how to completely rebrand yourself

Hey Climbers, today —

• The three phases of rebranding yourself

• Mercedes made an olympic ad w Simone Biles and it’s… art

• A podcast rec about super-smellers

THOUGHT OF THE WEEK
Matthew Mcconaughey’s rebrand

"If you don’t know where you’re going, any direction will get you there”

In the early 2000s, After a string of (IMO banger) movies like Wedding Planner, How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days and Failure to Launch, Matthew Mcconaughey realised he had a problem:

He had been pigeonholed as the rom-com guy.

Thing is, he didn’t want to be the rom-com guy.

He wanted to be critically acclaimed! Win Academy Awards! He wanted to be a “serious” actor.

So, unfulfilled, unchallenged and uninspired, Matthew had a choice: stay the romcom heartthrob forever, or rebrand himself.

He announced to his agent that he'd no longer be accepting romcom roles - serious roles only.

How long for? his agent asked.

As long as it takes, he said.

At first, the same old roles flowed in.

But he kept refusing them.

He even refused an offer for 14.5 million dollars!!!!!

The flow turned into a trickle. The trickle stopped.

For 8 months, he had zero offers.

All in, Matthew didn’t work for two years.

Then, slowly but surely, serious offers started coming in.

At first, they were only low budget indie films.

As someone so used to big Hollywood budgets, he could have scoffed and refused them on the grounds of ego.

But budgets didn’t matter. Because despite being small, these roles were aligned with his vision.

The Lincoln Lawyer wasn’t a huge success. Bernie went ok.

Then there was Mud. A few nominations.

Dallas buyers club - which got him his academy award.

It was working.

As the cherry on top of the rebrand, Matthew did something genius:

He coined his new era of acting as “The McConaissance"

By giving his new brand a name, he had finally separated his old brand from his new one.

If you’ve ever dreamed of rebranding yourself, Matthew’s story is a masterclass in how it’s done. He went through three phases:

Phase 1 - Define (the problem)

Ask yourself:

• What is the problem?

• Why is it a problem?

Phase 2 - Refine (the vision)

Ask yourself:

• Who do I want to be 20 years from now? How does this person think? Speak? What skills do they have? How does this person feel about themself?

Phase 3 - Align (your actions)

Ask yourself:

• Does this action make a vote for, or against the vision?

This is by far the hardest phase, because you have to be militant about it. But if you can pull that off, you can pull off anything.

It’s simple, but it’s not easy.

If you want help on the journey, I work with creators to find clarity on their brand and align themselves with their vision.

For an hour of power with me, hit the button below.

CREATIVE INSPO OF THE WEEK
Mercedes Olympic ad

So simple. So powerful.

REC OF THE WEEK
The woman who can smell Parkinsons

I know this is a lil out of the box but trust me on this one.

This podcast about how a woman who has hyperosmia (which is a fancy word for a really really really good sense of smell) can smell Parkinsons.

She smelt it on her husband years before doctors could even detect it.

And now she’s bringing new hope to the science of disease diagnosis.

Ok, that’s all for now

Until next time

Keep climbin’

Erica x