How to Build Authority That Makes Business Come to You | Dana Flanagan

0:00Trust is not transferable and you can't have AI take that over for you. You can build a brand through AI, you can build a trusted brand logo, pitch checks, things like that. But as a person and as a human being, we still want to know that we're talking to a real person. We want to have a connection if you need capital and you're having trouble getting in front of investors, you need to invest in somebody like myself that has all of those connections and is readily available to put you in front of the right people. We're not talking about throwing spaghetti at the wall to see if it sticks and sending you 50 contacts. That's not what we do. We actually go through and understand your business, take a deep dive and we put you and place you with people that understand your business and are going to be viable for you in moving the needle forward. Now if you're struggling in business to figure out one simple thing, how do you build more

1:00authority, credibility and influence you are going to want to listen to this guest. She's absolutely phenomenal has done hundreds of millions of dollars in real estate across the country in the commercial and global markets, but also is able to just recruit 70 agents in 90 days, where I know a lot of realtors are struggling to recruit seven agents. But the reason she did any of this and why I bring this up is because my guest also is known as the authority architect. She understood what it took to create authority for herself to reach the goal she wanted to reach and she's here to talk to us about architecting our authority Dana Flanagan is here. How are you? I'm great. Thanks so much for having me on the show. I'm excited about this. We've had many conversations off camera and finally we're bringing a two camera. We're bringing to the public. So now I want to just kind of understand this is not a podcast episode about real estate. This is a podcast episode about business, authority, credibility and how to be able to get what you want if

2:00you do this right. How you know, take me back 15 years, 20 years. Where did this start for you where it kind of clicked like if I do X, I receive Y. Yeah. So that's a great question. So I started in real estate about 25 years ago as a residential real estate agent and I started, I mean, I'm really dating myself here, but I started posting on Facebook and social media. I don't know. Facebook. Right. No, we do. Right. But this was one of Facebook was like brand new. Right. So I started posting my daily activities in real estate and my business and using it as free advertising what that got me was visibility. And so I soon realized that it's great to run at the time. We were still obviously running newspaper ads and all of those magazine ads and people did the placemats and the little diners and things like that. But I got so much, I attracted business. That's what I found is that I was attracting business. The visibility is what got me seen and got me known for my

3:03craft and what I do. So I picked up on that early on. I mean, I was pretty young. I was in my early 20s and I just started utilizing social media to be visible everywhere. I branded myself not with the company that I was with, but as a, you know, as what my brand name was at the time. And as that real estate agent, that is the obvious choice in your market. So when people thought, oh, I need to buy sell or invest in real estate, I'm calling Dana. And so business came to me. That's how I built my my clientele for buyers and sellers. But then as I got into the real estate world and joined a company that had a revenue share model, which is where you get a little piece of everything that the realtors that have signed up underneath you at that particular company when they sell you make a little bit of revenue from that. So I started attracting agents. And agents started saying, hey, I want to do what you do. I want to work with you. I want to come to your brokerage. So it was always

4:04an attraction based model that I built. And now I teach other people how to do that. I mean, the word that you see most of the time, like on LinkedIn is business development, right? I mean, it's we want we need somebody to do business development. And I basically work with companies now as an executive advisor, strategic positioning, where I help businesses and individual CEOs founders be seen, visible, and in the right rooms. And we know a little bit about that too. Just sure to do. Don't we now, I want to back up. I think what you are saying, and I need everyone to go rewind that. Most of you have probably heard as the omnipresent before we dive in. I want to talk to you about LFS capital. If you're looking to build passive income through multifamily real estate, LFS gives you access to exclusive apartment investments that aren't available to the public. If you want to diversify beyond stocks and create real cash flow, visit LFS capital.com to learn more and to get on the investor list. I personally invest with LFS capital and they have been

5:06incredible to work with. Their team is top notch. I get passive cash flow distributions to my bank account every month and I'm always in the loop with what's happening with the apartments I'm invested in. The best thing is I don't have to worry about managing tenants or dealing with repairs. The team of LFS handles absolutely everything and my income is 100% passive. And that's just the way I like it. So if you want to build wealth and passive income without all the work and additional risk, visit LFS.com. Now let's get to the show. That was harder when you were when you were talking about 20. That was harder than it is today. For sure. Yeah. And now we have everything. I mean, not to mention AI and I could put you everywhere on all platforms in like six seconds. But what I actually said, you know, I did a keynote speech around this in some level, but I called it CIA credibility, influence and authority. And if people don't know you or know what you do,

