Hey, y'all, Eve's here. I know you're ready to get into this episode, but really quick. We have been loving connecting with y'all over black storytelling, and if you've really been loving the show, then we would really appreciate it if you would leave us a rating and review, subscribe to the show, and share it with your friends. Thanks y'all, Now time for the episode. On Theme is a production of iHeartRadio and fair Weather Friends Media.
I'm Katie and I'm Eves.
Today's episode Branding While Black, So Katie, I have a fraught relationship with personal branding. I am not the most comfortable person on social media, but I understand the pressures of feeling the need to personal brand. And when I say personal brand, I'm thinking create a very molded and shaped and crafted story about ourselves on social media and
on the Internet. And I know that it can feel like a part of marketing, but too honestly, it's a part of storytelling because we are telling stories about ourselves. And I just wondered, does that look different for black people than it does for everybody else? How do you feel about personal branding?
I find it more of an evil than a necessary evil. I try not to do it at all. I try to resist as much as possible, especially I think with online personal branding.
Yeah, I think there are a lot of downsides to personal branding and to having to do it and having to be visible on the Internet in a way that is compartmentalized. But I know that there are also upsides to it. It's a very complicated topic and for that reason, we wanted to talk to Bridget Todd of the podcast There Are No Girls on the Internet.
My name is Bridget Todd, I you shee her pronouns, and I am the creator and host of iHeartRadio's techn culture podcast called There Are No Girls on the Internet.
Someone with a great personal brand. I'd say yes, definitely.
So let's get into our conversation with Bridget. Hi, Bridget, welcome to one theme. We are so happy to have you here today.
Uh Eve's my podcast play Cousin. I am so excited to be here.
So I have a lot of feelings about social media and about what branding means, and I definitely rub up against some friction a lot of the time when I'm thinking about what branding means and kind of feeling compelled to come up with the brand and do the active branding. But I am wondering, since you're very in tune with social media and digital media strategy, what exactly does personal branding mean to you?
To me, personal branding is very powerful. It's a necessary way to show up online. It is a necessary way to make sure that the people that you want to be in conversation with, the people that you want to give you money to make things that they think of you when they think of whatever it is.
That you specialize in.
However, I would also say personal branding is really exhausting. I think that it's something that we are forced to do because we live in a capitalistic, white supremacy society that kind of forces us to be not just making the thing and excited about making the thing, but selling how we make the thing.
And yeah, I just don't.
I think that any conversation about personal branding also has to be rooted with the fact that sometimes it feels like we are forced to do that kind of work in addition to the work that we want to be doing.
So, given your stance on personal branding, give us your personal brand a bio.
Tell us who we are?
Oh man, so who I am?
And as it pertains to my how I've branded myself personally.
Or like yeah, like if we were if I was a big shot in an elevator who had the money, like, what would you say to get some off of me?
First of all, I would say, if you're a billionaire, you probably didn't get that money ethically.
So you want to say it funds.
Your conscient No, no, no, no, well no. I did want to get drunk at a party with very rich people and I asked somebody how much their house costs.
My friend was like, that's such a rude question.
We'll do that when I'm not drunk.
So if I was in an elevator with a big shot media professional, I would say that along with my amazing team, with folks like Tari Harrison and Joey Pat, I make conversations about technology and the policy and the people that run it. I make those accessible, and I make those in ways that highlight the reality that it is traditionally marginalized people who make technology what it is.
And so we're fostering and curating conversations that really deepen the perspective of black folks, queer folks, black women, trans folks, working people, all the kinds of people that are often left out of conversations about technology, the Internet, social media, what it means, and the policy.
That shapes it.
We start there, like that is our starting point for those conversations.
I can tell you've done that before, Bridget.
I give you some money.
I'm just gonna know, right, money please, So when you are thinking about personal branding, like because I've went to your website and I was and I listened to your show, I'm like, I truly don't know anything else about you besides what you like put out there that's pertaining to your professional career. Like I don't know if you've got a man, you got a woman, you got kids, I don't know nothing. I'm like, I'm nosy and I want to know those things. But I feel like you personally,
like purposely, don't put those out there. So like, what story are you focused on telling? And what story are you? Like, No, that's a distraction for why I'm trying to get at Katie.
