Full Transcript – Goldie Chan – Wild Business Growth Podcast #345

This is the full transcript for Episode #345 of the Wild Business Growth podcast featuring Goldie Chan – Personal Branding for Introverts, Warm Robots. You can listen to the interview and learn more here. Please note: this transcript is not 100% accurate.

Goldie Chan 0:00
We’re not robots. We still need that time off. We still need to take care of ourselves.

Max Branstetter 0:20
Hello, welcome back to Wild Business Growth this is your place to hear from a new entrepreneur every single Wednesday morning, turning wild ideas to wild to Wild Growth and struggling to say the tagline for your podcast. I’m Max Branstetter. You can email me at and this is episode 345, and 2 zig-zags. Today’s guest is Goldie Chan. Goldie is all over the internet. She is the founder of the agency Warm Robots. She is the author of Personal Branding for Introverts. And in this episode, we talk how she changed LinkedIn forever her passions for everything from sea monkeys to KPop Demon Hunters and the crucial importance of touching grass and even touching a tree. It is Goldie Cylon, enjoy the Sure. Alrighty, we are here with the one and only Goldie Chan, who inspired a voice crack with her name coming out of my mouth right there. So that was a hot start. But Goldie, you know her from all over LinkedIn, social media. You know her from warm robots. You know her from her hot, brand new spanking off the press book, or maybe coming out soon book at the time that you’re you’re hearing this, watching this, personal branding for introverts. Goldie without a voice crack. Thank you so much for doing how you doing today? I’m doing good. I’m so glad to be here. Yeah, of course. Well, yeah, thank you so much for for making time for this. I’ve been enjoying your content online for for a long, long time, and so glad we can finally make this happen. But before we get to your angle on personal branding that you’re talking about with this book, as far as the introvert side of things, you kind of were like a real trendsetter, Trailblazer, all those you know, overused terms, in terms of, in terms of LinkedIn, and like, actually treating LinkedIn as like a way to create content and, like, put videos out there. Like, What the hell were you thinking?

Goldie Chan 2:41
I like the I like the way that you phrase that I got so much. It like very light hate mail. During the first three months, I created videos on LinkedIn. In fact, one of my friends at the time made me a t shirt. I still have it somewhere, and it just it has my first hate comment on it, one of my posts, and it was a very light hate comment. It basically was a troll that said, Why are you making these videos on LinkedIn? They should be on Facebook. Why are you not on Facebook right now? Like, how dare you be on LinkedIn? And I thought it was so it just was so funny. And I’m glad that was my, my first real big hate comment, because it was just it was just hilarious. It’s also so long. It was like two sentences long. And I think when I started to create content on LinkedIn. So I’ll back up. So I had been working in digital marketing for over a decade. I had a very serious career, mostly in the Bay Area and the tech scene, a little bit in Los Angeles, in entertainment, all in digital marketing, all in community management and social media. And I left a head of marketing job in 2017 and during this one month, I took off, which I’m going to very generously call a sabbatical, because that’s like a nice way of saying that I wasn’t gainfully employed. I took this month off, and then I said, Okay, during this month off, I want to be doing something that doesn’t look quite like I had a gap, like I was doing something, and it just needs to be anything, right? And I’m sure we’ve all been that place where you do like a side project of some sort. So my side project was, I got into the LinkedIn video beta. Totally had, you know, I posted every once a while on LinkedIn. I think I had 300 followers on the platform, and I got into the video beta, and there was maybe 20 of us in the video beta at the time, and I just started making videos. But what I did that was different than everyone else is I started doing daily videos. And Max, I’m sure this is also how you saw me. I did over 800 daily consecutive videos. And of those 800 daily consecutive videos, I think the majority of people who even followed me maybe saw like 50 or 100 of those videos, but I did them every single day for 800 days, so over two years worth of daily consecutive videos. I wish I wouldn’t wish on my worst enemy, and I think going back on it. Why did I choose LinkedIn? It was actually funny that I thought no one’s going to see these videos. That’s why I chose LinkedIn. I was like, nobody’s going to see these I’m going to sandbox. I’m going to play around on this platform. Nobody is like, it’s the uncool platform. So I know I have a hilarious nickname. Is the over of LinkedIn. The other nickname that I have every once a while is the queen of uncool, because I was at the top of this, you know, LinkedIn, the uncool platform, which I still think is really funny. And when I got to that point where I started creating so many videos, people just naturally started to see me, like, Max, you start. You found me, I’m sure, through my video content and all of that stuff, because it just was, I was making so much of it that it naturally showed up on so many people’s feeds, not even because every single video I did was a gem, but because I was so consistent.

