Closing the Authority Gap in the AI Era

If your content is consistent but your opportunities are not, you might be dealing with a problem most leaders cannot name: the authority gap. I define it as the distance between looking visible online and being genuinely trusted by the people who can hire you, fund you, or partner with you. After 30 years in healthcare technology and now building an AI-powered business accelerator for underserved entrepreneurs, I keep seeing the same pattern: brilliant experts and founders with real solutions still get overlooked because the market cannot quickly recognize their authority signals. 

AI is accelerating that pain. Tools can produce polished marketing in seconds, which means the internet is filling up with generic ideas and copycat expertise. Buyers are responding with tougher reputation due diligence: they search your name, scan your LinkedIn, review podcast appearances, and look for proof that holds up. Trust is becoming the scarce resource, and digital discoverability is now inseparable from leadership reputation, personal branding, and business brand growth. 

I break down my Brave Authority Index, a practical authority-building framework built on five connected pillars: Boldness, Resilience, Authenticity, Vision, and Execution. You will hear how to sharpen a specific market position, build durable credibility across platforms, show real human coherence without oversharing, publish future-facing ideas your audience can use, and create follow-up systems that turn visibility into revenue. I also walk through a case study where a B2B firm moves from commodity IT vendor to inbound demand by connecting thought leadership to clear next steps and measurable pipeline. 

If you want to stop sounding like everyone else and start getting believed, subscribe, share this with a friend who is “visible but stuck,” and leave a review so more leaders can find it.

Thanks for tuning in to this episode of Follow The Brand! We hope you enjoyed learning about the latest trends and strategies in Personal Branding, Business and Career Development, Financial Empowerment, Technology Innovation, and Executive Presence. To keep up with the latest insights and updates, visit 5starbdm.com
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And don’t miss Grant McGaugh’s new book, First Light — a powerful guide to igniting your purpose and building a BRAVE brand that stands out in a changing world. - https://5starbdm.com/brave-masterclass/

See you next time on Follow The Brand!

Transcript

Welcome And The Authority Gap

SPEAKER_00 0:02

Welcome back to the Follow Brand Podcast. I am Grant McGall, your host for the last five years. Yes, we have celebrated our fifth year, which starts June 1st, 2026. That's 262 episodes, I believe, of the Follow Brand Podcast consistently over that period of time. And today we're going to talk about something that's been haunting me for probably the last three decades, if you can believe that. And it's finally, I've given it a name. And I'm going to call it the authority get. So stay with me because this might change how you think about your career, your business, and how your entire visibility strategy is showing up. Very, very important. So I want to start with the story because this framework I'm about to introduce to you, the Brave Authority Index, it didn't come from a consultant's whiteboard. It came from real frustration that I had, real observation by watching other people and we're real moments where I watched brilliant people get completely overlooked time and time again. So let me paint this picture for you. I spent 30 years in healthcare technology. 30 years I've been in hospital systems, I've been in boardrooms, I've been in corporate boardrooms, I've been in enterprise systems. Over that period of time, whether they were healthcare startups, executive boardrooms, or the C-suite conversation about now, which is AI implementation, digital transformation, clinical integration, you name it. I have been in those discussions. And over those three decades, I have noticed something that kept happening over and over and over again. I would watch a brilliant health system CIO, someone with 20, 20, 30, 35 years of expertise, known knowledge, very deep knowledge, real solutions, and they would struggle to get recognized in their own industry. Not because their solutions weren't good. They were exceptional, but because the market didn't have a way to discover them, didn't have a way to see their authority. They had expertise, they didn't have authority signals. Let's let that sink in. Authority signals. Very, very important. And then recently I relocated from Miami to Omaha, Nebraska, about last year. I think it was in March of 2025. And I started building something different. An AI-powered business accelerator for entrepreneurs in North and South Omaha to start. Underserved communities, black founders, Latino founders, people with real solutions to real problems. And this is what I discovered, which is the exact same pattern. I'd meet a black founder in North Omaha, brilliant business model, real market fit, solutions that could transfer house, transform how small business owners compete. But they didn't have the trust signals that investors, that partners and customers knew how to recognize. They had access to AI tools, but they didn't have authority infrastructure. And I started seeing this everywhere. It's not just a personal branding problem, it is an economic development problem. It is a trust infrastructure problem at its core. So I built a framework, and that's what I call the Brave Authority Index. And it's been tested in the field with real entrepreneurs, real businesses with real outcomes. So this isn't theory, this is what's actually happening right now in what I call the SMB market.