That is a very like that is you're good with your Internet sleuthing because you would have to dig pretty deep I think to find out personal information about me, And that is very much with intention and by design, and I think It goes back to what I personally have found about my branding is that because I find personal branding and sort of storytelling about myself online, I find it kind of exhausting and I don't really like participating in it that much these days, but I know
I kind of have to because of the career that I'm in.
I am very intentional about it.
I almost would use the phrase like, you know, kind of neutrally manipulative.
I don't want any I only want someone.
To be able to say like, oh, well, she does x y Z kind of work, she's interested in x y Z kind of projects. And part of it is because you know, I care quite a bit about my work and my professional identity, but my real identity, the people that I love, my community, my values, all of that. I kind of hold that a bit closer to my chest because I don't want that to be something that
is a personal an exhaustive personal branding exercise. Right like when I'm spending time with my family, I don't want to feel that I have to be digitally curating a story about that time. Otherwise it doesn't count. That's just like not a not a dynamic. I'm really interested in bringing into certain parts of my life. But I'm happy to talk about it.
With you all. In terms of how I brand myself, it doesn't really show up.
Yes, I've no zy, I want to know. I'll talk about that after Katie.
Well, I'm curious how is it shown up for like how do you two as creatives and hosts and people who have platforms and make things like how do you How have you found that dynamic?
I think we approach very differently.
Say more about that.
I think cause like I don't have like a website about myself or anything I've taken into like also not like really posting anything about my like family, and I used to I felt like people would ask me questions. I just felt like I had to answer, like and it's like so silly to say it was like you actually don't have to tell people things just because they ask you that, Like, oh, guy Ross is asking me about my grandpa, I have to tell him and I'm just like, oh no, I don't. So like I've tapered
off of that. I feel like I've grown into like cause like in my personal life, I'm very like to myself, like I don't even be telling my friends like every single thing. So I'm like, why am I telling the internet every single thing? And I think I got to that very quickly. It's like, actually, I don't like this, Like I feel like I don't really have a curated personal brand. Maybe my personal brand is like not having one,
like being mysterious, I would like think. I was like, yeah, my agent was like, you need to have a website and you need to do this, and I'm just like, hmm, I hear you, but I'm not going to do that.
So yeah, they tried to do the same thing to me, like back in like years ago when I first started hosting pop they were like, you should probably set up a Twitter. I mean, and look how that's gone today,
you know. But I mean, I have felt compelled to be to have a public presence, but that that feeling of being compelled has never actually led me to do anything that I'm uncomfortable with because at the end of the day, I know that I have control over what I choose to share with people and how I choose
to share it. So I have found myself telling myself that I want to share more, but if that doesn't show up right in my body, then I don't do it, so I have shared more in the places where I feel most comfortable, which for me oftentimes that is if it's on social media, then that's in the Instagram space.
But if that's outside on the internet, like you know, just the articles that I write in the podcast that I produce, those are spaces where I know that I have creative more creative control, and they're subject to scrutiny in different ways, or at least more measured scrutiny. I don't think I have a personal brand either, but I think maybe one has been construct it for me and
my chosen interest. Actually, speaking of this bridget we've talked about this before in the title of public intellectual and how that's something that is like I would be labeled as regardless whether or.
Not I would choose to call myself that.
I mean, you are one.
I don't think somebody comes down from the sky. And as like Eves, I w a public intellectual.
You are one.
You publicly opined and have good takes and good opinions, and you're part of the public conversation and people look to you. The people who are listening to on theme, they listen to the both of you to help them understand, you know, what they should be help shape their own opinions, and so yeah, I think.
You are a public intellectual.
Even if you don't feel like you would ever call yourself one, you both definitely are.
I feel like I'm getting a therapy session right now for helping me work through some things.
Well.
Also, think about all the kinds of people who wouldn't feel like I just know a lot of people who are like, oh, I'm a X Y Z expert, and I'm like, oh, I feel like experts the kind of thing that other people have to call you.
It's you're calling yourself one.
That's interesting, and I think more people who have actual good things to offer the world should take ownership of those labels that mean so much.