6:06it is very hard for them to give you what you want. Yeah. Very true. So going back, you understood this in a very young age and very young into business. And it just leaned into your success that you see today. Now you have these large companies hiring you to come in and show these executives how to do this exact same thing. You talk a lot about, you know, a lot of people now are using it incorrectly about like having success on paper, right? But in reality, you're stuck, you're frustrated. I by the way, so you know, and you know this, but I did the same thing. I was called out for it by what I would call like my big brother. He's been my mentor for years. He's just like my big brother. And I was called out on it. You know, what does that look like? You know, what does success on paper look like that isn't actually the same thing as winning in the business space? Yeah. So it really comes down to credibility. And this is actually one of my key notes, which is like visibility versus credibility and the five C's of credibility. I'm not going to go through them all right now. But one of

7:09them is character. You know, who are you when nobody's watching? And you know, community, who knows you? Who knows likes and trusts you enough to recommend you? Who's worked with you? So I actually wrote a, I wrote a chapter for collaboration book and it was a call your broken glow stick moment. It was all women. And what I talked about was how I actually got scammed by this person that I went into business with because his visibility online was amazing. He had the Forbes covers, which I'm sure he purchased. You know, you can buy those. You know, all the little like visible things online that you would look at this guy and go, wow, what an extreme success. And then come to find out that guy didn't have any money to pay his, to pay anybody that he was working with. In fact, when a large sum of money came in from a client that I had brought in that his bank account was so negative that it ate up the deposit that came in and unfortunately none of us got paid.

8:12So at that, it was at that point in time that I said, you know what? I'm tired of putting my future in other people's hands. And I always want to, you know, I always want to help everybody, right? Like I want, you know, to collaborate with people and do good business with good people. And that's what I thought that it was. But when I really took a step back and removed myself from, you know, that and looked at it from like a 10,000 foot view, he was really visible online, but nobody really worked with him. Like he didn't have like a lot of like real relationships. He's one of those people that go around and collect business cards at an event, but never truly connects, right? So, yeah. So, you know, it was one of those things where his visibility got me and we see it all the time. You know, you can talk about Imposter Syndrome online where you look at someone and you're like, wow, if I could just get where they are or man, they really got it all together. But do they though? Like do they really, you know, yeah, I mean, it's really true. And so that's why I, you know, I created my company number one because I wanted to call the shots and I wanted to run the show

9:14and the people that got burned by this guy actually came over and we all worked together now. They're they're part of my team, you know, so something good came out of it. But a lot of businesses struggle to be visible in the first place. They have a great idea, great product, great service. But if you're not getting it in front of the people that need to see it, it's falling on deaf ears, right? So it's all of that's great. But if you if you need capital and you're having trouble getting in front of investors, you need to invest in somebody like myself that has all of those connections and is readily available to put you in front of the right people. We're not talking about throwing spaghetti at the wall to see if it sticks and sending you 50 contacts. That's not what we do. We actually go through and understand your business, take a deep dive and we put you in place you with people that understand your business and are going to be viable for you in moving the needle forward. So that's what we do when it comes to that. It's really that credibility is coming from me because I built those relationships over years. That's what you're paying for. You're

10:14not paying for a connection. You're paying for the time that I invested all those years to have those relationships to be able to say, Hey, you need to take a look at this product. Here's the you know, here's the financials, here's the pro forma and they're going to listen to me before they're going to pick up the from from somebody that they don't know borrowed credibility is one I mean, you're just highlighting something that like just doesn't get talked about enough. I will happily borrow Dana's credibility. Yeah, I don't have that relationship with Fred. Dana does. Why? Why would I go call Fred just because someone gave me his number? He doesn't know me. What I do? What I'm looking at? But Dana says Fred, I need you to meet Justin Justin has this Fred, you do that like borrowed credibility. Everyone needs to write that down. People do not talk that talk about that enough. That is brilliant. Just brilliant. Now you gave us two of the five C's. I might I might make you strip out all the C's because I love this because I believe in the same thing. How do you gain credibility? How do you gain influence? I call it CIA. How do you gain authority? Yeah.

11:15Well, it is simple. It isn't always easy for people. It is simple. You and I could go do a master class on how you can go meet people and network. But like your five C's, I want to strip them out a little bit. What were the first two that you mentioned? Character. Character. Who are you when nobody's watching your community? Your community? Contribution? What value would you bring? I want to stop you. I love these three. Keep going. Keep going. Yeah. Contributions, I always say come from contribution. When I meet somebody in an event, I always say, what are you looking for most in your business right now? What will move the needle forward for you today? That is super important. There are so many different things that you can do to build up your credibility. You have to be visible in today's market. You have to. When people say to me, I don't do social media, that is not cool to say that anymore. You have to be on social media. If you don't want to do it yourself, hire somebody to do it.