Max Branstetter 5:56
Yeah, and you mentioned those 800 videos, and you did all those in the matter of 48 hours. So it’s pretty incredible, quite the marathon that you did. But no, I think, I mean, the lessons you can take from that are, like, consistency, but also the fact of, kind of, like, what do they call it blue ocean strategy, of, kind of like, finding a space where people aren’t doing that thing yet and doing it. And it’s actually really fascinating that you’re like, you weren’t kind of thinking of it that way. It was just like, hey, no one’s gonna see this. Why not kind of mess around and say, and

Goldie Chan 6:28
then, yeah, I actually it was perfect timing for me, and it just was like a good moment, because I think that I started creating without the expectation of being a hit. I think so many people, for example, start YouTube channels now with the expectation that it will be a huge hit, like you make it a YouTube channel because you’re trying to be something. You’re trying to build your brand a certain way. You’re trying to create content. And I would say even now, people are doing that on LinkedIn because they think and they hope that their LinkedIn channel becomes a big thing. And I see people who started after me, and it’s funny to me, because their whole thing is like, Oh, I started very strategically. I started making videos, and the videos were like, I started with like, a 30 day plan on my videos, and I started with a plan of, I’m making two videos, and who knows if they’ll work. Also, who knows what the upload, because at the time, especially the first month of LinkedIn videos, the software, just being in Beta was not always reliable. So I remember I had one video of my first 100 videos where I literally was trying to upload in the airport, it wouldn’t upload. So I shot another, like 10 second video of me running down the gangplank to, like, get onto the airplane. Of being like, I’m trying to upload this video, guys for you today. And then that was the video that that was the video that uploaded when I was literally sitting on the plane. Like, that was the one video that uploaded because it was shorter and it worked. So, like, I had this beautiful, edited video that I couldn’t even upload at the time because, because because it was still in beta, it was a product that was still in beta. And it is funny to me too, how you can sometimes fall into things.

Max Branstetter 8:12
I think anybody can relate to that who’s been like, active posting out on social media, there’s, there’s nothing more stressful than like, when you have a limited time window to get something out, and then it’s just like, stuck circling, uploading, and like, that’s sitting on a plane. Because then it’s like, yeah, you’re literally about to you lose all connection

Goldie Chan 8:28
there, you’re about to take off, and you are just like, oh, no, I only you know I’m about to put my phone in airplane mode because I am a good citizen. And I always do that. I always put my phone in airplane mode. I know some people don’t, but I always do it. I always put up an airplane mode, and always stress me out when I have like, that last minute thing that I’m like, Oh my gosh, I need to respond to this. I need to respond to this right away. And thankfully, now on airplanes like the difference is now we have Wi Fi on on a lot of airplanes and stuff like that too. So, but Wi Fi on airplanes is not meant for video uploads. Wi Fi and airplanes is meant for text posts at most. So relying on that for video uploads, which you’re actually not supposed to do, because it’s in your terms of service, usually, to not

Max Branstetter 9:14
do videos on make sure you read all those terms of service.

Goldie Chan 9:17
That’s why you have to read all this. Yeah, exactly, to read all the terms of service.

Max Branstetter 9:21
Shout out my mom, because she is a hardcore not adopter of airplane mode. And by that, I mean she still turns off her phone when the plane takes off.

Goldie Chan 9:30
So she totally Oh.

Goldie Chan 9:32
So she turns it off completely, exactly good for her. I was about to say, Oh, she leaves it on and she tries to get that last the pilot, no, yeah, I know. I sure you’ve been on those planes. I’ve been on an airplane where people are literally finishing their call as the airplane is is ascending, and I’m just like, stop, stop.

Max Branstetter 9:50
It hit him with like, a ruler or something. Yeah, exactly.

Max Branstetter 9:59
So let’s get to. The warm robots, which is a fantastic name. Where did that idea for the name itself come from in the first

Goldie Chan 10:05
place? Yeah. So it’s funny, because my company came about before all the AI hype, and so now everyone thinks it’s related to AI. It’s not at all related to AI. It’s really, no, you said warm robots. Warm robots, yeah, yeah, exactly. I It is related to something very, incredibly nerdy, and that is Battlestar Galactica. So I really like Battlestar Galactica. It’s a sci fi show for those of you that don’t know.

Max Branstetter 10:32
I just know it from Dwight from the office, the beats bears Battlestar Galactica.

Goldie Chan 10:36
Yeah, exactly, exactly. So it’s, it’s not the coolest sci fi show, but is one of my favorites. And actually my handle on Instagram is Goldie Cylon. It’s also Battlestar Galactica reference. And warm robots refers to Android humanoid like humanoid robots, basically. So it refers to the ability to not only process data, but to be warm and human at the same time, and so that’s why I named my agency warm robots, because it is being thoughtful, it’s being analytic, but also has that humanity built in. So yeah, that’s why I named it warm robots. Wow.

Max Branstetter 11:16
Well, and the your arch rival, the cold humans agency, it’s gonna be really upset with that. But I guess where long in the in the timeline was this, like, had you started doing like, those LinkedIn videos before the agency, like, which kind of, what’s the chicken or the egg?

Goldie Chan 11:30
There? No. So I’ll give you the exact timeline of this. So I started creating videos on LinkedIn, once again, with the thought that in a month I would stop doing them, and I would apply for jobs, and I would be gainfully employed, and I kept making videos. And the videos, the videos, just started opening doors, like I started getting people who requested me to work with them in terms of branding. I was getting requests of folks who wanted me to do consulting work. And because I got all these requests to do consulting work and things like that, I thought, okay, great, I’m going to make an agency that kind of houses all of this consulting work. So really, the first thing that started was making LinkedIn videos. And then so many doors opened because of that. And I want to really shout out also the fact that part of why I think my videos did so well is because I was so genuinely excited at the time to make videos. It wasn’t for a business use case. It wasn’t for a strategy I see so many people do. What is funny to me is like, they’re like, this is me authentically on camera, and then they’re like, here’s a here’s a real selfie of me. But it’s still strategic, like they are very specifically trying to make themselves feel vulnerable and close. By