So, what would you say you're an expert in?
Oh? God, nothing, No, that's not true. I am an expert in this is a good question. I am an expert in curiosity. I know that's kind of a cop out answer, but you know, like, that's one of the reasons why I love podcasting is that you really just get to poke and product people. And you know, Katie, you said something earlier and Eves was like, Oh, tell
me more about that. If there was a question that animates my entire existence in this world and is probably tell me more about that, because I am just genuinely very curious about who people are, what motivates them, their values, where they see themselves, how see the world.
So I think I'm an expert in curiosity.
So you have your own personal experience with personal branding, but when you see other people and the ways that they choose to personal brand in public, what are your feelings about that? Like, do you have any sort of initial emotions that come up when you think of the ways that people have to personal brand on the Internet.
I don't know if anybody can relate to this feeling, But lately I have made a lot of intentional efforts to sort of step back and be a little more selective about my how my own brand shows up online, and also I've made the choice to care a little bit less about it and say, like, if I want to be a kick ass podcaster, I'm going to lean into podcasting and the personal branding stuff can come second,
and that's okay. However, lately I have felt like when I scroll social media, I am just constantly being bombarded with the ways that I'm getting it wrong the ways that I'm like, oh, you're not making reels, you should be making tiktoks like this. You should be offering your your audience. If you want to grow, do that. And I think part of that is just the nature of
social media algorithms. It seems like every other month at a mos Aria, the head of Instagram will be like, oh, well, last month we told creators if they wanted to use Instagram to the best of their ability, they should be doing X.
Now it's why.
And I realized that I just have no interest in being on this hamster wheel while where I have to be, you know, responding to the whims of billionaires who run tech platforms who I will never meet, right, And so I've made that decision for myself. But I don't feel like it's very easy to sit in that choice all the time, because constantly I'm bombarded by people who are doing it right or have the answer, or want to
sell me the answer. I often find other people's personal branding a little bit exhausting, and it's so just like me projecting my own insecurities and anxiety around it onto them, like they're not doing anything wrong. But it sometimes it seems hard to just exist online without constantly branding yourself
and constantly selling people on who you are. Like, whatever happened to kicking it online or having fun online or finding community online in a way that wasn't like just intentionally branding yourself as some sort of expert in your field.
Yeah, but that also makes me think about how corporations and commercial institutions, how their anxieties and their issues have been projected onto us, and how we've kind of had to co op them in our own efforts to survive and live in this world. And I'm wondering if you see any differences in the way that Black people have had to operate in that space of being forced to personal brand to live, and how people of other races have operated in that space.
Do you feel differently about them? Do you see a difference between the two.
I do see a difference. I think the stakes are different for us, you know. I mean, I think historically we have a lot less access, So we have a lot less access to platforms and spaces and traditional media outlets, and we've really had to build our own platforms and spaces and media outlets. If you want to be heard and want to be able to show up as our authentic selves.
That is a gift.
That is a gift that we as black folks have always had, is building our own tables when we're not invited to other people's stables, Right, So I want to honor the fact that that is a truly a gift and a legacy.
So I'm not knocking that.
However, I think that because of that, we kind of always have to be doing that, and like there's a feeling that if you stop doing that, you'll cease to exist or you'll cease to get those opportunities. And I
actually really do believe that. I think that if I were to take a year off of social media or a year off of making my podcast, I think that it would be that much harder for me to come back because people will be like, oh, what, like, in that year, I didn't see you constantly posting what awards you were winning, or constantly and posting what content you were making, So I guess you didn't exist, right, And So I think that because of these because of the
way that historically we have been shut out of that kind of access, I think it creates this kind of need to be doing something that luckily we're quite good at, which is building our own platforms, And I just, yeah, I just want to make sure that when we talk about that, we're talking about it in a way that both honors how great that is, but also is tuned into how tough that can be, that feeling can be, to be like, oh, I can't even take a break for a moment, I always have to be branding.
Yeah, if we're already black people, is the way I'm talking about already subject to so much scrutiny because even when we're visible in the very smallest of ways. So what do you think that kind of loop of visibility, of having to be present at all times just by nature of the Internet, but also because we're black, How does does that affect like how we are treated in terms of our visibility and hyper visibility.
