In what you've just said, though, a few times you've mentioned a word that i understand what a lot of listeners might feel slightly intimidated or terrified by which is the word branding and i know that in an email exchange that we've had you mentioned that you really don't like the term personal branding um so i just wondered if you could expand on that a little bit um on what you mean by the word branding why it is that you don't like the word the term personal branding

so i think It probably helps to consider what brand means and what branding means, because a brand is what most people see as the identity.

Branding is the process of getting there and supporting not just the look but the feel.

I think branding gets a bit of a bad rap because it's a word that we often associate with corporate businesses and maybe think that it doesn't apply to us or that what we're doing is too small for that or not enough for that and i i would argue that actually you know small business branding is is really important because you know it's all about connection really um it's all about you know community it's the foundation of marketing but I also try to explain to people when I work with them that it's not a one and done thing so there's no pressure to kind of get it right from the outset I think it's just something to bear in mind as you kind of grow your business or develop your practice or your your community personal branding it's an interesting one so for the last few years it's been quite a popular term for people to band around but I've always felt like it makes clients feel like they're packaging themselves up as a kind of product almost like you're the commodity and But it rubs me up the wrong way because whether you're a writer or a maker or the founder of a business, you know, you're not a product and it's your work and your worldview that people are connecting with.

So yeah, I guess it feels a bit abstract to me because a lot of clients will say to me, oh, I don't think I can do branding because I don't, think of myself as a brand so they're automatically identifying themselves as a kind of thing to be marketed and that's not what personal branding is actually asking of you and that's why I find it's quite misleading as a term you know I much prefer to keep branding as a separate thing almost you know focusing on that strategy, design and storytelling and not thinking too much about the personal side of it because a lot of us are scared to kind of show up as our true selves or share too much about us online and I think In my practice, it's about putting the emphasis where it belongs, which is on the meaning behind what you do, the narrative, the relationship between you and your audience.

And it's not about you performing or needing to be a certain way or do a certain thing.

how many of her posts were about her and I think there must have been about 15 posts and about three of them were about her which her perception was that all she'd done was talk about herself and so like having that kind of data that sort of says it's not even true like even if you had talked about yourself in every single post that might not be having the effect that you fear which is annoying everybody because like you said not everybody sees every single post and people get on with the rest of their day right they just get on with the rest of their life so it's probably not annoying people even if you do do that but let's actually look at the truth and the truth is that when we count it up it's just not even true So thinking about practical examples then, can you think of any authors that people can go and have a look at that may have some really strong branding, whether that is visual branding, a visual identity, or might just be in their voice and in the way in which they present their ideas on the internet?

So this is an interesting one because I think it would be very easy for me to like name best selling authors or ones who have had their books turned into famous films.

Uh, is, is that, is that the case and that's, that was kind of the thought process behind OLG bringing Kambi on board?

Yeah, I think so.

We went through an, a novation process there.

Their, um, their, uh, previous supplier was exiting.

Kambi took over, um, that, um, that contract.

Um, I think, though, you are correct in that, you know, a lot of what we are talking about with OLG today as part of our partnership is making sure that we have a super hyper-localized competitive product.

They are...

Are there other things that make, uh, the work that you're doing with OLG and the work you will be doing with BCLC and Atlantic Lottery, are, are there different unique pieces to those relationships?

It's all hidden away and internal.

But the fact that it's hidden doesn't make it any less important or any less powerful.

It's really conferring an incredible agency to the female to guard the quality of gametes and embryos that are allowed to develop to make the offspring for the next generation.

[upbeat jazz music]

And yes, you, human, mammal, in the big family of mammals, along with cows and mice, your body, or the body of your mother, has similar responses, sorting out good semen, modifying their immune response to facilitate implantation or, or not.

You might be surprised to realize that we didn't know anything about this until about 15 years ago or so when we started unraveling how this immune response works.

And it does cross my mind, how is it that we knew so much about the male side of things?