Max Branstetter 12:57
the way, more more people should say that that this is a real selfie. Like, explicitly call it out. This is not strategy. This

Goldie Chan 13:05
is not strategy. But I think that we as humans, we totally resonate, and we just viscerally like as animals feel when somebody is being really real on camera, like we feel that. And I think that’s why, when you see somebody who’s a great actor, it’s because we really believe them in that role. So we want to believe in each other. We want to be able to see each other as human beings

Max Branstetter 13:32
and as warm robots

Goldie Chan 13:33
So, and as warm robots. So how did you

Max Branstetter 13:37
I mean, you’ve had this thing running for years now. You kind of dive into a few different spaces in the in the digital brand building space, but how did you, and I won’t let you say, due to your video prowess, how did you start to win kind of some big and notable clients in like, the early days of this

Goldie Chan 13:53
thing? One thing that I did was I proved my expertise early on. So while I was making those videos, they weren’t just videos of me just hanging out and being cool, because I’m not very cool, right? And the queen of uncool, so, like My The Queen of cool as well, right? Thank you. But I I was making videos a lot on branding and marketing, so I was doing a lot of pop culture branding and marketing. So my first 100 videos were all on pop culture branding and marketing. And people were finding these videos and thinking like, Oh, that’s interesting. Like, that’s interesting knowledge. Like, I basically was doing walking Wikipedia, I guess, if that makes sense, so I’d walk and talk at the same time and do and so originally it’s like, I will say this, some of the first stickers LinkedIn did for a LinkedIn video, like walk and talk are inspired by the videos I did, which is kind of cool so, but I would say that that is what opened the door to clients. It wasn’t that I was just being on camera. It was that I said, Here’s my subject matter expertise, and this is what I know how to do, and this is what I’m going to talk about. And because I was talking also just very off the cuff, very casual, then it. Really affirms that that is something that I’m actually an expert in, right? Because I’m able to just talk about it casually, like you and I are talking casually right now,

Max Branstetter 15:07
yeah, well, madam, we could take this formal if you if you’d like me to speak. Madam is a proper term. It’s interesting. Thank you. Cheers. Thank you. So I think if you, if you look at any part of like the content world, you know, like any part of marketing, it changes so much year to year, or month to month, day to day, seemingly, what has changed about worm route, worm robots, it’d be nice if they could pronounce your company right. Worm robots today compared to what it’s like in the early days, like, as far as you specialize and and focus there,

Goldie Chan 15:50
oh my gosh, yes. So I would say in the early days of the agency, it truly was a hub for everything in a very you know, I whatever consulting I was doing whatever I got taxed to do. It was an all in one shop there, and it was everything branding and marketing under sun. And since then, as I’m sure you’ve talked to so many people who run agencies, it narrowed down. You know, sometimes I think some agencies expand over time and they they offer more things. And for me, it’s definitely narrowed down. It’s become hyper focused. So a lot of what I do is personal branding strategy with director level or above with C level executives. I do quite a bit of strategy around Ambassador groups and around building communities and things like that. And then I sometimes do fold in some of my Ambassador work. So like I work with brands like Adobe and Microsoft, I fold a lot of that also into my agency work and a little bit of public speaking. But before it was really the catch all of everything under the sun, and we were talking in the green room, right before we started recording about how content marketing is so tough these days, right? Because there’s so you need to specialize like you need to niche down. You need to have a focus to what you’re doing

Max Branstetter 17:11
and shout out the green room. With most guests, it’s just the room, but with you, it is the green room.

Goldie Chan 17:15
It is the green room. I like to say that because the green room is the room you go to before you go on stage,

Max Branstetter 17:20
exactly. That’s the interesting area there that you talk about partnering for, you know, Adobe and Microsoft and like, huge brands like that. What’s like the biggest difference to your approach when you’re working on content for like these huge, massive companies like that, versus maybe if you were just doing something for yourself or personal brand?

Goldie Chan 17:40
Obviously, when I do stuff for massive brands, there’s usually brand guidelines. So there’s usually, could

Max Branstetter 17:47
you imagine if you just totally go against those and post it?

Goldie Chan 17:51
You know, I literally have a course on LinkedIn learning called brand reputation management, so I would be the last person to do that, but it would be fun to, I guess, do something very off brand. It’s funny, because I myself, as you know, because the green hair and everything I myself exist as a brand. So even I have kind of internal brand guidelines for what I won’t, will and will not do. But when I work with a brand, it’s different brand guidelines. It’s what they feel is good and what they want to express their brand with and when I work these major brands, a lot of it is okay, how creative and how big can I get, but within these guidelines, that’s how I think about it. So I think also a lot of times, because when I’m getting sponsored content, I can do a little bit more, I have a little bit more budget for things. So sometimes I like to do things that are a little bit bigger, a little bit more fun, a little bit more experimental, if they’re open to it. And not every brand is right. And I will say Adobe is really great about being open to that, but I will say other brands that I’ve worked with in the past who I’m not going to name, some of them, are not so open to the more experimental content. They just want it straight down line. They’re like, I want you to talk about want you to talk about the product, I want you to promote the product, and then I want you to give us a video doing that. And I told I totally understand that, but I think it’s really fun when brands trust the creators and the ambassadors they work with to give them the freedom to say, like, do something really fun and interesting and weird, right?