Hypervisibility is a good word for it, because it's like, as black folks who show up online, we're both hyper visible, but in a lot of ways erased or overlooked. And it's just very interesting to me how you can sort.
Of be both.
I've had accomplishments in my life where things happen in my life that I don't put on social media and people act like they don't exist, and so I'm really challenging myself to sort of resist that internally. And I really think about this quote from MICHAELA. Cole when I think she won an Emmy, and she said, in a world that entices us to browse through the lives of others to help us better determine how we feel about ourselves, and to in turn feel the need to be constantly visible.
For visibility these days seems to somehow equate to success. Do not be afraid to disappear from it, from us for a while and see what comes to you in the silence. And I have always found so much power in that quote, because when you have that silence and that space where there aren't eyes on you, for me, that has equated to really making something I'm proud of, or really being able to lean into something right.
And so I think that in a.
World that tells us that visibility is success, not being afraid to step back and go invisible, go dark for a little bit, you know, I think it's really powerful to be able to do that and understand what the power in that in a world that tells you always have.
To be showing yourself and branding yourself more.
With bridget after this break. Have you ever taken a social media break?
Oh? All the time? I mean I'm not. I'm not somebody who will be like, hey, guys taking a.
Break, Like like, nobody cares, my girl.
You could have kept that to yourself'll take a nap, right, Like.
We wouldn't have known if that was the algorithm or them taking a break anyway.
I definitely take long breaks, short breaks, all the breaks from social media, and I don't feel the need to announce it. But isn't it so weird that you would even feel the need to announce it, Like there's like how many other things in your life. If you stop doing it for a week or a month, would people be like, oh, are you okay?
What's going on with you?
Like if you didn't play a certain game for a month, do you think that you would feel the need to like announce that to the world. I just think that that really, to me illustrates how we're so caught up in this idea that everybody, everybody has to be on social media all the time, and that you know that's not true, Like you can dip in, dip out, do it as it feels comfortable and right to you, and truly nothing will happen.
I think that also goes to the difference between personal branding online versus personal branding like IRL, because I don't think people paid that much more. People pay more attention to the online then like there in person presence. So like you're going to think about like what outfit you're posting when you're posting online, and you're going to craft your caption really well, and you're going to like have
all this thought. But when you're out in the streets, you're looking a mess, You've got a bond it on, and you're talking crazy to the people at American Deli, Like you're not really thinking too much about your personal brand.
And when people apologize for that, they do it online, like when they apologize for their public presence. I've seen people say I had to where I couldn't go outside
today because I wasn't. They'll say things about like wearing makeup, or wearing a bond it out or not being dressed to the nons, you know, not having their faces beat and apologize for that because they know that might show up online in a certain way, but not necessarily because they care about how that personal interaction in real life went.
So yeah.
I mean, by the way, i'm pro bonnet outside just putting that up out.
I'm just saying people will apologize for things like that because they want to be perceived a certain way, because they know their brand will show up.
Yeah, but it's like the personal branding, Yeah, I'd like the obsession with it doesn't really for I think for most people, it doesn't show up outside unless you're like on a panel or at a conference, but like just how you move every day, I don't see that as much.
There is this weird kind of collapse that I see between in real life and online evens where it's like, yeah, somebody might have an interaction offline that is in some ways authentically them because they're not branding it. It's just happening, you know, off the cuff or whatever, and then go online to talk about that interaction in a way that is part of the brand. It's so interesting how these
online and offline realities have kind of collapsed. And I do think that if something like in a lot of ways, the digital realm has become more real than reality in some ways where it only sort of matters how it shows up online, or how it's branded online and how it shows up in reality is a lot In a lot of cases, it's a lot less important to folks.
I think, yeah, for sure, are you familiar with the Google for faces pim eyes? Oh?
Yes, so I just learned about that, I think last week. Are you familiar with the use?
