the bossbabe podcast - Ep 489: These Two AI Tools Can Supercharge Your Personal Brand Growth - The Leila Hormozi Playbook

Episode Date: May 12, 2026

What does it actually take to build a 3M+ personal brand while running a $250M company? In this episode, Natalie sits down with Leila Hormozi - COO of Acquisition.com - to break down the playbook for personal brand: how Leila built one of the top personal brands without making it her full-time job, why deprioritizing content was the move that finally made her brand compound, and the practical content systems (including how she really uses AI) that let her ship without burning out. Expect specific numbers, a counter-discourse case for personal brand in the AI era, and a content "double dip" framework you can install this week. If you've ever wondered whether building a personal brand is even worth it in 2026, or you're a founder trying to figure out how to ship content without it taking over your life, this episode is the operating system. Time Stamps: 00:00 - The personal brand strategy that grew 3M+ followers  01:43 - Why content compounded after she stopped trying so hard 06:24 - The mentor's "ham and garlic" rule for packaging 09:35 - Why your niche is "one of one" — the anti-niching case 15:36 - The AI rule that separates real brands from AI slop 18:50 - Why personal brand is MORE valuable in the AI era 24:15 - Inside the first 100% AI-driven sale at Acquisition.com 29:17 - The doubling-constraint scaling lens for personal brand 35:51 - The newsletter she built without writing a single word Resources + Links: Follow Leila Hormozi On Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/leilahormozi  Leila's Letters Newsletter: leilahormozi.com Pre-Order The Freedom-Based Business Method. Sign Up For Our Free Weekly Newsletter & Get Insights From Natalie Every Single Week On All Things Strategy, Motherhood, Business Growth + More. Drop Us A Review On The Podcast + Send Us A Screenshot & We’ll Send You Natalie’s 7-Figure Operating System Completely FREE (value $1,997).

Layla, welcome to the podcast. I'm so excited to have you here. I'm excited to be here. I appreciate it, Natalie. One thing I would love to dive into from the get-go is personal branding. And talk about how you are thinking about personal branding. I really admire the way that you have built your personal brand over the past few years. And I'm just curious now that you've really, you've done it on all the platforms and you've really learned so much. And you've done it in a time where I feel like, I mean, the world's always changing,

but it's really changing. This last 12 months has been crazy with AI. Are you glad that you built your personal brand? I'm going to assume yes. And how are you thinking about that now with AI? Yeah, and I'll be completely honest. Like, I think personal brand is probably the last thing I think about of the things in my life. I show up and I do make content,

but I don't think about it a lot in my discretionary time. And I'll kind of give you my frames for it and why. I am glad that I built my personal brand. I think it's been incredibly helpful for the people that I bring on my team. I think it's been incredibly helpful for honestly, just like not even just business but my life because I think getting your brand, which is who you are out there, I think it's important. So then you could attract more of the people you want in your life, whether that be customers, employees, friends, like all of those things. And I think it's been

incredibly fruitful in that way. And I think that the caveat to that is I think when I first started putting content out there, I was, there's a book called The Inner Game of Tennis. And it talks about how you have like version one of yourself and version two of yourself. And version one of yourself is like the self that tries so hard and really wants to like, people to like them and to do well and like all this stuff. And then version two is like the self that you are when you're like in flow and you're not thinking about what you're doing, but it's like going really well even though you're not thinking about it. You're not like premeditating. In the beginning, I was so nervous even though I'd been running a giant company. Like doing content was like

a completely new thing for me and I was like, oh my God, I was so nervous everyone's going to fucking yell at me and tell me they don't like me and all this stuff, right? And I totally cared what people thought and I still care what people think. I just care less. And so the version one of myself was what was showing up in the beginning. It's funny because people ask So like what happened when, you know, your brand started growing? What do you think the contributing factors are? And I'm like, it literally started growing when I stopped being in version one, started being in version two.

It was like during a time when I just was so busy, I had so much going on. I actually deprioritized my content. I said, I have to film less. I can't do as much of this. I can't do as much of that. Like, I just can't do all this stuff. And I just realized I was like, I can't let this thing take more of my time anymore. And that is when everything started going well.

And what I realized, I was like, man, I was trying so hard and in trying to so hard to like be good at making content, I wasn't being myself. And so did I even have a personal brand out there or was it just like this, you know, shadow version of me? And it was like very robotic and very like, like, I was stressed when I was making the content because I wanted to do it like, fuck, I didn't get that right. And so because of that, it wasn't like, people didn't relate. I don't think that they, I was, I wasn't like super well liked. I got a lot of negative comments in the beginning. And so as soon as I took that term where I just said, like, I'm going to stop trying so hard and I'm just going to be who I am. That's when everything like started going well. And it's like the first,

This is the first time my life where me trying less actually resulted in better outcomes. Because normally for me, if I try harder, I get better outcomes. And that just was not working. And so that has changed how I see personal brand because what I realize is like, it's exactly what I've always wanted when I've seen someone's brand, like the people I follow or the people who I feel like are actually their authentic selves rather than like trying to be something for the camera. And I think you can feel the difference of those things.