Max Branstetter 19:22
Yeah, and that’s, you know, you’re pointing fingers at me there. When we paid you $2 trillion to represent Max podcasting, we’re like, you know, no, no, no, gold is only talking about podcasting, podcasting.

Goldie Chan 19:33
Listen. Now I will say this. You’re not paying me to do this, but I will say this, everyone, if you’re listening to this podcast, or if you enjoyed any of these episodes, please make sure to drop a rating on Apple podcast or wherever you’re listening, because ratings help every single podcast, and you want to help this podcast because you’re listening to it.

Max Branstetter 19:53
Thank you so much. You’re gonna make me cry and also looking at my phone now we’re actively losing ratings as. Or No, I’m just thank you so much, though. I really appreciate that. Yeah, it’s true. In the early days of the podcast, I was very active about reaching out to people to, like, remind them to rate and review, and then it’s, you know, it’s like anything in content marketing. It’s like when you have so many episodes and you you get kind of tired of seeing the same sort of CTA at the end. So totally was due for that.

Goldie Chan 20:18
Well, I said the CTA for you. So everyone listening to this, I’m Max’s guest, and please rate this podcast well, because not only am I on it, but Max has been doing this for so long, so that rating is an extra affirmation that he’s doing good job.

Max Branstetter 20:35
Thank you. Thank you. And then we’ll put a little LinkedIn Good job sticker up there as well.

Goldie Chan 20:39
Yeah, the good job seeker.

Max Branstetter 20:43
So branding actually brings us to your book, Personal Branding for Introverts. So congrats, brand new book. Exciting, exciting, focus, niche, however you want to say it, I hate that whole dynamic. I can’t believe I brought that up again. Anyway, Personal Branding for Introverts. So this caught my eye, and is really cool and unique, because as you know, and you are one, there are a lot of speakers out there who talk about personal branding, and a lot of people who have expertise in it, but not many people talk about it from the side of introverts. And I think one of the great things that’s come across, I guess that’s come more to the forefront over the past couple decades, decades, decades in the world of social media, is kind of the greater focus on people being open with like mental health and being more vulnerable and talking about things like that, and a little bit different. But introverts, I think probably when you first heard the term introverts, or like, when we were growing up, and far less people would like admit to being introverts or even knew what it was. And now, now you’re hearing more and more people, like, actually, like, you know, I’m I’m that way, or like, I’m that way a lot of the time. So before we even get into the whole personal branding side, what’s something that’s important to know about introverts or people that might sometimes be

Goldie Chan 22:01
introverted. I could just do a textbook definition for you of introverts, but that’s boring, so I instead, I’m going to talk about something totally different, extroverts. No, just kidding. Yeah, exactly. I want to talk about only extroverts. I’m going to talk about something that so many introvert books out there and introvert everything out there is like Quiet, quiet revolution, quiet something quiet the other thing. And I personally feel like introverts can be and I talk about this in my book, introverts can be loud introverts. And I think that when you’re an introvert who is really excited and really passionate and you really care about something, you can be such a loud introvert. You can be a public speaker like I am, and still be an introvert. You can do video content. You can do you can run massive groups, because I know introverts who run literally groups of like, 50,000 people or more, and they’re introverts, and they can do this because they really care about the group that they’re running. And so I want to throw out there that there are loud introverts in the world, and that saying that all introverts are quiet is such a lie, I will that’s my hot take for today. Saying that all introverts are quiet 100% of the time is the biggest lie about introverts and the definition of introverts. So I personally am such an advocate for saying that introverts can be loud. Introverts, it is absolutely possible for them to be loud introverts, it is absolutely possible for introverts then to build a brand without becoming extroverts. Because I think that’s the second lie, is that introverts have to become extroverts and have to be loud then all the time in order to be seen and be heard. But I think so many introverts just need a little bit of a push in the right direction where they are just still expressing themselves as an introvert. They’re still being an introvert, but there may be thinking about other venues that they will shine.

Max Branstetter 24:01
Can you share from your own experience, like in a given day, when are like, the times that you feel kind of, I guess, more like an introvert and and when do you, I guess, do something to change that I

Goldie Chan 24:16
don’t know so much changing because once again, I’m like, anti the change. Change thing where everybody’s like, Oh, you’re an introvert. You change

Max Branstetter 24:22
Yeah, and by that, by that, I mean, like, totally cool being an introvert. I just Yeah, you can’t talk.