AI Makes Visibility Cheap

SPEAKER_00 4:28

All right. Why this matters so so much. Here's what has changed probably in the last 12 to 18 months. And I need you to fully hear what I'm saying about this. Artificial intelligence has made visibility cheap and expensive, if you will. And I mean that literally. The cost of content creation has dropped to near zero. So you can use Chat GPT, Gemini, what have you, gather other tools that can produce newsletters, videos, social posts, landing pages, email campaigns, sales scripts, all within minutes, hours, or even seconds. Right? What used to require a full creative team, one person can now do in an afternoon. And that is very, very powerful, right? It democratizes marketing at its core. If you have small businesses, independent experts, underserved entrepreneurs can now have access to these types of capabilities that used to be reserved for just enterprise organizations. But here is the problem. It also creates a flood of sameness, right? Everybody sounds the same. The market is completely saturated and absolutely saturated with a lot of unpolished or polished information, but completely generic in what its content is actually saying. So everyone looks the same, everyone sounds the same, and everyone is posting the same insights. And buyers are learning. Very important to understand this buyers are learning to distrust surface level expertise. Audience are becoming more selective. Search is shifting from lists of links to AI-generated answers. Check out Google these days, right? And business development is shifting from cold outreach to trust-based relevance. Relevance is very important. And here's the real shift: leadership reputation is becoming inseparable from digital discoverability, right? So look at do you have a gap between your leadership reputation and what you can find out about yourself in a digital discovery? Search and social. What is it really saying about you or not saying about you? So the question is no longer can this person be seen, the question is, can this person be believed? Authenticity is king right now. And that's where the authority gap comes in. The authority gap is the distance between how visible someone appears and how trusted they actually are, right? And I'll give you an example of what I'm talking about. Let's say you are a healthcare executive and you're active on LinkedIn and you post twice a week and you've got a decent following, and you show up at conferences, so you're visible, right? But if you ask your audience, what does this person stand for? What problem do they solve? And why should you trust them? And the answer right now is unclear. If your audience can't answer those questions about you immediately, that is your authority gap. You're visible, but you're not trusted. And in an AI saturated market, that gap is where you lose opportunity, you lose revenue, you lose that upward mobility, right? So

Introducing The Brave Authority Index

SPEAKER_00 8:36

let's talk about the five dimensions of authority. So I built a framework to close that particular gap I just described. And it's called Brave. That is the Brave Framework. In my book here, First Light.

unknown 8:55

Right?

SPEAKER_00 8:55

The Brave Patch to Authentic Leadership. This is a narrative, but it teaches very, very valuable lessons, right? Because Brave is an acronym, not because it's complicated, it's simple, but it's also very comprehensive. Brave stands for five dimensions of market authority that is B for boldness, R for resilience, A for authenticity, V for vision, and E for execution. And here's the thing about these five pillars that they work all together. So the word brave, courage, courageousness, right? You don't score high on boldness and low on execution and expect to convert visibility into opportunity because they are integrated.