Like you probably can watch people and be like, no, I think that they're actually being themselves. Like there's like enough in there versus watching someone and being like, they're totally rehearsed and they sound like a court reporter or like a journalist and you can tell they're just trying to get the hooks and the this and like make sure the algorithms are going to go. And once I just let go of that and said, I don't give a fuck, that's when everything started working really well. And so I think some of us are so, at least a lot of women I've met are so conscientious of like how they show up on camera. Because you're thinking not just about what you're saying and how you're being perceived, but how do I look and then what's happening over here.

And like we have a thousand other things we're thinking about. I think adding on the pressure of I need to appear a certain way, I need to have a certain kind of brand rather than like, I want my personal brand to be like glass. I want it to be exactly what people get if they're sitting with me in person. I just made that the goal. It just needs to be that when people meet me in real life, they're like, oh my God,

you're exactly the same as you were in your content. That would be success. And that's really like how I look at it now. It's just when I talk to my team, sometimes I'll look at, for example, Instagram and say there's a lot more of a certain type of content on there. I'm like, hey, love that it's performing well, but this is not my life.

Like, I'm not all of that. I'm not all relationship. I'm not all business. I'm not all this thing. So like we need to have a good mix of those because I am a dynamic person with many, you know, sides to myself. And so that's been something that I've thought about a lot, which is like how do I make sure that my brand, which is just the perception of others, matches the reality of like how I actually am in real life. That's so interesting. So do you still find yourself, because I think this is such a struggle where you'll find yourself looking at what's performing, what kind of hook is really going to work, how things are structured. And are you less rigid now with I have to follow this format? or talk on this topic and bringing in more of your brand, like more of yourself into your brand? I don't even know what's performing.

Like, I'm not just saying that. I don't look at it. I, my team looks at it. And then they'll bring stuff to me. But like my number one rule is like, if I don't like it, I'm not going to record it. If it's not authentic to me, if it doesn't feel right to me,

I know what we'll perform. Like, if I make a video about money on YouTube, that thing's going to go off because I have money. I'm a woman talking about money. I can say all these things. But like, I only have so many things about money that I want to talk about. So I don't go into that a lot

because that's not what I love speaking to. On the flip side, sometimes like recently I made a lot more content on leadership. It didn't do as well. But I said, I don't really care. I want it out there because that's who I am. It's what I love.

And so I think that I just kind of go with like, am I feeling it? And I think this is like both me and Alex actually talk about like we're not feeling the content. Like we don't have emotion behind it. We don't care if it's going to perform. We're just not going to make it because I think that it's just going to,

I feel like I'm going to like sell myself out almost. And it's like I'm not a performer. I'm not an actor. I am a person and I'm just trying to put content out there about things that I actually know rather than things that I think people want me to know. You know, it's like if somebody asks me about like, if somebody asks me to break down math on something with, I don't know, so I'm like, dude, I am not a math person. My husband, amazing. He does math in his head all the time. I'm not.

That's not me. And so like I'm not going to just rehearse a script that says that. Now I will say this, which is the, what I think about when it comes packaging and things that are working well is I just think about the ham and the garlic, which is I had a mentor who told. me a story about there was a woman and she had a dog and the dog had a ticks on it. And so she told her son, she was like, hey, if you want to get the ticks off, you've got to feed him garlic. And the son was like, okay, so he gives the dog garlic. The garlic, dog's like, I don't want the garlic. And the dog like runs away. He's like, I'm not going to eat this garlic. That's disgusting. Right. It's like a clove. And so he comes back to his mom. He's like, the dog still has ticks.

I can't get him to eat the garlic. And she's like, oh, miho, Spanish. She's like, you cannot give him just the garlic. You have to wrap it in the ham. He was like, what do you mean? he's like, you've got to wrap the garlic in the ham and then give it to the dog. I think about packaging that way, which is I have this message I want to get across to people. I don't know if they're going to like it. A lot of people don't want to hear about certain things because the truth is often boring and repetitive and they've probably heard it other ways. But if we can wrap it in ham, which is something that they want to listen to and is something

they want to click on, I'm okay doing that because I know that I'm going to give them the garlic at the end of the day. And so when it comes to like packaging on YouTube, when it comes to what's the intro for the video? So I asked myself, like, how do I make this the, like, the most complimentary ham as possible to my garlic to get the message across? Because if nobody, if you write the best book in the world, but nobody reads it because the title is so boring and nobody understands what it means, then why does it even matter that you wrote the book? Right. Which, like, I'm writing a book right now, and that's actually something I've been dealing with is, like, a lot of these topics are complex.