Goldie Chan 24:28
So no, no, I definitely think of it as, like, recharging your introvert batteries. Because I think, like introverts, we all have batteries that go blue, and then you need to recharge them. You need to refill them. So I think whenever my introvert battery is low. And I will say this yesterday was just for me personally. I had like, a day where I was, I think, in like four different interviews or something like that, and then I went to work out, and then I had a doctor’s appointment, and then I went all the way across town to something else, and did another interview and stuff like that. And it was, it was just. Like a long day, and me as an introvert, that just really blooped, like my battery went all the way down to the very bottom. And one of the things I do, and I made sure I did this throughout the day, is one drink water. That’s just like a basic human thing. You should do that if you’re introvert or a short but two is, I tried to make sure I took, like, the world’s tiniest walk outside. So the moment I had just, like, a little bit of time, five minutes, I just made sure I at least, like, circled the room. I took a little walk. I, like, got up from sitting, instead of immediately diving into 50 million emails. I just changed my physical stance a little bit. And that’s that helped me. I also definitely that night, I definitely made sure that I was I took some time to just turn off my brain. I did the off brain time just recharge, where I wasn’t speaking on camera, where I wasn’t doing any of that, where I was relaxing and I was just enjoying my time. And that, to me, also really helps I do, like, a little bit of meditation here and there. So that also is, like another thing to add on to the pile of things that help me recharge my little introvert battery. So those, those were a few things I did on a day that was really tough for me just go not because any particular person I actually posted about it on LinkedIn, and then I feel bad because a couple of people that actually had meetings with were like, Was I the reason that day? And I had to be like, Oh my gosh, no. Like, not that. That’s not what I meant. I just meant it was a long day, because it was just a very long day. But I think that it was really helpful for me to do those little things that just take me out of the situation of it being a long day, like just changing physically where I am, or taking that time to make sure that I’m taking care of myself.

Max Branstetter 26:51
Well, I’m excited to check LinkedIn after this and see a post from Goldie chan just had the most draining interview of all time. Please. No one go on wild business growth. If you’re invited, send it back.

Goldie Chan 27:06
No, we already, we already talked about this once again in the green room that I’m going to send some more folks your way. I’m pretty sure you may, you may have, because this podcast has been going on for such a long time, you may have already interviewed them. But in case you haven’t, I definitely want to send you some names for this podcast. Yeah,

Max Branstetter 27:23
no, really, really appreciate that. Those are a lot of great tips that you shared. The buzzy, interesting, oh, I’ve never heard that word that stuck out to me or phrase was off brain time, because we talk a lot about, like, the need to unplug. And I was talking about this with my wife, Dana, of like, after work and like, she’s like, she’s like, do you want me to do the dishes, or I’ll do the dishes? You know, it’s like, I’ve had stuff a lot of work that day. I’m like, no, like, I’ll, seriously, even if it’s late, like, I will do the dishes later. Because, like, I stare at a screen all day long, I find it calming to literally just, like, do dishes and like, clean up. Like, even if it’s like, late and everybody’s asleep, and I’m just like, you need that time to turn off your brain, no matter what it is. I also, I feel like it’s, um, I guess this is a more recent term. I’m gonna sound like a dinosaur, but like, in the like, gaming community, when they talk about touching grass, yeah, I feel like that’s so relevant for like, adults and not non gamers, as well as like, 100% and it’s very real, yeah. Like, even just get yourself away and like, yeah. Like, how you say,

Goldie Chan 28:26
I think I was reading somewhere that if you are literally around trees and you touch trees, there’s a chemical that we as humans release that’s like, I forget which one it is, but it’s a positive chemical, and it makes us feel more calm and centered. And so it’s not just meditative, it’s, it’s an actual chemical reaction that happens your body because you touched a living tree. And that, that, to me, brings back the point that we’re humans. We’re animals, where it’s funny how we work. We’re not, you know, as much as I call my agency warm robots, we’re not robots. We still need that time off. We still need to take care of ourselves. I’m sure that the system that you have with your wife is like very thoughtful where you ask each other who wants to take care of this and and that also is a version of taking care of each other too, of course, and I like to do the same with my partner, but I think that it’s so helpful to, yes, get out there and touch grass. And if the grass is gross around where you are, don’t actually touch it. But, you know, go out and, like, witness the grass, I guess.

Max Branstetter 29:32
Yeah, yeah, even looking at it, or, like, going to, if you don’t, if you’re, like, written, real crunch before your next meeting. And, like, don’t have time to actually go for a walk. Well, you could do a mini walk, like you said, but you could, like, just go out to your window and look outside and, like, look, especially if you’re for someone like me, who’s in like, the podcast editing space, or, like, if you’re in the video production space, like, it’s really, really important to, like, refresh your eyes and look at something in the distance and take some breaths calm. Take some who was it? Jay. Gao, I think is his name from the James Altucher show. I messed I butchered that name, but he just had a really good LinkedIn post about how he like, when you’re an editor and you’re listening to stuff all day, like, he makes sure there’s at least an hour every day where he just doesn’t listen to anything, like, doesn’t play music, doesn’t play podcast. You know, even when he’s, like, off the clock, just to, like, give kind of your ears a break. So it’s, I guess we’re just attacking all senses here, one by one.

Goldie Chan 30:27
That’s right, that’s what this is. This podcast is just doing that

Max Branstetter 30:31
exactly sponsored by the sixth sense. So let’s talk about the Seventh Sense, personal branding. So, like, Yes, back to how introverts and or introvert dumb and personal branding are are tied together. If you’re someone who’s an introvert, what are some key things to keep in mind when it comes to making a personal brand for yourself and growing that personal brand?