12:20I'm not a social media. I don't do social media. I am a guru, but I don't do social media. I'm not going to come in and sit there and post for you. That is not what I do. We are much more high level than that. We have a team that will do that. If we need to build up your credibility online, you're going to need that. Here's the other interesting piece. Whenever somebody comes to me and they tell me that they are not getting any traction online, and I look at their followers and their activity online, it's minimal. I'm never going to have anybody coming to me that understands social media and they have 200,000 followers or even 20,000 followers on Instagram or whatever. Because they understand social media. Every single person that comes to me and I'm mostly talking about LinkedIn for this executive business crowd. That's where the majority of my business comes from for this particular business. When I look at their LinkedIn, they have barely 500 connections.

13:21They are not actively engaging and networking online with people that need to hear what they have to offer. It's never somebody coming to me that's got 20,000 followers and connections on LinkedIn. If you see someone that's busy online, they are usually moving the needle forward because they understand what needs to be done in order and when it comes to their positioning. We work with a lot of business owners on positioning and just really getting them in the right rooms. Not everybody needs capital. Not everybody needs to have PR or have articles written about them, but they need to be connected to the right people that can invite them to those rooms, whether that's virtual or in person. You and I just talked about what I'm doing. It's because I don't, I'm not in that room. I'm making a very large financial investment to get in the room. What do you say to the people that are just gun shy when it comes to making any level investment to

14:21build any relationships to build any credibility to get into the room? What do you say to those executives or those people? I know what I would say. I want to hear what you would say. Good luck to you. Seriously, I mean, really good luck to you. There are people that will come to me and I've actually now had to put this like in my initial message that goes out to people. When you work with me, it is on a retainer. That retainer is customized to each individual person or business. So it's not a one size fits all. If you email me and say, what are your fees? You're not going to get anything from me because it's personal. It's personalized. However, I have companies that will come to me. They're looking for capital. They're looking for strategic advisory. Oh, and where, by the way, we'll pay you, we'll give you a piece of equity when we get funding. And I'm like, that's not how I've worked. And so they're not willing to put any money out there. Like you have no budget to do anything. That's unfortunate because if you're starting a business, I don't care if you're, if you're like, oh, I'm waiting for funding and you're raising capital, you still need money for due diligence.

15:24You still, like you're not going to come in there. It's not, this is not 100% financing. You know, like you can't even buy a house that way. So it's, if you've got to have a level of investment, there should be, there should be monies put aside for travel, like networking, getting yourself to events, rooms, speaking events, pitch, pitch type of events. Like if that's what you're looking for. There are, people say, I don't have time. That's where then you have to make those investments. Don't go on a vacation then. You know, it's like you have to give something up. I mean, I would much rather go to an event like you and I were at a few weeks ago than go on a vacation because for me, like that is mentally stimulating conversation. I just can't, like go and talk about nothing like an all inclusive resort at a pool bar. Like I just can't. So, you know, for me, it's like I would rather do those types of things. So what, you know, what would I say is you have to set aside. And I understand when they're startups and things like that that people have very little money to sometimes move the needle forward, you're either going to invest now or you're

16:28going to pay for it later. And what I mean by that is it's going to take you. I still have people that don't have any money to for due diligence for an investment to get in front of the right investors. They are still looking for capital three, four years later. And you know, it's because, and it's because they haven't put any of their own money. Take money out of your 401k, take a home equity borrow money, ask friends and family. I don't care what you do. You've got to take some money to make money. And working with me is going to collapse time. That is what I do. I work on a 90 days, six, six month advisory. I do sometimes what's called a 30 day sprint. So that is for I do that for people that don't have a lot of capital and they need like 30 days of repositioning. Getting them, you know, a few introductions. It's not my typical, you know, 90 days because again, like anything, you have to, you have like a ramp up period. But you've got to take some time and invest in your business or you were going to be kicking the can down the road for a very long time. What do you say to the executives? Because you play in in two kind of fields, how I look at your business model.