How do I break them down in a way that people are, it's digestible? So people are actually going to want to keep reading rather than like a text. book from college. So that's how I think about packaging hooks, like what's trending. It's like, okay, if like you want to do something for, you know, five seconds to be in the video, that's kind of like the ham to get their attention and then give them the garlic. Like I am much more amenable to that than like copying stuff that's like super trending. Even with like, you know, I like to do little skits because I think they're fun. Like I have fun doing them with my team. I genuinely like, I just have a good time doing them. But one thing I told my team is like in the beginning we used to copy people's skits.

It's like, oh, this is a trending one. I told him, I was like, I just feel gross doing that. Like, I don't copy people's content. Why would I copy their skits? So, like, let's just make them up. Like, we can be inspired by skits, but I don't want to, like, one for one, make a skit. It's like, even if celebrities are doing it and stuff, I don't know. I just like, I see it.

And I'm just like, okay, that immediately turns me into like an actor, not a person who has a personality that makes content. Does that make sense? Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. And I think that's exactly what you find if you want to be in the content space over the long term. If you are so robotic and an image, like you want to project this image, you're going to find that you're exhausted. And I feel like you cannot show up like that day in, day out for a really long time. And I found for myself, too, in the beginning, it was really great to jump on trends. It was great to do what was working, to look around.

And at some point, I realized there's very much a difference between having a following and a brand. And I'm going to have a great following if I do all these things that are working. But I'm not going to have any substance to the brand. No one's going to know me like me, trust me. And so I think there's a place to teach that. There's a place to, hey, study what's going on, look at different formats, think about telling stories. And at some point, you have to figure out what's you, what's authentic to you.

And if you want a brand, how are you going to lead the space in a certain way? Yeah, I totally agree with that. I think also hearing what you're saying, and correct me if I'm wrong, it sounds like you haven't necessarily put yourself into a niche. Do you have a niche, a certain space that you want to fit into? Did you have in the beginning and it's widened? Like, how do you think about that? I kind of think about it.

Like, my niche is just me. I am my niche. Like, you know, and I think that that's also probably like I, I'm not like directly selling something from my brand. So I think it might, it would probably be different if I had like, I am trying to drive sales from this thing. But I look at it like, I have a lot of different aspects to my personality. I have a lot of different things I'm interested in.

I'm probably going to have buckets of different people from these things. So like, you know, I know there's a decent amount of people that are, you know, big, you know, business operators to follow me. There's also people who don't have businesses that just like want inspiration. and motivation. There's also just women who like fashion and hair and stuff. And then there's like 13 year old girls that are looking for somebody as a role model because they don't have one. Like I've never wanted to call out who I'm speaking to, which I'm aware is like completely different than like a lot of things I even teach. But it's because I don't have a target customer from my brand.

My brand is like right now at least I see it much more on a long term time horizon. So I'm like, I don't know. There's like seven different types of people that could follow me. And sometimes like I literally the other day was walking down the street and there was like a construction site and this construction worker. This guy comes up to me. He's like five foot four, probably like 47 years old, you know, covered in dirt. He's like, oh my God, I love your videos. Like it's so inspirational. And so I'm like, in what world would I ever think this guy would like be a fan? You know what I mean? And so it's just interesting. Like people surprise me and I think I look at it like, your niche is one of one. It's just like you are your niche. And so like you're going to, as long as you share who you are

authentically and all your authentic interests, I think you actually can attract a lot of different types of people into your world. And it doesn't necessarily have to be a certain type. Now, if you're selling something from your brand, I think that's different because then you do want to call out the person you're selling to. Like if I were making ads or like a VSL or something, of course I'm going to say, hey, business owners, like doing, you know,

above a million a year or above three million a year. Like, absolutely. But in my content, I don't like narrowing myself down to one thing. I like talking about everything. Now, I am pretty obsessive over business. I work a lot,

etc. But like I have other stuff I like talking about too. And so I'll talk about that stuff because I don't know. I look at it in long term, which is like if I'm just making content that I, if I limit myself to the content I will make and to certain perspectives that I've had in the past, I will hate this in the long run. I'll just quit doing it. So it's not like the best most optimal strategy in my opinion, but it works for me because I don't want to stop doing it. Like I genuinely like the process now versus before I used to feel like, oh, this feels transactional. And I don't like that feeling. I think that goes hand in hand in exactly what you said at the beginning where content's actually not your main priority, running your businesses, living your life, other things. things are more of a priority than growing an audience, growing a brand. And I don't think people often like to hear this, but I think that's kind of a prerequisite for having a really successful online brand. At some point, there has to be a substance behind it. Doesn't mean to say you have

to be a business mogul to speak on a certain topic, but what are you embodying in your life that people actually want to tune in and listen to? And if I find when all I'm doing is forcing myself to create content and not pouring into other areas, I've got very little to talk about. There's not as much to share. And so I think that is a really interesting perspective to share because a lot of the people listening, a lot of the women listening, are business owners. And they'll often say, I've got nothing interesting to say because most of the time I'm operating my business. I actually think that's such a great thing to bring into your content. What are you learning from that? Bring the experience in. Because especially with AI, we're sick of all this just AI slop,