Goldie Chan 30:57
Absolutely so I think a lot about the 5c of personal branding, and today I will only talk about one of those C’s, and that is consistency. So that’s the way that I personally blew up on LinkedIn, and I garnered an entire following. I have over 100,000 followers on LinkedIn right now. And of course, there are people who have more followers than I do, right and there are people who have fewer followers than I do so but I get I grew my following by being incredibly consistent. It wasn’t that every single day was the the most beautiful gem that I’ve released ever, and it wasn’t well edited, because, I’ll be honest, because I was doing all the videos myself and releasing them, I think the first couple of videos weren’t edited at all, like I only knew how to trim the front and the back end of a clip. So it was these videos that were literally, like they were so long, they were too long, and it was just me walking around because I didn’t know how to edit. So it’s like, if I ever fumbled or dropped the phone, there was no editing. It just you saw that fumble. You saw me drop the phone because I was filming them all my phone. So I do think that consistency is so important. So if you’re out there listening to this, and you’re an introvert and you think it’s so overwhelming to develop my personal brand, I suggest, and you’re thinking about content in particular, I suggest, of course, not daily content. But if you can even commit to I’m going to post once a week. Or if that’s even too much, I’m going to post once a month. So that’s 12 times a year. You can make the commitment that in 2026 that you will post 12 times. That is so doable. Every single person has at least 20 minutes in an entire month to find time to write a single post or post a photo or do whatever. And I think it’s all about consistency. So if you can consistently stick with posting once a month for three months, then maybe the next three months, you post once every other week. Then maybe after that, you post once a week, right? And then you stick with that consistency of posting once a week for a while, and then maybe you get to up to twice a week, or whatever that eventual cadence that you want to hit is. I think it’s so helpful to think about consistency

Max Branstetter 33:10
Absolutely, and consistency ends in the C sound as well. So I’m going to dock you for doing two C’s. It’s pretty good, though. Yeah, that’s a great lesson. What about, I mean, we talked about the, like, off brain time and, like, how, like, you know, all of us need some time to I’m not going to do the sound as good as you, but the recharge the batteries. Yeah, what would you say is, like, a good split? I guess I know everybody’s different, but like, how much of your day should you focus on being kind of like productive and efficient versus working in those you know, touching tree time?

Goldie Chan 33:53
Well, I think it obviously depends on what your workload is. But I think about one exercise I go over in the book is called ideal daydreaming, and that’s thinking holistically, like throughout the entire day, and that’s includes the time you spend with your family, with your loved ones. What does your ideal day look like? And I give an example of one of my guy friends, and he travels the world. He eventually settled down with his partner in a different country, not in the US, not gonna say which one, but his ideal day is exactly the day that he lives now. And he’s been dreaming about this day. He’s been focusing on having this day be real for so long, and now it is real. He gets up the morning, he makes breakfast for himself and his partner. They eat breakfast together, then they split off. They both work from home, so he’ll be there answering his emails and whatnot. She’ll be there doing her writing, etc. They’ll split off. They’ll do work, and then they come back together for lunch. He makes lunch. They maybe eat outside on their porch. Very nice, right? And they get that outside time. They get time away from their computers, their devices, their whatever, their work. And then. They go back, and then they do work, or they have meetings, or they have whatever. In the afternoon, which is usually that time they set aside, actually, for that, they go off run errands, etc. And then at night, I think this is so cool. At night, when they have supper, we have dinner, they will actually, a lot of times, go and have dinner with their neighbors, or they will go out and eat and like, that’s the time that they step out of the house and they take that time out because they cook all of their other meals. But I think it’s like, so beautiful and communal. But also that day is thinking, like, really, not just about work. I think so many people focus on only the work part of your career, but your career has so much to do with your life around it. I also always hope that, if you are thinking about your career, that you have so many other beautiful things around that career.

Max Branstetter 35:46
Yeah, that is beautiful. Yeah. I want to have dinner with them right after this. That’s That sounds

Goldie Chan 35:52
wonderful at the supper on their terrace.

Max Branstetter 35:55
What’s something as you’re writing this book and researching for this book, I don’t know

Max Branstetter 36:01
what that word was. You’re okay. I just burped the word book.

Max Branstetter 36:04
Yeah. What’s something that really kind of surprised you took you off guard, but you realize it’s like a key insight in terms of personal branding for introverts.

Goldie Chan 36:15
Gosh, I would say the the loud introvert thing that I mentioned before. I just realized, as I was rereading so many other introvert books and introvert sites and things like that, I realized how many things had the word quiet in it. And so I wanted to very specifically put the word loud in my book. And I also wanted my book not to be have the word quiet in there anywhere, you know, anywhere in the title and the subtitle anywhere. So that was one thing. And I will say another surprising thing for me was I told a few of my stories, like my personal stories in this book, and one of them is, and I think this is funny, because I forget how much people love this story. I was once in the Prime Minister house, like Prime Minister of London, right? So, like, very, very big, important place, people with machine guns are there. It is going, going inside. You have to, like, go through all this, these metal detectors. You have to, like, get everything scanned. The security is very high. And I was in the Prime Minister’s garden, and I remember just being so overwhelmed as an introvert with anxiety in this garden. So I know where in the garden to hide. There’s, like, literally, it’s the corner in the far right. They have this, like, weird tall chair thing, and then it’s right next to it. You can, I can just like, barely fit my body in that space, and then no one knew that I was there. And I literally just hid there for, I think, at least 10 minutes, five to 10 minutes, I’m sure time passed a lot more slowly than I thought it did. And then I came out, and then I hid in the bathroom. I’ll be totally honest. I ran to the bathroom, I hid in the bathroom, and I just had to do that, because that was like a very introvert moment where I felt overwhelmed that I just wasn’t in the mood, or I wasn’t able to I was I just wasn’t able to be, you know, on point, and be networking and doing all those things. And I think so many introverts have this struggle, and then we feel bad, we feel shamed for doing those things, we feel like we shouldn’t be doing those things. But I want to offer that it’s totally normal and healthy to do those things.