So it's basically like, if say I have a picture of you, and you can have a mask on, you can have your eyes closed, you can be like looking a different way. I can put that into that and it would show every instance where your face appears online, whether you posted it, whether you're just like in the background of somebody else's picture, just everything, And like learning about that really just like made me want to just
go further away from not branding myself. Like I was, like, I want to remove every picture of myself from online, just because like I think when we first started doing this, I would say like for us, maybe like the early twenty tens, we had no idea like what the internet was going to be, and so like now in twenty twenty four, I feel like we still don't have a true idea, but we see a little bit more and to me, it's like very scary what the internet is about to be.
Yeah, I completely agree.
You know, I think I might be a little older than both of you, But I remember when I first got Facebook. I was an undergrad in college and I graduated college in two thousand and seven, two thousand and seven, and this was when the main thing was like, you are connecting with your friends, You are going out to a nightclub, you are taking.
A thousand pictures from.
That single outing, posting all of them pistays, and all of them for sure pit stains. Yeah, like albums, right, And so I think that was sort of that the heyday, when we really really kind of it was easy to think of this as something that was about connection. Here in twenty twenty four, I don't think that anybody feels like social media platforms are offering us genuine connection anymore. I think what they're offering us is exploitation. I think
what they're offering us is anxiety. I think what they're offering us is surveillance, criminalization, all kinds of things. And I think that you know that idea of connecting with your friends, even if you look at your if you if you open Instagram right now and scroll your you know.
Whatever their version of their feed.
A lot of the stuff that you're being shown is it from your friends or people that you've opted to follow. It's algorithmically generated content that they want you to see that they think that you might like, right, And so I think that what is I think we should be asking what that means for our role in all of this, how we fit into that if social media platforms are going to go to a place where it's more about like surfacing you content than connection.
So if you're no longer connecting with your.
Friends, are we all like Katie Eves and Bridget are we all now de facto content creators?
Or or what like? Are we the audience here?
I think that we really need to have a more refined role in how we fit into this because the two thousand and six, two thousand and seven, two thousand and eight days are like way behind us in terms of how this is all working.
We're living in president at times, but we've been doing so for for a while now. It's not like, oh, we have like one one event that happens. It's like ooh that was unpresidented, Glad that's over. It's just like all of it, like the evolution of it is just like, oh my god, like what's the next what are.
We going to do?
And as a podcaster, Bridget, I'm interested in getting your take on like who owns our personal brands? Because it sounds like, oh, it's our personal brand, we own it.
But you know, like as.
Contractors, like do we own those or is it you know XYZ Corporation media conglomerate that owns our personal branding?
What do you think about that?
Well?
As a company girl, I have to shout out the good folks that iHeart radio definitely own my brand and all of the things that come with it.
No, I'm kidding.
I mean I think your question is it's like a really good one. I am I might be a weird person to ask because I'm particular about ownership, right If you ever watched that show Breaking Bad and Walter White, one of the reasons it's like revealed by that one of the reasons why he's so weird about his meth recipe is that he was cut out of a cut out of a deal when he was a scientist and he didn't have ownership over a product that he made,
and it like stuck with him. I kind of feel like that's a little bit of my origin story too, where I am a real I am very particular about ownership. I would rather get screwed on the money and have more ownership of something. I don't know if that's like the best choice, but part of it is because of
that discomfort around who owns what. I just hate the idea that something that I create right, something that I conceptualized, that I put my heart and soul into, that came from me, that was that was colored by all of the experiences that I have brought with me to this world, that somebody else could be like, oh well, that's just another point in our annual sales meeting about how we're doing right. So like I am very I'm like very
weird about that kind of thing, and I do. I mean, I've had situations where the line of ownership who owns what about me and my work and my brand isn't so clear, And so these days I'm trying to really move through the creative professional world with a lot more clarity about where the lines are about who owns what about?
You know, who has the final say, who has control, who makes the money all of that because I think it's I think you need to you know, I don't want to get too into it, but like when I was first coming up in podcasting, I've signed some deals that I wish I had looked at a little closer, because I would see, like, oh, I'm I'm inherently, both in the work and on paper, just generating stuff for other people. And so no matter how much of myself I put into that, I'm only going to ever be
generating for others as supposed to generating for myself. And so yeah, I feel a bit burned on that in some ways and really trying to move now with a little more clarity around it, but again as creative. So it'd be really curious how you all are navigating that as well.