information. We love the story, the lived experience, the relationship. And so I'm curious with that how you think about personal branding now with AI, with, you know, there has never been more content, but I think there's never been as much mediocre content. I don't think we are still seeing really amazing content. I think there's a big disparity. There's people who are using AI to make their content so much better and to build the brand. Or I think there's a temptation to use AI and the content, your message, everything's getting diluted. Yeah. I think that, So I'll just tell you how I think about using AI for content, for one, which is like, I don't use AI to write my content. I use AI to edit and think about different perspectives with my content. So I will use like whisper flow, which is an AI tool, you know, that you can dump, you can speak to and it's very good at capturing your words. You might familiar. I use that for everything at work, emails to my husband text, like everything. And so I will brain dump everything into, say, Claude, right? And then I'm going to say, cool, now structure this like out. So it's written well. I'm making a YouTube video.

Here's the structure of my YouTube video. Put it into that structure. And then after that, then I'm like, okay, I read through. And then I'm like, hey, on story number two, do you think that this story is relatable for my audience? Do you think I should add a different angle? Hey, for this overall, this video, are there any blind spots or anything that I'm seeing where I'm going to lose the listener?

Like, I'm asking it very specific prompts rather than, like, write me a video on how to do X, Y, and Z. Because honestly, like, I don't, I like, I like using my brain. I do not like, want to atrophy that all. Also, maybe I'll fall behind, whatever, but like, I think it's really important that I, I reflect on what are my actual authentic experiences that only I can speak to and I actually have stories to support versus what AI tells me people are going to want to click on. And so, you know, even in making my content, I don't speak to points that I don't have stories

to back up. And so I think it, right now, at least, in my opinion, like there's so much, like, how to do something online. People know how. They can hear that. But people don't change their behavior because of you tell. telling them to do something. And this is actually something I've been writing my book,

which is like, if you want to change someone's behavior, the first thing you have to do is model it, which how do you model something online with content stories? And then you have to prompt them to do it. And then there's a whole other series of, you know, events have to occur. But prompt somebody is like you have to get them to try. So like two things I do in my content law is I'm telling stories. And then I'm asking them to reflect on a question and then giving them a very small step.

Because I'm like, how do I get them to take action based on this thing? Use a story and then give them a small step to take or question to ask them. themselves. I think what I'm seeing a lot of right now with AI is like, one, people are having it right for them and it's fucking terrible. I'm sorry, I don't know if I could swear on this podcast, but it's like, yeah, you can swear. It's friggin awful. It's disgusting. It's like, I'm like, dude, this is so lazy. It's so lazy. You might as well not make content because making content where AI writes for you is so much worse for your brand than just having not made it at all, in my opinion. I mean, the same goes for, by the way, in like my company. Like, someone will send me

a memo and they're like, oh, I made this memo for you. I'm like, this is AI slot. Like, please never send me something like this again. I'm horrified for you. And you're lucky that I'm empathetic because like please never do this again. Do not send something like this to the whole team. Everyone knows it's AI. Like we don't talk like this in real life. Like especially, I mean, there's just words that uses that we don't use. Signal noise. It's not loud. It's quiet. The constant. Quiet confidence. Just the position. Oh my God. It's so bad. And so I think you have to think of it like an editor where you must give it great prompts to edit, specific prompts, versus a writer.

It's not a writer for your content. It's an editor. I think that if given the right prompts, it can help you build content that can speak more clearly, more concisely, to your audience. But if you use it to come up with stuff for you, I just think you're going to look like everybody else.

And so what happens, at least what I feel, I don't like go on social media on my feed a lot. But if I do, I'm just like, oh my gosh, it's all the same. It's just people regurgitating the same content. And if you look at people who actually have a brand, well, I think that if you do that,

your brand becomes they use AISLLL. Or like, are they AI? I mean, like, people are even wondering if they're a real person at that point versus if you come up with the content yourself, you know, I think it's easy to stand out right now. So I feel like what's happening with social media is everything is just going to continue to go more and more raw because people are going to feel like everything's so curated, everything's so built by AI. And they're going to be craving that authentic human connection, which I think everyone's always wanted. But I think it just swung so far now with the AI, that it's like, God, we just want to hear someone to say some real fucking words. Like, I would just love to hear something that's not scripted by chat GPT, right?

Which is, by the way, the worst one to write for you. So it's so bad. I mean, what are you seeing? Yeah. Well, I was just going to reiterate that system you shared because I, this morning, I mean, I hold a little baby all day every day. It's rare that I even have two hands to myself right now. And so my process, just this morning, I was having Claude helped me write an email.

and I used Whisper Flow and I just sat there holding my baby and I spoke to Claude, hey, here's the angle that I'm feeling for my email. I'm feeling really behind right now and here's what's going on in my life. Here's why I'm feeling behind. And I saw this stat. Can you go research this stat for me? It was this. I want to get it fully accurate.

And I was just speaking to it like this and then it pulled something together based on the training that was probably 60% there. And it means I bank all of that when I've got a baby in my arms. And then when she's napping, I can pull all. of that up and I can take it from 60 to 100 very quickly. And I think I love that kind of workflow because you're taking out a lot of the clunky, time consuming pieces, but it's you going in and it's you coming out. So I'm really loving that. I don't know why anyone's still using chat to write because it's absolutely terrible. But what I am seeing is I've heard conversations of people saying,

oh, I don't know if it's even worth building a personal brand now. The landscape's going to change so much with AI. And I actually really disagree with that. I think there has never been a better time to have a personal brand because like you said, we're looking at some people online thinking, are you a real person? Are you even a human? And I think having a personal brand, firstly, you own distribution. And in this world where knowledge is available at your fingertips, any bit of knowledge you want, actually owning distribution is way more powerful, I think, and useful than just owning vaults and vaults of information. So I think about it like that.

And then I also think about, yeah, that gap, I think those that are using AI to help them write or produce even higher content and more of it, they are really going to succeed. But I think those that are using AI to just get their content out there for the sake of publish, I think it's deciding, do I even want to do this? Like if I'm not going to really learn a platform and I'm not going to learn how to do this, Maybe my time is spent somewhere, better spent somewhere else. I don't think there's anything wrong with that.

I don't think you have to be a thought leader. I don't think you have to be a brand. I don't think you have to create content. But I do think it's the decision of if you're not going to do this properly, let's do something else. I, a thousand percent agree with you. And I, like, viscerally disagree with people saying it's a bad time to start a personal brand. I mean, I speak to some of like the top of the top with AI in this country.

And they still, they in fact think that maybe the only thing that will matter is your personal brand. So I think it's actually quite the opposite. But the thing is, like, everyone just clings to whatever is the most convenient excuse. So, you know, it's like now before it was like, oh, my God, I don't have time to make content. Now it's like, oh, I have time. But it's irrelevant. His AI is coming. I think when people don't see what's going to happen in the future, the human brain tries to rationalize with apathy, which is like, oh, I might as well not bother.

I mean, that's like literally I've read that in many psychology books. Like, we go to apathy when we feel like we don't know what's going to happen next. And so we would like to rationalize why we aren't taking action. And I think a lot of people do that right now with AI. They're not even just doing with personal brands. They're doing it with, I hear it all time with business. Well, I don't even know if I should try and grow my business more lately because AI. And I'm like, dude, come on.

Like, yeah, let me be a loser because of AI. Like, that's really what it is. It's like, I would like you to tell me that I'm not a loser. It's the problem. And that's why I'm acting like a loser. And it's like, no, like you're scared. Humans are always scared. That's okay.

So I think with the personal brand thing, it's totally an excuse. We've got to pull our heads out of our booties and think about like the fact that in a world where building a product, building a service, all of these things, actually, I think those things become much easier to do. What's going to differentiate any of those things? I mean, if you look at, for example, like, let's just take Kylie Jenner, right? I mean, if you buy her makeup, it's like, okay, what's different between this and like a million of the other brands at Sephora? Like, not a lot. It's the brand. And that's been happening for a while. Now, as AI gets better and better, I actually believe that what's going to become easier and easier to do is build

products and build companies because we have so much more leverage now than we did. I mean, I even look at my work and how much more work I can get done with AI, it's just made me more of an efficient leader and being able to grow things faster, do more, take on more, think about more, I can get more time back because of it. And so then I think, okay, well, the hardest thing, the one thing you have left is your identity as a human. And the fact that you are a unique human, and if you get yourself out there in a way that showcases that, and you can own that distribution, then you can build whatever product or service you want using three people in an AI team

and you can outcompete because of your brand, not because of the product because it's going to become easier to build great products. So that's how I think about it, quite the opposite of where I think a lot of people go with it. They think brand's going to be the first thing to be taken over. I think building the actual guts of the business is the first thing that's going to be taken over.

I couldn't agree more. As I've come back from Matt leave, I've been in more of a season of like soaking things up and deciding, okay, where's my time going to be going to be going this year? and what I've been loving playing with different tools and just creating tools that's going to help me be more efficient at work and save me time. And there was, there's tools that I've put together that in the past, I'm not a techy person. Like, that's not how I would class myself. But in the past, if I wanted this thing built, I would have to contract an agency who have engineers and pull tens and tens of thousands of dollars and months of work into this.

And now I can do it in an afternoon. And so the product, I mean, yeah, great products. They take time. But the product hasn't been the hard part. Now I've been thinking about, okay, I really want to make sure I've got an audience if I want to sell this product. I need an audience to sell to. You know, Facebook ads are great. But if you have no brand behind them, it's not the same. And so I do think that investing in your personal brand is going to be a massive payoff as all of this takes off. Like you said, it's never been easier to do certain things. And so I feel very excited about it. And I think you can go two ways, right? You can be very fearful about what's going to happen. Or you can go the way of, yeah, you know, there are some scary elements of it. And if you immerse yourself in it and you allow yourself to learn and not shy away from it, then there's a lot less fear in that.

I think the fear comes from a lot of the avoidance and the what ifs. Whereas if you get into it and learn how to make it work with you, I think the fear goes away. At least I've found that. I agree 100%. I think a lot of people are looking at it like a threat when it's really like a challenge to learn how to use these things. I mean, you know, today I'll give you an example. Like we have a new division that we hired a CEO for and we have launched and we said we are going to completely build an AI sales team. So we're not going to, you know, I have a 30 person sales team here in this building for our advisory practice.

We're building it in our new division. We said we are going to just say we are not allowed to have a sales team. And so how do we do this with AI? and then I got a Texas morning. They said we got our first sale from AI. I have chills. Yeah. I mean, like from start to finish,

somebody paid multiple thousands of dollars based on an AI sales bot. And so, you know, the whole idea behind that, by the way, is that we, you know, in my company, I have myself, my husband and my president Sharon, we all together have 21 million followers across our brands. We were like, we just, at some point, there's so much scale of your brand that you actually,

it's very inefficient to have a human team because you can barely scale to keep up with the brand. So if you really can put a lot of power behind your brand, then the constraint becomes the inside, which has a lot, like, there's so much you can do now. And so I actually just think, like, if people were thinking about that, like, how do I build my brand to be so big

that because now we're able to automate and use AI to build so much of the back end of these businesses, it's crazy. And I think, you know, a year ago I might have said, like, oh, I don't think AI is going to be able to do a lot of these things and people are going to want a lot of human interaction. I actually think that people would like, to avoid a decent amount of human interaction if they don't have to talk to them. I mean, think about

how often you walk into a store and you want to buy a shirt and then you walk out because they won't stop bugging you. How often does that happen with somebody that's trying to sell your product? They're like, I just want to buy your product. I don't actually want to talk to you. Yeah. Let me look in peace. Yeah, exactly. Like, let me live my life. I actually don't need to have another conversation today. Yeah, I agree. I think so too. I think we're just craving efficiency in so many areas. And there's areas that I think great. Let's reserve that for human connection. And when we go to an event, we don't want to sit around a table with 30 robots. We want to be with humans.

But if I'm trying to make a sales decision, I know my mind. I know I'm kind of in or out. I've got a few questions. Let me get in there and do that. And I think there's absolutely nothing wrong with that. I'm curious. And it's a quest, you know. Yeah, it is.

But I got chills you sharing that because I think that's just, that's very, very interesting. And it's funny because even if you asked me three months ago, you know, could you imagine AI doing this or whatever that it's doing today? There's just no way. I know. It's crazy. And I think that the issue for a lot of people is that they are bad at using AI and therefore they judge the ability of AI by their input to it where it's like it's going to meet you where you're at. So it's like the worst your inputs, the worst the output shit in shit out. And so it's funny because some people like, oh, touch EBT is not even that good. I'm like, it's because you don't really know how to use it. I mean, like, ask it to teach you. Yeah, no, I completely agree. I had that example. I was sitting with my mum and law last week and she, when she was over here, we got all of her blood work done. And I said, hey, go put this in chat, Chi BT and have it analyzed for you. And so she screenshots her blood work. She puts it in. She said, and analyzed for me. And she got a choreograph or two back. And it was, you know, decent. And she was like, look, Natalie, I'm really healthy. And I was like, cool. Can I play with it a little bit? And I changed the prompt completely. I give it some context. I told it its role. I told it what to pull from and what I expected from. it and then we get a full like pages and pages report of detailed insights and it was the same

AI tool. It was just prompted a little bit differently. And so I think that's it. You need to know how to ask it. You need to know where to pull from. You still need to be learning. Say you're in marketing. You still need to be learning how to market. It cannot be a marketer for you, but it can help if you know how to prompt it. 100%. It increases the quality of your work if you know how to use it. But having it make the work for you is the harder part. Yeah. It will increase the quality if you use it right, especially like you said,

like it can be a research assistant. It can do this. It can help, you know, increase the perspectives that are taken to this email. Like, there's so many things it can do. It's just like, have you taken the time to learn it? A lot of people just are kind of lazy. Well, isn't that the big problem that we're all dressed on?

So I think a lot of people hearing this after we've talked about personal brand and thinking about personal branding or owning distribution as a bit of a moat in this industry are going to be sitting questions. well how? Where do I, where do I start with this? And I'm curious what advice you would give someone who's not looking to just dip their toe in. Maybe they've already been growing, you know, they've got a couple hundred thousand followers on a platform and they've done that very organically through sharing knowledge. They're already probably an expert in the area that they're in. If they are saying to themselves, you know what, this is the year that I am doubling down and I really want to grow this distribution

channel significantly. I'm curious what your advice would be there or where to start what to look at. Yeah. I mean, I'm a fan of doing more of what is working before you add in something new. So, you know, in any of my businesses, it's like, okay, we want to increase sales by 30%. Okay, well, then a lot of times people like, hey, so let's add a new channel. And I'm like, well, how many channels do we have? It's like, okay, we have three. Which one's the best one? This one. Why would we not just try and double that channel? And then it's like, okay, well, no, we could, but, you know, okay, we just thought we would add a new one. Because, like, our brains just worked that way.

They want to add things. And so, you know, a lot of people even just come into this building and they're like, I'm, you know, making a lot of content. How do I increase my distribution by making more content? I'm like, well, how much content are you making? It's like, okay, well, I'm posting twice a day. Well, have you tried posting four times? Or have you tried increasing your reach on each of your posts by double?

Like, either one of those, you're going to increase your distribution. And so we just have to figure out which one is the constraint. And so when I think about that, I think, okay, if I wanted to increase my distribution, I wanted to double it tomorrow. What's the first thing that isn't going to work? Why can't I do that? Why can't I double it today? And then often that's what leads you to the answer, which is like, well, I'm writing all of my emails. Well, I'm the one who does all the research on the platforms and I only have so much time. Or it's like, well, I'm already filming three days a week or four days a week and I have to run my business. I don't know how to. Okay, so then let's solve for that. And I think about it, like you have to put inventory before

the bottom back. Like you have to add capacity before you expect more outputs. Like what's the input? And so for me, as I've looked at scaling my brand, so I've been very methodical about is like, I am not going to add more onto my plate unless I get something else off. This is my limit. Like the amount of content I make right now is my limit. And so if I have these inputs, maybe I write emails, maybe I write a newsletter, maybe I film this many days a week. And now I'm like, I want to grow my reach. So I'm just going to do more of that. But you only have so much time. So the first question is, what I have to get rid of or delegate or use AI to get off my plate so that I can take on doing more, doing better, doing whatever that means to me. And then I would say, okay, now what can we do

more of that's already working really well with that time that you've gotten back? So often that looks like, you know, for a lot of people, I think they have the, they want more reach. But if you really want to keep growing a brand, I think that the hard part is like, I don't know anybody with a giant brand that doesn't have a team that's helping them, even with AI. Their team, use AI too. And my teams use plenty of AI. But as I said, like how I want my brand to grow, I've been like, okay, I have to grow my team. So my team has grown in probably direct correlation with my brand growth. Now, is that like I add a ton of people? No, it's like, you know, a handful of people on my team. But, you know, having those people there to think about what's going on to

use AI, to do all these things like that is something I think a lot of people I think are averse to. And it's not something you see often with people talking about. And I think that's because I think it's more natural for me because I started businesses, and you need people often, right? Maybe not soon, but like to do some things in the business right now, at least quality check AI.

And so I think about the same thing of brand is like what resources are needed for me to double what I'm doing. Is it a person? Is it an AI tool? Is a person who configures an AI tool? And so that's what I would ask is like, why are you not, if I told you to double tomorrow,

why would you not be able to? Let's fix that. And then let's do more of what is working. Like, for example, if YouTube is going really well, Well, let's do two videos a week instead of one video a week, or let's do six videos a month instead of four videos a month. Let's start with that before we venture onto the new platform, because that is going to take way more investment, way more time, way more brain space, and probably not provide an ROI immediately. So then it's like, oh, it's tough. When I think about expanding the brand, that's obviously got to be in the picture.

You have to try new platforms at some point. But if you haven't maximized the ones that you're on and you're already doing well on some of them, then why wouldn't you double down and just say, how do I get better or do more on these platforms, I'll ready that I'm on. And that's kind of what I think about. Like for me right now, you know, one thing that I've been talking to my team about is like, how do we learn how to package my business content that it does just as well as my, we call it wide TAM content, right? If I talk about discipline and confidence motivation, it'll get millions of views. If I talk about leadership and management, it's like, okay, it gets not that many. Well, how do we need to package my leadership content so it performs just as well as my wide content? And we've been working on that. We've actually

add a few winners. So it's like, am I going to do something new? No, I'm just going to try and get the quality of this content to match the quality of that content. So it gets just as much reach, but then grows my brand by consequence. So I would think a lot more about, especially if you're, you've got a couple hundred thousand followers and maybe you don't have a giant team, probably don't. Probably have a few people, maybe contractors. Like, how do we get more out of what we're doing rather than just do more? I agree with that so much. It actually reminds me of this specific time. This was maybe seven, eight years ago. And I was sitting at dinner with my husband. And I just hit 500K on Instagram. And I was sitting there celebrating. I've just hit 500K.

This is amazing. And he, I was expecting him to like, you know, be celebrating with me. And so I was like, I'm thinking about my plan to 600K. And he's like, I'm really happy through this is awesome. But what's it going to take to get to a million? And I remember being so mad in that moment. I almost walked out the restaurant. I was like, what do you mean? Get to a million. I'm at 500. Why are you so in the future? He's like, yeah. And I've seen you grow. But I'm seeing, you know, the way that you think about this, then you're thinking about a hundred at a time. I'm asking you to think about what you would do to double it because it's probably very different to what you would do to add 100K. It's very, very different. So he's like, let's play.

Let's try this on. Tell me what you do differently. And I remember being so defensive and combative and then started to really realize actually that's exactly how I need to be thinking. And within just a couple of years, we exceeded three million. I remember it happening so fast. But it was that shift. It was instead of thinking in those little incremental, how can I just do a little bit more to push it to here, okay, this is work, how do I step back, take what I've learned and really maximize that growth and output. I think that's a huge game changer with content, yes, but you know, as a premise in your business, thinking about doubling down on what's working and a lot of the time, you're cutting so much of the stuff out to really drive that growth. So I love that.

I absolutely love that. Thank you for sharing it. Yeah, I love you asked you that. He loves, I love that he loves to push me, but partners like that, and I do the same thing to him. It's so annoying in the moment. And then you step back and you're like, thank God you're willing to talk to me like that. Yeah, I know. I guess. So my final question to you, and I'm kind of putting you on the spot with this one. And I know we talked about the Claude workflow, which I love. So maybe the answer is that. But is there a specific workflow in your business in content or marketing that's really worked for you and that something in the company, it's really saving you time or it's driving more. I'm just very curious. One thing I really want to double down on is sharing with listeners, systems they can implement for success. And I think often when we're scaling, we are generally

systems away from doing that. We need to learn how to systemize what we're doing. So I'm just curious if anything comes to mind when I ask you that. Yeah. I think there's one thing that specifically does, which is I really wanted to add a newsletter six months ago to, I felt like I didn't have enough written word out there. And then as I researched like, what does it take to make a good newsletter, etc, et cetera, et cetera. I'm like, oh my gosh, like now I have to add in and I have to write

this many newsletters a month. And then my team's educating me on this and I'm like, I just don't have time to write that as well. Like I don't want to commit to more right now. I don't think that's smart for me. And so then I asked myself, well, how could I use something

that I'm already writing? What do I already write every week that people would want to read? And I realized, I was like, oh, I write messages to my team every week to my leadership and management team. And I was like, what if I just take that? And I just, the value proposition

of my newsletter is you just get the unfiltered memos that I send my team every week. And it was so well received and it continues to grow like week over week, month over month, like really, really well and healthily. And I think it's because it's just like, one, it takes zero effort for me. I have changed nothing about my life, not a single thing besides the fact that I look at the newsletter stats every week. But it's now something that was valuable for my team that I can now take and make it valuable for my customers. And it's not just valuable because of what I'm saying. it's valuable because they see how I talk to my team. So it's like a lesson with a meta lesson,

which is like, I'm sharing just raw unfiltered content. I just black out people's names and stuff. And at the same time, they're also getting the lesson in the content. And so I was like, wow, I took something that was going to be a lot more work that people like, people like this is going to take you a few hours a week. And then I found a way to do it where it's less work. And I actually think it's more valuable for people because they get to actually see how I speak to people at the same time.

And I think if more people did that with their content, like, just share. Like, people like, oh, I'm going to teach you how to do this. Like, just show them. It's like maybe you teach a team. this is how you do a team huddle. It's like, what if you just live streamed your team huddle every week? You know? I just think about like that. Like it's, I call it like a double dip. It's like how to get double dip out of everything you do. And that one felt like a win for me because I really like having a newsletter and I didn't want to add more to my list. I love that so much. I think that's so smart.

And I think it goes back to the exact way you start at this conversation that you're not thinking about your brand as being completely separate in this thing that you do. It is who you are. It is what you're doing. And I think that's such a massive reason your brand's so successful because it is what you're doing. It is authentic. It is an extension of you. I love that. Thank you for sharing. And thanks for being so open to sharing all of your content processes and how you think about it. I really appreciate it. With this newsletter, where can everyone go sign up? I already get it and I absolutely love it. I guess so much value out of it when you send it. Oh, thanks. Yeah, you can go to, I think it's, oh my God, I'm like, what's the URL? You go to my Instagram. Lela Hormosey newsletter. Lela Hormosy newsletters.

Layla's letters, Google it. Yeah, I'm such a terrible at that. Yeah, but there's a CTA and there's somewhere. Amazing. I'll find the link and I'll put it in the show notes for everyone listening. Layla, thank you so much. This was incredible. I love, love following your journey on social on all of your platforms. You're incredible and I really appreciate how authentic you are and the message you put out there, especially for women. I think it's really amazing. So just thank you for taking the time to do this. Thanks, Natalie. I appreciate you. And thanks for having me on. Anytime.