Max Branstetter 38:25
I’m visualizing the Homer Simpson and the bushes meme. Yeah, it

Goldie Chan 38:29
was, it was literally, and this was before the Homer Simpson meme created. It came, I think maybe, maybe before, maybe after. But it was definitely me, like, just doing this.

Max Branstetter 38:37
I just, I don’t know, they say that Simpsons predicts everything, so no matter what

Goldie Chan 38:44
they call literally going into the bushes. But yes, I know, and also, there was a lot of spiders there, and I’m thankful I’m not super afraid of spiders. But if you were ever in the Prime Minister’s garden, you were looking for a place to hide and you’re afraid of spiders, do not hide in the same place I hid.

Max Branstetter 38:57
Did I mention how relatable that was? Do let’s switch gears a little bit. A couple quick, kind of wackier segments to wrap up here. First one’s called the unusual. So I’m not going to let you say a story about a time that you hid in the Prime Minister’s bushes, just in case it’s relevant for one of the answers. Again, not that that that would come up, but this is, like, interesting aspects of your personality that kind of just make you who you are. Like, I love hearing from entrepreneurs about, like, what they are outside of work as well. And so first thing is, quirks. What’s something a little quirky about your personality, but it’s who you are. You got to love it.

Goldie Chan 39:36
I like to say that I’m a sea monkey rancher. So I I raise sea monkeys, which are brine shrimp. I am part of many sea monkey Facebook groups, and the top YouTubers who do sea monkey videos know who I am. So I’m so out of you know the 20 people who do see monkey collecting. I’m one of the two. 20 that they

Max Branstetter 40:02
know, oh my God, that’s, that’s, I love when crazy coincidences like this happen. So I’m number 19 on the let, no. I’m just going, No, no, I we’ve been watching Big Bang Theory and some episode like a week ago, I think it was Sheldon brought up sea monkeys. And I was like, oh my god, I haven’t thought about sea monkeys in forever. And so I was like, looked it up on like, what are they? And I’m like, wait, they’re actually shrimp, like some type of shrimp.

Goldie Chan 40:25
They’re brine shrimp that are cryogenically or something, right there. They’re Han soloed. Yeah, they’re Han Solo the eggs. The eggs just need to stay dry, and then you rehydrate the eggs, and then they life springs from them, which is

Max Branstetter 40:37
really cool little kid, you know, you think they’re like real monkeys too. So

Goldie Chan 40:41
that’s, I mean, yeah, as a little kid, you think they’re real monkeys because they misrepresented it in the advertisements for them. And then as an adult, as an adult, I’m just like, yeah, brine shrimp,

Max Branstetter 40:53
sea shrimp, aka shrimp, all right, what is a pet peeve? You have just something. It could be in the social media world, it could be not something that just kind of grinds your gears a little bit.

Goldie Chan 41:04
My pet peeve is when you are clearly taking a picture and a photo op, and then the person walks in front of you when there’s and I totally get when there’s no room and they have to walk in front of you. Of course that makes sense, but when there’s so much room, and then they make the choice to, like, dart in front of the person taking the photo for you, and then go right in front. That’s my pet peeve.

Max Branstetter 41:25
That’s a good one. All right. If anybody sees Goldie taking pictures out, you know what not to do? Don’t do it next time you see her in the bushes. Yeah. And then, what’s a I call them weird talents, but it’s also like a party trick. What’s something that you’re really good at, but it has no impact on anything? I

Goldie Chan 41:40
don’t know if this is a party trick or weird talent, but I also cosplay. So I was just at San Diego Comic Con, and there’s a big movie that’s out right now on Netflix called KPop Demon Hunters, which I very much like, and I’ve watched too many times. I watched in theaters. I’d done the sing along, and so I actually cosplayed with my partner. I made him a cosplay, because I used to more professionally cosplay, but I made him a cosplay, and we cosplayed as like, two of the characters from the show. And it was great because all these little kids came up to us, and they were just like, oh my gosh, you’re like, this character. And then the best part is I love kids, because they came up to me. They’re like, Oh, you’re this character. And they’re like, that’s not my favorite character. I like the other

Max Branstetter 42:27
character. Oh, okay, okay, I

Goldie Chan 42:29
see how it is, because it’s a trio of girls. And then I was doing one of the characters, Zoe, and they really like the main character, Rumi. So they kept coming up to me, being like, Rumi is my favorite. And I’m like, Well, thanks, kid, you know, like, wow.

Max Branstetter 42:44
Well, you’re my favorite character, Goldie, so number one in my book,

Goldie Chan 42:48
thanks. Thanks. All

Max Branstetter 42:53
right, let’s wrap it up with some Rapid-Fire Q&A. You ready for it? Yeah. All right, Let’s Get Wild. Couldn’t resist I know you’ve been asked many times, but I have to hear it from you, straight from you, straight from the Goldie’s mouth, the green hair. How did that become kind of like a trademark and iconic, branding aspect for you?