17:30You play with the larger company executives. I, but then you play with the, the, the small to medium size business, the ones that are making a million to 10 million, like they're doing something, but they could be doing better. What do you say to the executive? That is just like, I just, you know, and by the way, when you meet them, you realize why they don't love to be on camera. You go, okay, there's, there's a little bit of a point here, right? Like I don't have that personality. I don't, and they, they give you all the reasons why they can't. How do you overcome that? And sometimes you and I both know sometimes there's legitimacy. They are just awkward. They're weird. They don't communicate. Like they shouldn't be the way. So what do you advise that executive? I am a point person to do that job, whether that's me and that's, and that's one of the things that I can go do for you. I can go to the events and be your representative. I was like, you're, let's just say a chief marketing officer, right? And you know, go to these events, network for you and your business on your behalf. So it's almost like you're hiring somebody for that role, but you're not

18:36having to hire a full employee. So you have to have a point person that's going to be really good at talking to the media, press releases, being interviewed on podcasts, speaking events if appropriate for your service or product. If you are behind the scenes type of person, that's totally fine. There's so many people that are really introverted. They don't like public speaking and they would prefer to just sit behind, sit at their desk, behind a computer screen and work on their craft. By the way, that's fine. Just like you said, not just totally fine, but it doesn't mean you don't take what Dana is saying to heart and actually act on it. I'm a big supporter Dana, her business is why she's here. Like this is a big, big, big thing. And then I want to bring this a little sideways into this world of AI. Because I think there's a lot of people who are the introverts, they are the people like, I don't like being on camera. I'm a little awkward. And they're just going to go full steam into AI. I'm just going to make everything AI based. What do you think of

19:40that person? Well, I mean, there is a time and place for AI, right? And I think nothing is ever going to replace the power of human connection and how important building that trust trust is not transferable. And you can't have AI take that over for you. You can build a brand through AI, you can build a trusted brand logos, pitch checks, things like that. But as a person and as a human being, we still want to know that we're talking to a real person. We want to have a connection. There are people that I've met. I mean, I'm a big energy person. So I can feel someone's energy across the room. There are people that I've met. And it's like, have you ever met somebody and they're great, great person. But they start talking and you really just don't get them. I'm like, what the heck are they talking about? Even though they're very smart, maybe they're even, you know, made a lot of money in their lifetime. But I'm like, I'm not connecting with them. There's like a disconnect here. So that's okay. I will think to myself probably not a great match

20:47for me. It's just like dating, right? I mean, when I got divorced, I went back into the dating world and I loved it because I went into a, with an open heart and an open mind. And everybody said, oh, the dating scene sucks. I'm like, no, I've met like so many great people. I just knew enough to know that could be really nice person, but I knew immediately not a match. Like not a match. Like great person can go out to dinner and have a conversation, not a match. And so I look at it in business too. Like there are times where if I don't understand your business, as much as you try to explain it to me, maybe you're not explaining it the right way, or maybe I just, it doesn't click for me. It's not a match. It's going to be really hard for me to go pitch something that I don't, number one, don't understand. We're not, there's like a disconnect there. And that, that happens in business too. And I think people try to force things because they see dollar signs. And there's a lot of this, what's it for me? How quickly can I, how quickly can I like to change the cash register with this person? Right. And so I think people

21:49are afraid just like in dating, right? Like people are afraid. Oh my gosh, what if this is as good as I'll get, you know, like he's nice. I just went out with him because he's nice and he was nice to me. And then they end up like marrying them. I'm like, there was, that's like, it wasn't a good match. Right. It's kind of the same thing. So I think, I think it's really important to really connect. So AI's great. I mean, I love to write emails with AI because honestly, it saves me so much time. Yeah. Such a great time saver. But you have to personalize it too. I mean, I, I make sure I, I go through and I personalize it. Like I'm not just sending, you know, AI is really great at doing the repetitive sentences and the, you know, the m dashes and all that. Like you've got to go through it on your own. Yeah. Funny about AI. Something is important to me. So I run a club. There is some coaching I'm doing on just video, like a training, right? Well, I gave all my videos to AI about the subject about raising capital. I said, here's all the

22:52videos I have. AI took it and formatted the training. So I don't have to go spend however hours to go script it, record it, get it done. It literally was in like two hours of AI doing it. I was working on something. AI did the whole thing. And it's still my brain, my everything. But then I can deliver it without feeling, well, a, the time saving. But for those of you that feel a little awkward, they feel a little, that is a huge time saver. I want to lean back into the connection. You talked about character. You talked about community. I believe, and I want it your take. If you aren't out shaking hands and creating relationships, you will have some level of glass ceiling on, on your growth, on your bank account, on your business, on your something. Yep. What do you advise people to be doing today that doesn't need, they don't need to do Facebook ads. They don't need to do it. But they need to start making this connection. Where can

23:54they start today from listening to this podcast? So being consistent on social media with who you are, what you do, who you help and how you help someone. Those are the four key pillars when I talk about building your brand. So again, that was who you are, what you do, who you help and how you help someone. So putting those using those with AI even talk tell AI who you are, you know, and what you do and who you're avatars, who you're trying to attract and then utilize you can ask AI to set up, give me 14 days of valuable, engaging hook valuable content and a call to action. And that way it's going to spit out a whole bunch of different, you know, 14 day calendar however you ask it to do that. Now, obviously you're going to have to go through and pick and choose. Some stuff may not be relevant for you, but it gives you framework to work with. And you can actually have it create the graphics for you too. You can have it create just like a static square graphic. You don't have to get

24:56on camera. You don't have to do these, you know, you don't have to do reels and things like that if you don't want to, but you do need to be consistent about what you do. So people with and why people should care. Like, why is it relevant to them? Right? You have to be relevant in today's market or you're forgotten. So if that's not something that you want to do, you could hire a social media marketing agency. It's it is a service that we provide. I personally am not doing that for you, but I do all my own social media for me. It's authentic. And I some days I may feel like recording a video. Some days I'm not feeling like really talking to anybody. So I'll just put up like a static post, but you have to be consistency is key because if you posted two days ago, think about how quickly your Facebook feed moves, right? Or your LinkedIn feed moves. You're gone. You're at the bottom of the pile and utilizing your stories on Facebook and Instagram is so important. I sell in my stories all the time. And and that's just where it's up there for 24 hours. And then it just sort

25:57of drops off. It's that can it's like anything. I mean, I'm not telling you guys anything that you don't know, consistency with anything. You know, the gym works too, but you got to go more than twice a month, right? So it's like that consistency and everything that you do is going to help you in your personal and your professional life. I say it in a way of feelings over standards. Too many people put their feelings above their standards. So you said, some days I feel like doing it and some days I don't, but I do it anyways. Why? Because you're standard of business of who you are, you're standard of of, you know, creating authority are so high that it doesn't matter how you feel. You do it. It's just like every morning I get up and I work out every single morning. Whether you want whether it's, you know, whether it's raining, whether I don't feel good, whether I'm tired, it's a standard that I that I don't miss. And so it's not that hard to go for a walk. You know, if you're even if you're not, you know, 45 minute walk, if you're not feeling super great, but,

26:59you know, it's again, it's a standard and that's such an important key point because how you show up in one thing is how you show up and everything. What is a big mistake that you've seen the high performing entrepreneurs make when it comes to their personal brand? When it comes to their brand, I think people spend too much time on the things that don't matter as much. Now they matter, but they don't matter as much. Logos, a fancy website, you know, buying like decorating an office, right? Like these are things that in the end are not going to move your business forward. Investing in someone like myself that's going to get you in the right rooms, make the right introductions for you, get your product placement or your service position properly so that people understand why they need you and that you are the obvious choice. When, you know, whatever market you're in, you want to be looked to as the obvious choice. We're going to rewind way back to when I was a realtor. I was the obvious choice. I was the number one

28:02agent in my town for 20 years. And in my county and, you know, in how did you do that again? I realized we were talking about social media and that may have played a small part back then. How do you do that then? What made you the number one realtor in your county for 20 years helped you great, you know, get 70 agents in 90 days, walk me through the actual mechanics of what you'd have in a day. Yeah. So I basically, you know, I utilized my photo as like my branding, like my real estate photo. I put it on all my signs. You would not mistake if it was my listing. You would not mistaken ad. If you saw my, I mean, you saw my face everywhere. I could not go to the grocery store because I would get stopped a hundred times by people. Oh my gosh, you're that realtor. You know, I literally like, I would run into people. It would just, it would be such a time suck. I'd end up being in the grocery store for two hours talking to people. So it was that branding, that repetition and that consistency of putting, and this is kind of like, I mean, use this as an analogy for your business now. I was in a small, you know, a smaller town. And I had my name on

29:05all my signs wherever you went. I had the majority of the listings in town. I put my name in advertising. I was all over social media. I, I did the little like things on the shopping carts, you know, like when you, I was everywhere. And it wasn't that I just did that one month because that's what people will say. Those things are not cheap. You know, bill, a billboard is, well, billboard in my town is to pay $2,500 a month at the time, which was a cheap billboard. That's right. But if you do it for one month, it doesn't really do anything. If you're up there, I'm that billboard for six months in a row. That's when the repetition, people aren't going to stop. When you drive down the highway and you see a billboard, you're not going to be like, oh, my God, I got to write that phone number down. But you're going to remember that you saw whatever furniture store next time you need to buy furniture or an insurance company next time you are thinking of switching insurance agents. It's the repetition like a billboard that when the time comes to utilize XYZ, that you're going to think it's top of mind because you see it all the time. That's the idea that you're trying to create behind your business. People will say, oh, I don't want to do podcasts.