Well.
I was just about to say you are.
You would not be the only person to say that, Bridget, And I think it's like comforting to hear that coming from you, a person who's worked on so many podcasts, because these deals were happening then and they're still happening now, and yeah, I think pretty difficult to navigate because if you're working with the company, there's going to be some trade offs, and the question is that you have to ask yourself, like what are those trade offs to you?
And what are the most important parts of it to you?
Those questions are often about ownership, and I think that I in the past have not been like competent enough, or I haven't had the team on my side, like a good lawyer on my side to be able to tell me what the right things were. So I've been able to learn from crowdsourcing and the sharing of information, which has been amazing.
Information is power. If anybody listening wants like DM me, I will, I will give you my contracts, I'll give you my lawyer's name, right, Like It's the only way that we will ever take up more space in this industry is if we share information. This mindset that like, oh, we have to be cling to what you have because you don't want her to get it or her to get it. That's complete bullshit, Like there's enough room for
all of us. We need to have that mindset, and we will all win and rise up when we share information with each other.
And yeah, I to that point.
He's like, whenever I see companies that are hosting, like, oh, we're doing a contest where if you submit your idea, maybe we'll make your show. I'm always like in the Instagram comments like, Hey, what's the ownership look like?
What's the IP look like? Great contest? Like do they own it?
Like?
How does it work? What's the adsplit?
Yay?
Like that's me in the comments asking those questions.
I was at a festival and they had one of those like activations like picture podcasts.
I was like, don't do.
Good.
Yeah, And I think for black people in podcasting and in writing in general, I've come up against that question of like what I choose to share and what I don't choose to share because as a creator, it's it's like the generative process and a part of the process that there can be fear around. But it can be important to share certain things and to not be afraid to put yourself out there all the time. But especially as black creators in American media, it's important for us
to protect ourselves and the work that we create. So it can definitely be a fine line to tiptoe. We'll be back with more conversation with bridget after this break.
I think it goes beyond just sharing information, honestly, Like I can speak to it from the book publishing side of it. And I'm getting like less than fifteen percent of list price.
And I have done all the work on this book.
I thought of the idea, I've gotten all the people together, I'm designing it and I'm not a designer, but I'm like showing the designer everything that I want to do. I've written everything, I travel, you know, all these things, and I'm getting less than fifteen percent of list price. So like even if I told somebody that coming in, like if I said, ease, I'm getting this much like okay, like maybe you can get like one more person, but like I don't know, I don't think like that's truly
going to make a change. And like a lot of people's books are very personal, Like I don't know if y'all read the memoir Heavy by Kisa Leiman, but it's like a very personal book. And the books you've written before, it's like got one thousand dollars total for those books, And it's like this is the publishing industry, Like this is what they do, like even if you're going to
be a really big name. So I think it goes beyond sharing information and like actually, like you said, like making our own thing and like having it cooperatively owned and not like wanting to like cozy up with these like big companies, which I know is like so like hard to not think is really cool. But I feel like every time I think something's really cool and I'm like, fuck, this isn't cool.
It's not no, you know what, you know, those big companies aren't cool.
You know what's cool? Katie's cool, Like you know, you're cool, like it.
It's such a weird it's such a you're so right, it's such a hard thing to turn off that being associated with x y Z big brand or big company or big publisher or big network or whatever that is going.
To make me feel successful. And it's just not true.
And it's like half the time those deals don't look as shawny as they as they appear on the outside on Instagram. Right, And you're so right that I think
it's not just information sharing. It goes beyond that of like, here's the reality of what it looked like for me to work with this company, so that you can decide if it's worth it for you to work with this company to only get X y Z of the price, right, And I agree, I think it really has to go back to building more abundant models for us to put our stories and ideas out there that don't involve having to cozy up with companies just because they have a
big name but a terrible reputation about how they treat people.
Yeah, And I also think it goes back to the personal branding, because I will be the first tie to say, like, I'm like a I like making an announcement about my book, Like I have a book deal with the biggest publisher in the world, and it's just like, well, and I'm not going to be like and I'm getting like shitty royalties and like all this stuff like all that, you know, because I want to get my Instagram like so off and for people to buy the book to tell me congratulations.