Goldie Chan 43:10
Yeah, so the green hair happened. I had a million different hair colors before green. I just like having colored hair. It just is fun. Why not? You’re an adult. You can do what you want, right? Yay. People forget that. People forget that. And green, ironically, is my favorite color, but I just happened to do green hair for the first time. I had never done green. I’ll these other colors and cycled back over time, and I just happened to have lime green, like tennis green hair, right when I started to blow up on LinkedIn, and people started to drop the green heart emoji on LinkedIn when they would see my posts and stuff. And then I thought, just as a branding person, like, very reactively, like, Oh, that’s cool, maybe I should keep the green hair for a little bit longer. And I’ve kept it ever since 2017 so outside of a brief period of time where I didn’t have it for medical reasons. I’ve had my green hair the entire time.

Max Branstetter 44:05
Holy moly, it’s incredible. And I want to see pictures of the million different colors that you mentioned.

Goldie Chan 44:12
I was like white at one point.

Max Branstetter 44:15
All right, what I saw on your LinkedIn resume, if you will, that you do some writing for comics. What’s a tip for anybody in terms of making really, really good, doing some good comic writing?

Goldie Chan 44:27
Oh, gosh. So I write for Archie Comics. I’ll just say it out loud, super Americana. I’m such a huge nerd fan of them, and I’m so thankful I get to be a writer for them. I think anyone out there who’s thinking about doing comics and wants to make their own original comic. I would definitely also say, like make your own original comics. It always is the story. So what is an interesting story that you can share? And for those of you out there who are who are illustrators, drawer, drawers, or the writer is part of it, it’s all about the story. It’s all about. Like, what is that story that would be interesting to share? One of the most popular web comics out there that became this entire brand is lore Olympus. And that started from just being a simple web comic, a simple story they wanted to share.

Max Branstetter 45:15
That’s so good. You’re you’re living your dream. Yeah, all right. And then I have to ask you another LinkedIn tip. So this, there’s a great debate about this, and this is probably going to be super outdated by the time people listen. But I have to ask you, there’s a whole debate about, if you’re linking to something on LinkedIn, do you put it in the post or the comments? What’s your take on it?

Goldie Chan 45:36
I think that if you want to know what LinkedIn prefers, like LinkedIn, internally, prefers and will serve up in the feed. I think that no one knows, except for the person who’s at LinkedIn who works on that. That’s my official take. My personal take is I do try to mostly drop things into the comments, but I actually do about half and half. These days I will put it in the post itself, because I do think it’s easier to find it in the main post. And then if I do in the main post, I will also drop it as a comment. So I’ll double drop that link.

Max Branstetter 46:07
Oh, double drop that thing. Well, drop that has the potential to go, go viral. Talk to a 2.0 all right. And then last, last thing, this might come in a great surprise for those who don’t know you well, but one of the most amazing things about your story is you’re a cancer survivor. And I think, for for somebody who’s who’s been through what you’ve been through, to have such a positive outlook, and, you know, approach things and inspire people the way that you do is it just makes it that much more inspiring. What can you share about just kind of what you’ve learned and how it shaped your outlook, I guess from the whole experience.

Goldie Chan 46:45
Yeah, I would say that obviously it really changed. It really changed my FOMO, which is, you know, fear of missing out to, I would say Lomo, lack of missing out. I stopped worrying all the time about all these other people who are booking gigs. And I’m sure we’ve all been in this space, right? Like, oh, this person got this client, or this person got the speaking gig, or this person got this and that, and you feel like, why didn’t I get that? Or like, I think I’m kind of at their level, like, I wish i i I got that, and that’s that FOMO speaking. And I think having a major health crisis like that, it really removed 99% that, because I was for especially right after I finished the first round of treatment, thankful to be alive. And that thankful to be alive energy is so strong, and it’s, it’s honestly, at the end of the day, it’s more important, and it’s more what you end up focusing on than the like, I didn’t get that tiny speaking gig that this other person who’s at my level got. I just don’t care as much about those things. And I think to me, that was a great gift of going through a major health crisis and a major change in my life,

Max Branstetter 48:03
usually we wrap up with final thoughts, but nothing could possibly top that. Thank you so much, Goldie, thank you big, big fan of you and your story, and thanks for making time today and sharing all of that. Last thing, though, where is the best place your preferred way for people to get personal branding for introverts. And before you said that, I will say for those tuning in, make sure to connect, follow, connect slash follow Goldie on LinkedIn, as well as on Instagram @GoldieCylon like you said earlier, but where’s the best place for the book?

Goldie Chan 48:36
So the best place for book, you can find it at GoldieChan.com/Book I listed all the different places that you can buy my book online. Some of them are indie bookstores. So please, if you can shop small

Max Branstetter 48:51
and if you can be gold like Goldie, thank you so much Goldie for coming on Wild Business Growth, sharing your unbelievable story and thank you, Wild Listeners for tuning in to another episode. If you want to hear more Wild stories like this one, make sure to Follow or Subscribe to Wild Business Growth on your favorite podcast app, wherever you listen to podcast and hit Subscribe on YouTube. YouTube is @MaxBranstetter. That’s where you can find the video versions where, when Goldie’s episode comes out, she will have, in fact, green hair. You can learn all things about me, about MaxPodcasting, about the Podcasting to the Max newsletter every Thursday at MaxPodcasting.com and until next time, Let your business Run Wild…Bring on the bongos!!