You always see things differently depending on the stage of life and business you're in, because your position is different each time.
When I was a teenager my biggest problem was "What will people think of me when I will start doing this?"
In my early twenties my biggest problem was "What if I can't figure out accounting, taxes, legal stuff?"
Now I have a different problem how do I scale something?
Over the past one, 2, or even 3 decades, technological development has accelerated dramatically thanks to the digital revolution.
But some technologies generate a lot of hype and still don t seem to have reached mass adoption or shown enough long-term potential. For example, that s how I currently see wearable glasses.
On the other hand, technologies and concepts like the internet, social media, artificial intelligence, and perhaps even Bitcoin have already had a profound impact on society.
In the month that I've been here, I've been noticing a pattern in a lot of launches - strong demos, polished UI, clear outputs of "what it does."
But when I ask myself "What problem does this solve?" I sometimes have to dig for the answer. (I come by that thinking honestly - I've spent 33 years building and fixing businesses, so this is the lens I can't turn off.)
I don t want to rant here (but I probably will a bit)...
Almost every ad visual, but also a lot of organic content on social media, is very generic and created by AI (I get it, it s a cheaper and more scalable way of promoting). But when everyone does it, it becomes really hard to stand out and differentiate yourself.