I think it goes back to like the personal branding, like yeah.
And that makes me think about just going back to our initial ideas around this about how personal branding is a form of storytelling. We craft a certain story about ourselves when we're telling our personal brands. We choose to
give this, we choose not to give that. And I pulled a definition from personal brand dot Com, which I had no idea existed before this episode, but they specifically, say, a personal brand is a widely recognized and largely uniform perception or impression of an individual based on their experience, expertise, competencies, actions, YadA, YadA, YadA.
All the rest of that definition. You can go look it up. But the point.
Is is that it's clearly a crafted thing. It is when we create our personal brands, we are thinking. We're being intentional about what we choose to share and what we don't based on how we want to be seen. So I know that we've used the word authentic a couple of times in this conversation. I was wondering, Bridget, if you think it's even possible for us to be authentic and maintain a sense of self in how we express ourselves when we are doing this personal branding.
Oh, absolutely not.
I mean I think I think, based on the definition that you just read that I agree with and our conversation here, I think it's I mean, I don't think it's a lie.
You know, when Katie says like.
Oh, I have this great book, deal with this great publisher and all of that, leaving out the bit about the parts that maybe aren't so exciting that she's not doesn't not thrilled about.
That's not a lie. It's just selective.
It's just you're only getting a partial view into it that Katie wants to control, right, And that makes all the sense in the world. So I don't think it's I don't think it's inauthentic to mean dishonest, but I do think it's selective and we should all like have that in our minds when we're scrolling Instagram, you know every day that we're not getting the full lens into
whatever whatever is actually going on with you. But when they're branding themselves online, like I'm not giving my full self and how these things feel for me when I'm branding myself, and I don't think the people that I'm consuming their content.
I don't think that they are either.
And I would also add, like, I think that it's really important to be branding yourself online if you're a person making something in twenty twenty four. However, I think that I've really found power in doing it, understanding that I have to do it, but then not really putting too much stock into it because how many likes my stuff gets or whatever it feels good. Like it's like a like who doesn't like it when they're when like all their friends are in the comments like gay, good job.
But you really have to like have a sense of what success looks like, like what nourishment looks like for you. Right, So, Like I know stories that I want to tell, the work I want to put out. I know how closely it aligns with my actual values. Those are the kinds of things that make me feel like a successful creative. And I have to be really clear about that. They that, like are the benchmarks of success for me? And what are not the benchmarks of success for me?
What just like feels.
Good and if I'm having a bad day might give me a pickup, right, And so I think it's important to not conflate those two things.
Yeah, I also think it's important to acknowledge how that self selection, even though we have agency when we're doing it, it can also be exhausting. Like just because we're doing something we have control over doesn't mean that it doesn't also take like a mental and spiritual toll on us having to segment those parts of ourselves. Because black people we have to compartmentalize in so many different ways already. We have to be respectable sometimes, you know, we have
to tone shift. We have to do so many different things of like how we think about how we appear to other people in order to ensure our safety. So when we self select in doing that and personal branding, I think some of those things can also come up around how it takes a toll on our bodies and how it takes a toll on our spirits. And I think that is also an important thing to acknowledge, because both of those things can exist at the same time.
I'm so glad you said that.
And yeah, and it's so funny that you could be crafting and in control of your personal brand, but still very aware of like needing or wanting to come off as a certain way, like more palatable or something.
And it's like, if there's ever a time where you should be the person in.
Control of how you show up, it's like your little corner of the Internet.
But I don't feel that way. I wonder if you all feel that way.
You know, I don't really want to be in spaces where I have to show up a certain way in order to be accepted there. However, even as I curate my little corner of my personal brand Internet, I am aware of that sort that sort of double consciousness that you're talking about.
I think, Yeah, I feel like if I truly showed up how I am, I would be on like an FBI's most Wanted list.
We'd all have black black pillowcases in some secret room.
Like, girl, I ain't even trying to get that deep with y'all for real.
