Personal Brand = Personal Power
You don't need to be "known" — you need to be clear about who you are.
At 57, I found myself staring at a blank computer screen, cursor blinking mockingly at me. I had just made one of the biggest decisions of my life – to launch You Are Not Invisible After 50 – yet I felt completely invisible myself. Who was I to speak about women's visibility when I'd spent years feeling professionally unseen? Who was I to talk about reinvention when I was still figuring out my own next chapter?
That moment of raw uncertainty became my greatest teacher. It taught me that personal branding isn't about having all the answers or projecting perfection. It's about having the courage to be authentically, unapologetically yourself – especially when that self is still evolving.
Four years later, at 61, I understand something profound: your personal brand isn't what you want people to think about you. It's the truth of who you are, lived out loud, with all the messiness and wisdom that comes from decades of real experience.
The Myth of the Perfect Brand Story
We've been sold a lie about personal branding. Scroll through LinkedIn and you'll see endless stories of seamless career progression, strategic pivots, and carefully curated success narratives. But here's what I've learned from speaking with hundreds of women over 50: our most powerful brand stories aren't the polished ones. They're the honest ones.
A study from DDI found that when leaders regularly display vulnerability, even without specifically acknowledging failures, are 5.3 times more likely to be trusted by their employees. When we try to present ourselves as having it all figured out, we create distance. When we share our authentic journey – including the detours, setbacks, and moments of doubt – we create connection.
I think about my own path. A mediocre university. A corporate career that included both multi-million-pound project successes and spectacular failures that taught me more than any MBA could. A divorce that shattered my sense of security but ultimately led to discovering my own strength. These aren't Instagram-worthy highlight reels, but they're the experiences that shaped my perspective and gave me something genuine to offer others.
The study from DDI also showed that when leaders acknowledge their failures or shortcomings, they are 7.5 times more likely to maintain trust from their employees than those who don't. For women over 50, this is liberating news. We don't need to pretend we've had linear career paths or that we've never questioned our decisions. Our complexity is our strength.
Why Authenticity Hits Different After 50
There's something that happens around 50 that researchers are just beginning to understand. Dr. Laura Carstensen's work at Stanford reveals that we enter what's called the "socioemotional selectivity" phase – we become incredibly skilled at cutting through noise and focusing on what genuinely matters.
This shift fundamentally changes how we approach personal branding. While younger professionals might craft brands around aspiration or potential, we have the luxury of building on proof. We've weathered recessions, navigated career changes, raised families, survived loss, overcome setbacks that would crush someone half our age. Our brands aren't about promising what we might do – they're about demonstrating what we've already survived and learned.
When I started YANIA50, I found myself thinking about what brought me to that position – both personally and professionally. I thought about the economic downturns I’ve weathered and the uncertainty of finding contract positions, raising my two children almost single-handedly, delivering vital projects on time and under budget and equally dealing with toxic corporate politics, feeling abandoned by family and so much more.
That's when it hit me: my brand wasn't about being the youngest or the most cutting-edge. It was about being the person who'd seen it all, learned from it, and could help others navigate similar challenges with hard-won wisdom.
The Science of Second-Act Success
The research on what happens to our brains after 50 is fascinating and liberating. Neuroscientist Dr. Patricia Reuter-Lorenz has found that mature brains engage both hemispheres simultaneously for complex tasks, while younger brains typically use just one. This research suggests that older adults’ brains are highly adaptable and can build alternative neural circuits (scaffolding) to compensate for age-related declines.
What does this mean for personal branding? It means our brands can be inherently more sophisticated and nuanced than those built on single-focus expertise. A 30-year-old consultant has knowledge. A 55-year-old consultant has knowledge plus pattern recognition plus the emotional intelligence that comes from having been wrong enough times to develop real humility.
Dr. David Galenson's research on creativity and age reveals something even more encouraging. He identifies two types of innovation: "conceptual" (which peaks early) and "experimental" (which often peaks later). Experimental innovators build on accumulated knowledge and experience to create their most impactful work after 50. Think Grandma Moses, who didn't start painting until 78, or Laura Ingalls Wilder, who wrote her first Little House book at 65.
This research suggests that for many of us, our 50s and beyond aren't about decline – they're about entering our most creative and impactful phase. Our personal brands at this stage aren't just about leveraging what we've learned; they're about stepping into our most innovative period.
The Power of Lived Experience
When I launched You Are Not Invisible After 50, I wasn't trying to compete with career coaches half my age or motivation speakers with perfect Instagram feeds. I was speaking from the specific experience of being a woman who'd felt professionally invisible despite having decades of expertise, who'd questioned her relevance in a youth-obsessed culture, who'd had to rebuild her sense of identity in her sixth decade.
That specificity became my strength. Instead of trying to be everything to everyone, I could focus on the exact intersection of challenges I understood deeply: women, over 50, navigating professional and personal transitions
Research shows that the most successful personal brands are built on "authentic differentiation" – the unique combination of experiences, perspectives, and expertise that only you possess. For women over 50, this combination is inherently richer and more complex than it could be at any earlier life stage.
Consider what you bring to any conversation: You've lived through technological revolutions, cultural shifts, economic cycles. You've managed through crisis, celebrated through success, learned from failure. You've mentored others, been mentored yourself, and developed the kind of emotional intelligence that can only come from decades of human interaction.
This isn't just experience – it's wisdom. And wisdom is exactly what a rapidly changing world desperately needs.
Beyond LinkedIn: Where Real Influence Lives
The mistake I see too many women over 50 make is thinking personal branding happens primarily online. While digital presence matters, our real competitive advantage lies in the depth and quality of our real-world relationships.
Research from Harvard's Grant Study, the longest-running study on human happiness, consistently shows that the quality of our relationships is the single biggest predictor of life satisfaction and professional success. At 50+, we've had time to build these deep, trusting relationships in a way that younger professionals simply haven't.
Your personal brand at this stage isn't just about what you know – it's about who knows you, who trusts you, and who's willing to vouch for your expertise based on actual shared experience. This kind of social capital can't be manufactured overnight or boosted by algorithms. It's earned through consistency, integrity, and genuine care for others over time.
The Clarity Advantage
One of the unexpected gifts of reaching this stage of life is clarity about what matters. Research conducted by Nathaniel S Eckland and Howard Berenbaum shows that older adults demonstrate significantly higher levels of "emotional clarity" – the ability to
This clarity transforms how we approach personal branding. Instead of trying to chase every trend or opportunity, we can afford to be specific about who we serve and how we serve them. Instead of building a brand around what we think people want to hear, we can build it around what we genuinely believe and have proven through experience.
When I created my personal brand, I made a conscious decision to focus specifically on women over 50 and to dismantle the societal stigma that we are invisible. Not all women, not all people over 50, but the specific intersection I understood intimately. This felt risky – wouldn't I be limiting my audience? But specificity became the key to everything that followed. When you try to speak to everyone, you connect with no one. When you speak to a specific group with genuine understanding, you create real impact.
Building Your Authentic Brand
So how do you actually build a personal brand that reflects your authentic self while positioning you for what's next? Based on my own journey and conversations with dozens of women navigating similar transitions, here's what I've learned works:
Start with your story, not your strategy. What's the thread that connects your various experiences? What themes emerge when you look back over your career and life? Your brand story isn't about creating a perfect narrative – it's about finding the authentic through-line that explains how you got to where you are.
Identify your earned expertise. What problems do people actually come to you for? Not what your job description says you do, but what colleagues, friends, and family consistently seek your advice about. This real-world validation is worth more than any credential.
Embrace your perspective. You've lived through changes that younger professionals have only read about. You've seen trends cycle, watched "revolutionary" ideas prove themselves or fail. This perspective isn't something to apologise for – it's your primary differentiator.
Build from relationships, not algorithms. While online presence matters, your real competitive advantage lies in the depth of your professional network. Who already knows and trusts your work? Start there.
Focus on contribution, not recognition. The most powerful personal brands are built around genuine value creation. What do you want to contribute based on what you've learned? How can your experience serve others facing similar challenges?
The Long View
Personal branding after 50 isn't about quick wins or viral moments. It's about sustainable influence built on genuine expertise and authentic relationships. It's about recognising that you've spent decades becoming exactly who you are – and that person has something valuable to offer.
The research supports what many of us feel intuitively: this isn't a time for reinvention. It's a time for recognition, clarity, and powerful contribution. Your personal brand isn't about becoming someone new – it's about becoming fully, unapologetically yourself, with the volume turned up and the static cleared away.
At 57, when I started this journey, I thought I might be too late to build something meaningful. What I've learned since then is that I was actually right on time. The experience, perspective, and clarity that come with this stage of life aren't obstacles to overcome – they're the very foundation of a personal brand that can create real impact.
But as I sit here at 61, I'm more confident in my identity than I've ever been. Not because I have all the answers, but because I'm comfortable with the questions. Not because I've had a perfect career or a perfect life, but because I've learned from an imperfect one. Not because I'm trying to be someone else, but because I'm finally comfortable being fully myself.
The world needs what you've learned. The question isn't whether you're qualified to share it – you've been qualifying for decades. The question is whether you're ready to own it completely, messiness and all.
Because here's what I know for certain: your most powerful story isn't the one you think people want to hear. It's the one only you can tell.