30:09What's the point? Right. Who listens to it? It's the, I'm telling you guys right now. I've got another camera over here recording me on my phone. I've got, you know, be so I can take the bits. I know Justin, Justin's going to have his own, you know, amazing production with his podcast. But I'm just going to take a 30 second clip and put a reel together for social media. Then I'm going to take another clip regarding something else on another day and, you know, I can plug Justin's business. I can plug his podcast. You can take one piece of content and you can recreate 10, 15 pieces of content. So if you, even if you create like a small video, you can repurpose that content over and over again. I still use videos. I like the content vault and I use videos that I've recorded. And I'm not even speaking. It's just you can do like movement videos of you washing your car or whatever, you know, and then you just use those for social media. It's what you write over it that matters. It's really not what you're doing is what stops people from scrolling. So there's so much that I can do to help, you know, people with their, their branding and their positioning. But

31:14it's that repetition of being the obvious choice in your market. Think about how, think about Amazon. Like the first thing you think of ordering something, usually for most people is Amazon because it literally has everything. But Amazon is everywhere. There's not a day that goes by that I don't see a truck in my neighborhood. Right? And it's like you don't, you don't even, you just think of it now because it is the obvious choice in that market. And then you can even lean for some companies. I just looked at Bloom, which is a new like energy drink company. His biggest secret sauce that he used is he realized Amazon got all the eyeballs and he spent like every last dollar, he says like 150 grand to advertise specifically as like the top third of of Amazon. So when you go into Amazon, his company was the top 30. He was like, I realized one thing. Amazon has everyone's eyeballs. So if everyone has going to one place, everyone on the planet, I just need to be the thing they see first. And now they have this massive exit for almost a billion dollars. And by the way, they

32:14started the company like three years ago or something crazy. Like so crazy. And so if you just think of what Dana is saying, how can you be in front of more eyeballs? What does that actually look like? Is it just social media? Is it the investment and opportunity to go into these large rooms, whether they're an event room where they're going to go try to sell you? Okay, well, don't buy their thing. Just go network with people. But if you're not in these rooms, you're leaving all the opportunity out there just like the company or reference, they realized where the eyeballs were at. They just went there. They invested every last dollar and you guys can look up the story. Greg is his name. Greg Lavon. So I just say that just because like anyone who's hit some level of success in the branding authority, influential space, they go all in because they realize something. Now I want to ask you a personal, not personal question, but your thoughts on the company going for company brand or the CEO and founder going for personal brand. What's more important?

33:18The the company going for the company brand because that's what's that's where the consumer is headed. Like what is what is the what is your end goal? Right? Like where are you trying to drive the consumer to a website to purchase something to make an investment in your services, whatever it is? It depends what your goal is, right? But like I have my own personal brand. So everybody, when they think of Dana Flanagan, they think entrepreneur, real estate expert, brand authority, and then the authority architect is my is my brand and my business. But in the end, if you go to my website, it's Dana Flanagan.com. And so that is because I have speaking on there. I have PR, we have a series of things that we do inside that company. But I built a strong personal brand over the years. And in the right, right now, I think people think of me for always being able to make a connection and always being able to move the needle forward for them. So it really depends on what

34:23you're trying to accomplish. Like if you don't have you don't have to have a strong personal brand to build on your company. I mean, again, when you look at a lot of things online, you don't even know who's behind it, right? Like if it's just a company name and you're like, oh, this is a cool little product that I want to buy. You don't really care like that, you know, Joe Schmo is the one that built it. You don't care. It's just like, what's this going to do for for me and what clear and immediate problem does it solve in your life right now? That's really what you need to be thinking about is how the consumer out there, everybody's busy. The most people only care about themselves and what's an information. So in the end, how do you fix my problem? Yeah, exactly. Like what is your problem is that you need more clients or more customers, then you need to get and get and try to someone like me that's going to solve that problem for you. It's going to it's going to be a continuous ongoing kick in the can down the road problem for you. If you don't invest in it, you want people to invest in your business, but you're not going to invest in your own. Like that to me is a little, a little