Like, and then are often times of dissonance for me where I feel like I'm branded a certain I can go look at my website. Y'all know I'm Southern. Y'all know I'm gonna say y'all, y'all know I'm gonna be
in front of things. And then like you know, when I'm in certain rooms, I mean, that's how I am, That's my personality oftentimes, but you know that excuse me, yeah, but that that there's a dissonance between my brand and like how I do show up in some ways, not necessarily because I am cutting off parts of myself, just because I'm multiple people, Like I'm different ways in different places.
So also speaking of being multiple people and showing up in different ways, I would have never expected you Bridget to align yourself with Walter White.
But so that's something I wasn't expecting you to say.
There is one thing I wanted to say, just that I think we would be remiss or I would be remiss not to say that you were part of information sharing for us, Bridget as we were doing this podcast, Like you shared your contract with us. So when y'all hear Bridget say that, know that she's telling the truth. I would do the same. You know, anybody can come to me. I will be transparent about that. And I can't solve all your problems.
I'm not a lawyer.
I don't know intellectual property law. You know, there are other people who would need to be on your support team, but I would be happy to be of whatever kind of assistance.
I would like to be.
Oh my gosh, this is my favorite topic. Like I will tell you how much money I make, down to the penny. I will like, like, I'm curious about other creatives how much money they make. There's so much smoke and mirrors, so like I want to know how much your house cost. I will ask the question, and I'm happy to give that information back to others.
And now it is time for role credits, the segment where we give credit to a person, place, or thing, and we have Bridget joining us, But first Eves who are what would you like to give credit to today?
I would like to give credit to t I'm not a big coffee drinker, and I didn't become a big warm tea specifically.
I'm an iced tea hater, so don't ask me why.
I don't like sweet tea and I'm from the South, but I love hot tea.
I love drinking green tea in the morning.
I like macha, but I like other kinds of tea too, And I can somehow handle the caffeine from tea, but I can't handle the caffeine from coffee.
It makes me very dittery. But I love tea.
I like get and tea when I'm in different places. And I don't know as much about it as I would like to like. I would like to learn a lot more. I know people who are master herbalists when it comes to tea. But yeah, I want to give a shout out to tea today.
Okay, Tea, what's tea? Brigit? What you've given a shout out to given credit to me?
I'm going to give a shout out to journaling. I have not been one to journal that often. I'm kind of on and off. But I had a weird kind of personal professional situation and I went back and was reading my journal entries about it because I was like, am I Am I being crazy here in reading my journal entries. I like, no, actually, I'm being I'm very
clear on how I feel. And if I had not written down how I felt through the situation, I think I would have really second guessed myself and dabted myself. And so yeah, I don't I want to give it up to journaling.
Keep a journal.
I would like to give credit to neighbors. I live in a neighborhood where most of the people are like old and retired, and you know, they see a young hot bitch and they do you hate in a little bit. But this past weekend they were not hating, and they invited me over to their shindig that they have every week and they never invite me to but they seem nice and they kind of were just like, oh, like,
we didn't know how to invite you. And you kind of forget that people are like weird and just like, oh, like you're weird, they're weird. Like maybe they y'all are both thinking weird things about each other. But it's fun when you like have that like neighborly bond with someone like you don't got to be friends, but like you can be like in community and like you know, borrow the lawnmower something. So give me credit to tea journaling and neighbors.
All right, well then, Bridgie, can you tell everyone where they can find you on the internet.
Be sure to listen to my podcast there are no girls on the Internet twice a week.
You can find that on.
Apple Podcasts, Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts. And you can find me on Instagram at bridget Marie ndc Perfect.
Thank you so much for joining us.
Thank you, this has been a dream. Thank you so much for having me, and honestly, thanks so much to you too. Congratulations to you and the whole team on launching on Theme. You know, thank you for what you're doing to elevate our stories. It's really such a beautiful special thing.
So congratulations and we will see you next week.
Bye.
Hi.
On Theme is a production of iHeartRadio and Fairweather Friends Media. This episode written by Eves, Jeffco and Katie Mitchell. It was edited and produced by Tari Harrison. Follow us on Instagram at on themeshow. You can also send us an email at hello at on Theme dot show. Head to on themet Show to check out the show notes for episodes. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple podcast, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows,