In the beginning days of Platinum99, I was scared to show up for my brand.

I didn’t even want to tell people about the brand and business because I didn’t know whether I was doing a good job.

I thought to myself, ‘What if I look stupid?’ I was worried that people will look at my work and decide that I wasn’t good enough for the job.

As entrepreneurs, you might be able to resonate with the fears I felt. All the what ifs… What if you fail? What if you make the wrong decisions? What if it was the right decision but you were too scared to do it and you miss an opportunity?

All the thoughts and questions make for this endless cycle of doubts, and you stick to this mindset that what you are doing will not be valuable enough for your clients.

Meanwhile, if you want your clients to to trust your process and see your brand and business as their go-to service provider, the ONE for them, then they have to see your confidence at the foundation of your brand.

These fears are exactly what’s stopping you from crafting your brand credibility and attracting your dream clients.

What is brand credibility?

Brand credibility talks about the depth of trust that your clients have towards your brand and business. It is about the relationship you build with your clients, the emotional connections you create that grows their trust bank towards your brand.

While you cannot control how people perceive your brand, the way you show up for your brand and your values will contribute to the level of credibility and trust people will have towards your services.

In my journey with Platinum99, it took a long time to craft our brand credibility. For the longest time, I focused on getting the outside appearance right because I thought those were the things that matter most for my brand. Let’s fix the designs, let’s update the logo, let’s hire people for the website—all those things! And yes, they were good things, but do they really contribute to the relationship and trust you want to build for your brand?

For many entrepreneurs, they think brand credibility equals having many testimonials. Maybe you think that the best way to show your brand credibility is by updating your case studies and having an array of projects displayed on your ‘Work’ or ‘Portfolio’ page.

The reason why many service-based businesses would go to brand and design agencies is because they want to look credible. They want to feel like how they present themselves align with how they want to be perceived by their audience.

But those aren’t the only things that contribute to building trust and showing your experience to your clients—the most important thing actually comes from the core of your brand.

The key to crafting your brand credibility is how confident you feel about your brand, how unapologetic you stand for your values, and how you show up to share that message.

Brand credibility starts from the inside.

It’s not about how it looks on the outside only because clients want to partner with brands and businesses that they have a solid connection with. It has to mean more than good designs.

So brand credibility boils down to 3 things: feeling confident about your brand, standing up for your values, and actually showing up consistently to share that message to your audience.

Feeling confident means you know who you are as a brand, who you serve, and why you do what you do. It means you have that sense of conviction that ‘This is it!’— you are right where you need to be. You are excited about your process and you can’t wait for dream clients to be transformed by your service. There’s that sense of embracing every part of your business and feeling proud of it.

From there, because you know what you’re all about, you can stand up for your values. You can highlight the things you believe and the mindsets that govern how you do things. If you want to advocate for women entrepreneurs, be bold about it and share that through your brand experience. If you want to help reduce carbon footprint, you can do that too. You have every right to believe in those values and share that to the world.

People want to buy from brands they can trust and emotionally connect with, so crafting brand credibility is all about building relationships with your audience.

When you start showing up and sharing what makes your brand unique, you are connecting with people who also believe in what you believe and want to bring the impact that you want to bring. You are building relationships that will serve as the foundation of your community dream clients.

I noticed that for P99, when we started showing up and sharing our values, people started inquiring about our services with questions that showed they too believe in what we believe.

We went through years of working with clients that didn’t align with us, some were even scammers. But when we got clarity on our brand direction and core values, and then built content based on our brand foundations, we started attracting the people we wanted to work with.

Here are 4 things you can do to start crafting your brand credibility:

1 – Be Brave

Be who you are!! You don’t have to be a perfect brand and business, but your audience wants to get to know the real you.

When you choose to stand up and show up as who you really are, you are showing them that you’re willing to sacrifice your brand reputation. But here’s the thing… it’s not a sacrifice at all because if you are being real, then your audience won’t be disappointed.

You can be brave to show up as your authentic ‘you’ because you’re an honest business person. You’re not hiding from your audience. You are putting yourself out there, showing that who you are behind the scenes is the same with the one that your audience is seeing in public.

If you can offer certain services, tell your audience that you can. If you don’t have the capacity to do what they ask you, tell them that too. Own your position and know what you want to do. You don’t have to please everyone, you just want to pursue your vision, achieve your goals, and work with your dream clients.

2 – Get the right help

So many service providers are scared to reach out and ask questions because they worry that people will think they are dumb for asking such questions. Well, let me tell you this: there are no such things as stupid questions!

Any question you have in mind about how to run your business, about how to grow your brand, about anything that is tingling your curiosity—they are worth asking. It’s okay for you to not know everything!

I’ve worked with brand strategists, therapists, musicians, creatives, techies, entrepreneurs and all sorts of service providers here at Platinum99 and there’s a reason why they are good in their specific expertise. Your brand and business challenges can be clear to some people and unclear to you, and that’s 100% okay!! That’s also exactly why it’s okay to collaborate and get the right help.

You don’t have to have all the answers for your brand and business, just ask for help. I’m here for you! Collaborating and partnering will take you to the next level.

3- Build connections and relationships

I realised now that you need to build connections and relationships. This is so important.

And please note this: I’m not talking about marketing your business! I’m talking about meeting people and genuinely connecting with others. This isn’t about sales, but this is about getting to know your audience and people in your community. It’s about learning from other people and growing from there.

When I first started my business, so many people asked me to collaborate with them—and this was a valuable experience. I learned to give away some things for free and not just think about making money. I learned to be generous with my time, while still being mindful with all the things I need to do. I learned to go beyond just the dollars I can make based on my hourly rate.

These connections and relationships will open doors that will lead you to opportunities you’d never thought of! It’s not a waste of time.

When you genuinely get to know others, they grow curiosity to understand about you. And their experience of connecting with you—your personality and sincerity—will contribute to your brand credibility too.

4- Develop your brand strategy

It’s hard to feel confident when you don’t have clarity about your brand and business. This is why Platinum99 does what it does: brand strategy and design.

The confidence that you want to feel about your brand and business comes from the clarity you get when you work on your brand strategy. You nail down who you are so you can stand up and show up confidently and with authenticity. And once you have this brand direction mapped out, you can go further by mapping out the action steps to help you know how you can show up for your brand consistently to craft your brand credibility. It’s what brand strategy is about!

When Platinum99 started attracting more and more dream clients, we didn’t change our logos and colours! What changed was how people perceived the brand.

Because I started sharing our values and being unapologetic about what we do and how we do it, we connected with people who valued what we valued. It’s that confidence that attracts the dream clients!

When it comes to your branding, you are in charge!

You are in charge of how you want to be perceived.

You are in charge of how you want to show up.

You are in charge of how you want people to feel when they experience your brand.

Need help figuring out all things related to your brand and crafting your brand credibility?

I’m here for you. Sign up for a free consult call, I’ll help you get clarity to show up confidently through brand strategy and design!