Your identity crisis is killing your growth

Your bio changes more than your underwear.

Each change feels smart in the moment. New niche. Fresh dopamine. But to everyone watching, you’re a fuzzy TV channel they can’t quite tune into. They scroll past because they can’t remember what you actually do.

And that's exactly why you're still invisible.

Every month it's a new angle. Last month you were "helping SaaS founders scale."

Next month? "AI consultant for confused executives."

By December you'll probably be "Chief Underwater Basketweaving Officer for Web3 Dolphins."

You're not building an audience. You're confusing one.

Let’s dive in:

Here's what you don't see whilst you're busy reinventing yourself for the fifth time this year.

Those "big creators" you're comparing yourself to?

They've been saying the same thing for years.

Justin Welsh has been banging on about solopreneurship since 2019. Same message. Same positioning. Same relentless focus.

Jason Fried has been preaching "calm company" philosophy for over a decade. Still talking about the same principles. Still building the same audience.

But you?

You gave yourself three months to "see results". And when your follower count didn't explode?

You decided the problem was your positioning.

Wrong.

The problem is your patience.

Results come from compounding efforts

Think about the Grand Canyon.

It wasn't carved by an earthquake or explosion. It was water. The same water, flowing the same path, for six million years. Drop by drop. Day by day. Creating something so massive that astronauts can see it from space.

That's what consistency does to a personal brand.

Psychologist Robert Zajonc discovered the "mere exposure effect" back in 1968. The more people see something, the more they like it. Not because it changes. But precisely because it doesn't.

Translation: show up so often your face hijacks their dopamine loop.

I’ve spoken for thousands of hours on audio spaces. Same topic. My wife could probably recite my talking points in her sleep. I’ve posted over 10,000 times on social platforms. Two years of newsletter articles that all circle back to the same core principle.

All about one thing.

Focus.

People now tell me, "When I think of focus, I think of you."

That didn't happen from a viral post in week one. It didn't even happen on the 500th post. It happened because I became a broken record that somehow people wanted to keep playing.

Repetition builds reputation

Living rent free in someone's mind isn't about being clever once.

It's about being consistent for so long that you become the automatic answer to a specific problem.

Consistency wires identity into other people’s brains via the basal ganglia. The same habit-loop region that makes you crave coffee at 9 a.m. Repetition literally turns your message into a neural shortcut.

Here's the reality of building a personal brand:

• Trust builds through consistency, not creativity.

• The magic happens in year two, not month two.

• Authority comes from repetition, not reinvention.

Your audience needs to hear you say the same thing 50 different ways before they believe you actually know what you're talking about.

They need to see you show up when the algorithm hates you. When engagement is dead. When that voice in your head whispers "maybe you should pivot to crypto.”

It's like learning guitar.

Nobody becomes Hendrix by learning a new instrument every three months. They play 'Smoke on the Water' until their fingers bleed, then play it another thousand times."

Choose your hill, die on it

Pick one thing.

The thing you could talk about for the next three years without getting bored. The thing that makes you slightly angry when people get it wrong. The thing you'd defend in a pub argument at 2am.

Then say it again. And again. And again.

Until people start finishing your sentences.

Until they tag you in posts about that topic.

Until "Oh, you should talk to [your name]" becomes the automatic response when someone mentions your subject.

What's the one thing you're going to stick with for the next 12 months?

Say it. Commit to it. Then shut up and build it.

Drop by drop. Day by day.

Like water carving stone.

Until next time,
Dave