Boldness That Creates Memorability

SPEAKER_00 9:49

So let's break each one of these down, right? So let's talk about boldness, right? Boldness is the clarity, conviction, and courage of your market position. How are you positioning your market? Here's what boldness is not. I want you to take note of that. This is what boldness is not. It's not recklessness and it's not arrogance, and it's not, it's, I would say it is being more specific. Let's put it there. It's specificity, right? A healthcare executive known for digital transformation is generic, right? And that could be anybody, but a healthcare executive known for helping health systems close the gap between AI potential and clinical adoption reality, that's bold. That's specific. Boldness creates memorability, so makes you memorable, right? It attracts the right audience and it repels the wrong one, which is actually a feature, not a bug. It's what you want to be able to do when you're bold about who you serve, and what the problem is that you solve the people aren't your audience, right? The people who are not supposed to be there, they automatically will self-select out. It's exactly what you want. That's fine, because you're not trying to sell to everyone, you're trying to build authority with your within your specific market, right? So I want you to be able to answer some of these diagnostic questions around boldness. Can your audience explain what you stand for in one sense? Do you have a distinct market position? Or are you competing as a generalist? Is your point of view, your POV, strong enough to attract the right audience and repel the wrong one? And does your content sound like you? Or could it belong to anyone else in your field? If you can answer these questions clearly, you've got boldness. Be honest with yourself. This is an exercise that you look in your own mirror and determine if you have these values. Boldness is clarity. Next

Resilience Beyond Any Platform

SPEAKER_00 12:29

is resilience. This is around the reputation that survives when you're not even in the room. Resilience is the strength and durability that your reference your reputation across time, across platforms, market shifts, and moments of pressure. Resilience is not dependent on any one platform. It's not dependent on any one algorithm. It's not dependent on any one viral post. A resilient authority brand has depth. It has multiple platforms and it has consistent publishing history. It has third-party validation, it has case studies, it has testimonials, it has media mentions, it has speaking engagements. When you build resilience, your reputation holds up when someone conducts independent research. It survives algorithm changes, it survives market shifts. So I'll give you a real-world example. And I've been in healthcare technology for 30 years. That's resilience. I've got a thinkers 360 recognition as an expert. That's third-party validation, that's resilience. I published a book, which I just showed you, First Light. That's evergreen proof. I host a podcast with now over 260 episodes. That's consistent evidence about leadership over time. That's resilience. So let's ask some questions around that, you know, the diagnostic questions. Is your authority, and I want you to ask these questions to yourself as you look at your own business or your own career, is your authority dependent on one platform or one algorithm? Does your reputation hold up when buyers conduct independent research? And that will happen. Anytime you're going to get a grant or apply for a grant, if you're looking to get a capital raise, they're going to do due diligence, any kind of partnership arrangement. You've got to make sure that your reputation is going to hold up under that independent research. And do you have a record of adapting to major market shifts? What does that really look like? Are you just linear in your approach? And can your brand withstand scrutiny from very sophisticated buyers, somebody that actually wants to acquire your business? What does that really look like from that other lens? Very, very important.

Authenticity Without Oversharing

SPEAKER_00 15:20

So that's going to lead into authenticity, which is is your voice or your brand voice aligned with reality? Then you've got to do your own measurement, right? So authenticity is the alignment between what you say and then what you have lived, what you deliver, and how the market experiences you. Authenticity doesn't mean oversharing, it doesn't mean posting your entire life on LinkedIn. It means coherence, your story, your expertise, your values, your offers, your voice, and your proof must align. And I can tell you about a lot about technology transformation because I've actually spent 30 years in technology. So I've seen this change over a large bandwidth of time. And AI is no no different, even though it is a platform shift, it's moving from the internet age of what I call information technology into the intelligent technology phase as a platform. And that is why this is so important. Look how dependent right now you are in the internet. The internet is cut off. What happens? And this is happening now within the AI world. If you don't have uh access to these tools and all of a sudden you couldn't use them anymore, what does that really look like? Or what it will look like, because all of these different systems that we're using every day, from enterprise business to government to public-private sector to the small business world, is going to be utilizing artificial intelligence. So I can talk about AI implementation for Main Street America because I've relocated here and built an accelerator for underserved entrepreneurs right here locally. And I can talk about personal branding in the AI era because I've lived enough through the entire evolution of visibility and trust dynamics. I got involved in what we call social selling in the digital realm in 2014. This is 2026. I have a 12-year history in this type of work. Not something I just started doing two, three, or even four years ago. That is coherence and that is authenticity. In an AI saturated world, audiences learn to get tech empty polis. They can feel when someone is performative and they know when someone is just repeating what they read online. Authenticity is the antidote to that. It's when your audience can feel a real human behind your content. So we're going to ask those same type of questions. I want you to ask us about your own brand, your own presence. What are you saying about yourself? And is there a gap between what you see online and what you live every day? Does your brand reflect your lived experience and actual expertise? Can people feel a real human behind your particular content? And are your claims backed by examples, verifiable examples, stories, and revenues? And are your values visible in your business model and client delivery?

Vision That Gives People Language

SPEAKER_00 18:56

And as we move from that boldness, right, that resilience, that authenticity, now we're going to open up our vision. We can start seeing the future and start looking at what's relevant and what's important. Vision is the ability to interpret where the market is going and where we can help others to prepare for it. I am in the unique position to be able to mentor my own self five years ago. What was I doing in 2021? What was I doing in COVID, pre-COVID, right after COVID? And where am I doing now? And that five-year body of work, that's the follow-up podcast of itself. It's 260 episodes of me interviewing professionals throughout the world. I didn't just go out and say, hey, I'm the number one personal brand expert by FeedSpot because I just said that. That's because they've done the due diligence and looked at uh my particular statistics, and then they came to that determination themselves. Thinkers 360 did the same thing. Like, wow, this guy's very consistent. He's very relevant. He knows what he's talking about. We're gonna we will give him an expert status. Elite expert is what they gave me in Thinkers 360, also at that number one level. I love that, but I earned that because I am doing the hard work. Authority leaders don't only explain the present, they help the market also see the future. And they give the audience language for a future they can feel, but also they may not understand it, right? Where we are right now. So in 2026, AI is changing how work is structured, how buyers make decisions, how brands are discovered, and how trust is evaluated. I want you to understand this. Our quality of work, our day-to-day activity, especially most of us now, are what we call digital workers. So if that digital world changes, ultimately our whole platform changes. What does it change into is very, very important to understand it. It's not about, oh, I don't like AI, I'm not gonna use it. Well, you may not, you may not like Microsoft, but I guarantee a lot of people use it. You may not be a lover of Google, and I guarantee you a lot of people use it. You may not like Uber, but guess what? A lot of people use it. A lot of people will be using AI. It will be all around us if it's not already is and become ubiquitous to what we do on a daily basis. Very, very important. So if you are a leader, a business owner, an entrepreneur, you can feel something shifting and changing. You know that AI is going to change your industry. But you might not have the language for it yet, and you might not know how to prepare for this new reality. So a visionary leader will give you that language, that framework, that roadmap, and that's vision, right? So we ask ourselves these questions again. Are you interpreting the market change or are you only reacting to it? Do you have a clear view of how AI will affect your audience's future, your business future, your company's future, the market that you're in? What does that feature look like? And are you giving people language, frameworks, and decisions that they can use? Can your audience associate you with a future-facing idea? Right. And that then will lead into execution, your activity, your ability.

Execution That Converts Authority

SPEAKER_00 22:43

You're bringing it all to the table now, right? You're executing on what you're doing. The authority pipeline is now built. And this is where most leaders, right now that I can tell, they fall short in the execution phase. This is the implementation phase. This is where the rubber meets the road. How are you showing up on the field? What does that really look like? Execution is the discipline of converting authority into action. I'll say that again. Execution is the discipline of converting authority into action, into relationships, into revenue, into partnerships, and measurable outcomes. Many leaders have insight. Many leaders have great content. Many leaders are invisible. Very important. Execution is where the brand becomes a business engine. You've got a LinkedIn post that resonates. Wonderful. But does every episode have a call to action? Are you measuring how that visibility converts into opportunities? Execution means consistent publishing cadence. It's a clear offer architecture, a CRM. That is a customer relationship management tool, a CRM or relationship management process, a lead magnet or conversion asset, speaking in webinar strategies, case studies and proof assets, or measuring your pipeline contribution and repeatable follow-up system. And here's the thing execution is where the magic truly happens because visibility without execution is what I call wasted effort. Authority without follow-up leaves money on the table. Authority without follow-up leaves money on the table. So we also have to ask ourselves the hard question. Does your visibility create measurable business opportunities? Is your content connected to a clear offer for a next step? Do you have a system for turning conversations into pipelines? And can you measure how authority contributes to revenue, partnerships, or influence? So those

Scoring The Framework On Myself

SPEAKER_00 25:44

are what I call the five pillars. That's brave, right? Because if you can do all these things I'm talking about, you're running, right? You're making strides, you're making ways, you're making it happen. You have boldness, you have resilience, you have authenticity, you have vision, and you have execution, no matter what the challenge in front of you may be. And I'll share with you one other key insight to that. They all have to work together. You cannot be brave and be missing any one of those pieces, right? You're not trying to get 100 on just one of those pillars. You're trying to get balanced excellence across all five of these, right? Person told me a long time ago, it was so important. So you may have a cell phone. Yeah, I got a cell phone. Right? And you got 10 digits on that cell phone. Like, yep, I got zero through nine on my phone. He said, but can you call me up? You cannot dial my number or to get a hold of me or communicate with me, let you have my exact digits. The brave framework is the exact visit you need to dial up the result that you're looking to achieve. That is what I'm trying to tell you. And I'll be honest with you, I took a look at it even myself. What did I look like across these pillars, right? And I didn't just build a framework and ask someone else to just use it. I use it on myself. This is how I do business, right? So even with my own score, looking at this as 100, 20 out of 20 for all five pillars, I came out to about a score of about 88. That's what I self-graded myself at, right? Well puts me, I call myself in the category authority, right? Range, about kind of where I'm at. Meaning I shape market, I shape market conversations and I generate trust before the sale. And I'm converting reputation into measurable growth. But here's what gets interesting. I'm not 100 out of 100. I'm about 19 on boldness. You know, I what I would call my AI implementation for main street America as a category phrase. That is bold. Technology plus personal branding is a distinctive combination that I have. But there's probably room to sharpen it even further, maybe into my verticals of healthcare and my personal branding, and also my investment banking world. What does that look like, right? Resilience, I'm scoring about an 18 out of 20. What does that mean? That's 30 years in technology, right? Technology applications for enterprise business. And then the thinkers 360 recognition that I have in the in the Hems world, HEMS is the Health Informatic System Society, which is a large organization for healthcare technology. I am a fellow, right? This is my resilience. I have my podcast, I have my book, I have multiple platforms that I'm visible on. I have multiple proof points. But honestly, I could probably deepen my thought leadership publication strategy a little deeper to get more. There's always a plus element. There's always something more you can do once you realize how you can move the needle. And then authenticity, that's 17 out of 20. Now, to a lot of people, about my father's story, you know, his death from a preventable healthcare system failure that drove everything that I do even today. I don't want anyone to have to go through that. Those are things that are fixable if we take the time to do that. It's visible in my work. Now, Omaha is my mission that is visible right now. My voice is getting stronger in that world as far as what I do because they see value in what I can bring to the table. But I could probably do a little bit more in some of that of my publishing and then become more vulnerable in that world and to say what it needs to be said, because a lot of people have had some trauma, some drama in their lives that are kind of independently driving them, subconsciously driving them. And they need to be more authentic and take ownership of that and try to turn that pain into something more profitable for themselves, right? Then we work into vision, which is 18 out of 20, according to my particular uh scoring. And that's the Brave Authority Index itself, my flagship asset, especially here in 2026. And I'm interpreting how AI is changing the authority and trust dynamics. I'm positioning myself as the guide, not a participant. But I could probably be more explicit about the longer-term implications around it. What would that look like over time? Six months, 12 months, 18 months, three years. And it's hard to tell because of all the changing dynamics in our own world. But we got to keep the ship going toward the goal. And that's how we execute. Right now, I'm scoring, I count, I give myself a 16 out of 20. This is the field I need to even be better at in the execution phase. But my thought leadership is pretty strong. My assessment, I call it, is launching, and my follow-up systems are scaling, but I think I need to be better with my CRM, which is customer relation management tooling. It can be a little bit more sophisticated than I have. And my, I say my sequences could be more automated. And this is a gen tick AI. A lot of people are starting to in the back end. You know, that's what I'm doing to grow five-star BDM on a national and international basis. So I gave myself an 88, and that number matters because it's not 100. So you have to be honest in your scoring and what that really looks like. Because I learned that by taking this kind of assessment myself, that perfection is not really the goal. The intentionality, how intentional are you, is really very important. So you may be an 88. I would say you're doing well. And I would say you're probably top tier if you're at that 88 stair. But you're also acknowledging that there's room to go grow. And I feel that's an honest conversation we need to have about authority. We don't need to be perfect, we need to be intentional. If you want to write that down, you must be intentional.