35:27contradictory, right? 100%. And so the only thing I would challenge there is so I use an analogy, who is the CEO of Chevrolet and no one knows the answer and then he's the CEO of Tesla. Yeah, right. Yeah. Who's the CEO of Barnes and Nobles? Right. Who's the CEO of Amazon? Uh-huh. So the only thing I challenge the brand of the business being senior is people want to buy into a thesis of movement. Who's the CEO of Apple? Who's the CEO of Samsung? Right? Like so they want to buy into the people as much as they want to buy into the problem. Right? Yeah. So I will lean into specifically for the founders. Founders have to have a part. You said to yourself, all of that goes under the brand of Dana. You go to Dana's website and they go find brand authority and authority architect and all these things because you understand something fundamental. They're going to be buying into Dana above all else. Now Dana can help solve the problem through the company, right? Right. Right. Right. I really believe today what you just said

36:31for 40 minutes about people want trust. The trust company's gone. They don't trust companies. Companies are out there to go just sell you. Right. You can connect with them if your character is right. You start to bring that to you. Right? So sort of trying to pull people to you. It's actually it's being thrown at you because people are bought into the person you are. Right? Yeah. Yeah. And so that would be the thing I would say given, unless I'm not a massive influencer, right? But more people buy Alex from Ozzy's book than any other author on the planet. Yeah. Yeah. That's a crazy stat. A hundred million dollar book launch. Like come on. That's wild. Yeah. It's crazy. Yeah, but he's already known as a trusted authority in his space. That's right. And it's true. Yeah. Mm-hmm. And it's and you think about those people online that you follow, right? And we can call them, I mean celebrity status or they're well known, right?

37:31The enough well known enough like everybody. Everybody knows who Tony Robbins is, right? I mean, everybody knows who Alex from Ozzy is. So it's think about their brand, right? Like like Tony Robbins has unleashed the power within and he has, you know, all these different books and all these different conferences and different pillars of his business. But in the end, Tony Robbins is where the trust is built, right? And so and he's done that from repeatedly getting in front of you consistently and earning your trust. And I'm using him as an example. But think about the people that continuously come because you followed them, they continuously come up in your algorithm. Those people have built an authority online, right? As a trusted, as a trusted person or brand in that space. But again, like you said, the they don't necessarily, it's the brand speaks for itself in some things like a Chevrolet, right? Like that is that speaks for itself. But then you look at like a Tony Robbins. If some other guy came in and took over like Tony Robbins company

38:35and like tried to market it, wouldn't have the same effect because Tony's built that trust with his audience. And so think about that with your business. You've got to walk before you can run. And people don't want to make the investment in their business. They are going to pay heavily for it down the road. And it's it's really got to be I see people piecemealing things together too. Like, oh, I hired this person over here for this. I mean, and then the end, I'm like, what did you spend on that? They spent way more than they would have spent with me. And so and then they got burned because it didn't produce the results that they thought it was like Facebook ads is a great example. If you run Facebook ads, which I they're great, they can absolutely produce wonderful results. If you don't have the trust built with your audience and the framework and foundation, they're already you are throwing your money out the window. You might as well just throw open the window and throw money out there because the Facebook ads will not work if they're not done properly. They're not going to convert. And if you don't, if you haven't done the other dirty

39:38work, and if you're not getting business organically, Facebook ads are not going to work for you. You have to be getting business organically first. And then you you layer on the Facebook ads and the PR and the other things on top of it. People want to like put the cart before the horse. Yeah. And everybody wants the fancy stuff. Oh, I want to get here and I want to do that. And you haven't done these things first, though. And if you're not willing to invest in your own business, you want other people to invest in you, but you're not willing to invest in in your own business, that's crazy to me. Like that's absolutely crazy. Yeah. And we all bootstrap, right? For those of you listening out there that you know, you started, but then do the things that are free, right? Like make the investment of your time, right? So instead of posting once a day, post 10 times a day, well, how do I do that? And we don't have to go down this rabbit hole today. And maybe that's why you do need to reach out to Dana and bring her on board because if you don't have the money, then invest the time. You got to invest something, right? That's

40:38that's the end principle. Now you've worked with a lot of high level celebrities. You've worked with pro athletes. You worked with high net worth individuals. What do you see while working with them is is a trait that makes them ultra successful? Like that maybe people aren't aware of. Well, some of them, you know, some of them, it's not the case, right? I think that with the high net worth individuals is that they understand the power of walking before you run. They've built something else or some got in their success in whether they're a pro football player or they are a, you know, business person that had a massive exit. They understand the process that's involved, right? Like a football player doesn't get to be a pro football player without learning, practicing a ton, starting from the bottom. Everyone started at zero, right? And so

41:40I see it all too often that people look at other people in maybe their space and go, well, well, they're already here and I want to be where they are, but they put in the work. Like people fail to understand the work that people put in behind the scenes. Like you are recognized in public for what you practice in private. And a lot of people forget that that they don't see the blood sweat in tears. They don't see the clients that don't pay that don't pay you. They don't see the fact that you're not taking family vacations or you're, you know, in your office until midnight work. They don't see those things. They see the highlight reel at social media does such a good job of giving us in past or send or right? But those pro athletes, celebrities, they all went through the shit. Like they had to eat like a shit sandwich, really. You know, and they had to do the unsexy work. And I say that all the time, like you, we've all been there. Anybody that's had massive success has, has still has to do the unsexy work that people don't see.

42:40And I think there's people that feel that they're above that. That they don't, they don't need to do that because they've been in business xyz long or whatever. And so they, they try to skip the line. And it just ends up setting them back. Yeah. You said something that I'm going to reframe. They give themselves enough runway to win the game. They play the game long enough to win the game. It's a long game. It's a long game. So when you're hearing data, make it sound simple because that's for expertise. Understand, you just need to be willing to play the long game, right? Yeah. And if you do that and you have people like Dana in your corner, you can ultimately build this massive personal brand, the business brand create a lot of authority, create a lot of influence. But you have to play the long game that the, you know, going viral and being this agency's virality success as a brand doesn't equate to dollars per cell. There's, there's the unicorns that have found that to work. 99% of us, including myself, including Dana, they have not found

43:46virality to be able to pay the bills. What you need to do is be consistent to your point, right? Like getting the game, staying on the field until you win the game. Exactly. And too many people give up, like they, they'll, you know, they'll start a social media campaign and 30 days go, I didn't get anything. I didn't make a sale from it. Okay. Well, did you have conversations with people? Like it's the long game. Like I have been doing this for 25 years. Yeah. And utilizing social media to build my brand and my business and to have people coming to me 30 days is nothing. It's the same thing. You want to lose 50 pounds, 30 days. Maybe you've lost four, right? You know, like it's the same thing. So they give up too quickly. They give up too easily. They want what other people have. They don't realize the work that they've had to take to get there. And, you know, they're just not, they're not committed. You know, it's really just coming down to, like, committing, building a business, virality. I've gone viral several times. I've had millions of views. All that does is what happens is I'd rather have a post that gets a good amount of engagement.

44:50And I get, let's say, 10 really good DMs from it where people are in my inbox, hating. I really like what you're doing. I'd love to set up a call. This is my business. This is what I'm struggling with. And think about that for yourself. Then I had the first time I ever went viral. I had, like, two million views or something. And I had 16, 100 comments. I was like, oh, this is so cool. And then when I looked at the comments, they were all just people arguing with each other. Yeah. Like where the conversation totally went off the rails. And now I, you know, I have no control over what's going on now. And did it, did it, did it equate to any sort of movement in my business? It did not equate to one D not one. So, so going viral is a, is doesn't mean anything. It's getting visible in front of the right people and getting in front of the avatar who's, that's your, you know, that's your ideal avatar. Now I'm, I'm ready to pepper you with like 300

45:51questions, regardless. But what I'm going to do is I'm going to want everyone to actually just reach out to you because they're going to have their own questions. They're going to have their own new wants of how they want to build their brand. I'd really like them to just reach out to you. Where's the best place for everyone to reach out to you? Find you communicate with you. Sure. So you can go to my website, which is danaflanagan.com. And that's D-A-N-A-F-L-A-N-A-G-A-N. There is an intake form that pops up on the first screen. That'll talk to you a little bit about your business, what you're looking for, what your budget is. Fill that out. And I will get right back to you. You can also email me at danaflanagan.com. And you can find me all over social media just by looking my name. I'm staying aflannigan official on Instagram. And LinkedIn is, you know, for for this business is the best, you know, I think for any of the entrepreneurs, executives, people that are looking for capital that you're not going to find that on Instagram or Facebook. So but yeah, I would love to talk to any of you. And you know, whatever I can do to help you move

46:53your business forward. Everyone, this is Dana Flanagan. Please reach out to her. She gave you the email. She gave you the website. She gave you the link. Dan, make sure she's phenomenal. This is why she's on the podcast. Yeah, of course. And she is a authority architect. She can really help all of us take, you know, the world by storm to create the brand that we want. So Dana Flanagan, thank you so much. If this was helpful or you think a couple of people need to see or hear of Dana, make sure you share this with at least to your friends and make sure you give this a five-star review. I would greatly appreciate it. And we'll see you on the next episode.