Case Study From Commodity To Inbound

SPEAKER_00 32:22

So one of the case studies that I've worked with to really give me some context, because I want you to show how this works in practice. There was a company that I worked with a few years ago, and they did a lot in the software development uh field, and they had a problem. They were positioned as a commodity IT vendor, right? Very generic. And they look like probably 50 other tech firms that are out there, maybe probably even more. They were competing on price because pricing has dropped like a run in software engineering, software development with the development of AI. And people can vibe code, they can do code, especially now with Cloud out here now and some other applications. Like that's driving the market down, right? So, what are you gonna do? So they were making cold calls at that time, and they had some steady business, but they were not growing. It was kind of like neutral, right? And more importantly, they weren't being recognized for their deeper expertise, they just weren't creating software to collect software. They did have software provisions that were they, I would say was a key differentiator for themselves. You have to have a differentiation and be able to communicate that differentiation at scale. So they knew they had something I would say was special for what they did, but the market, their messaging, didn't see it. All they saw was commoditized software engineering firm, right? So they had to change that. So we took them through the Brave framework, right? So first, instead of positioning them as IT consultant, they we repositioned them as an AI-powered business transformation for, I would say, in health systems navigating the clinical integration challenge. So it got a little bit more specific than just IT consultant. What exactly are you consulting on? I see that even in the coaching world. What are you coaching on? Just because you say yourself as a coach, are you a football coach, you're a basketball coach, you're a baseball coach? What type of coaching are you doing? And is that visible uh to people? So we had to develop the thesis, what I say, a signature thesis. And that in their particular case, the understanding AI adoption fails when health systems focus on technology first and then change management second, and we flip that. So that becomes like a tagline, right? Which you're known for. They're you're able to take that from our change for just the tech itself. And that resonated with a lot of people because they've been through that, right? So they became, I would say, in that particular conversation, that became what was bold about them. That came, became what was specific about them. That differentiated them from the other 50 other IT vendors who had not owned their messaging. Very important. Then we had to get resilience. So instead of relying on just sales calls, they built a reputation asset stack. Well, what's that? That's thought leadership articles within their industry, right? Speaking engagements at a lot of these industry conferences. They started a podcast featuring many healthcare CILs discussing their AI readiness challenges, and they built case studies showing specific outcomes. And the founders' credibility became visible across multiple platforms for endless time, right? Not depending on any one single channel. So they sign LinkedIn, it's on YouTube, it's on their own particular website. So it is visible for the audience to consume, not only in real time, but for the future as well. So then we had to work on authenticity. So the founder connected his 20 plus years in IT background directly to his point of view. This is very important. Your POV. And what he said was, I seen IT implementation succeed and fail. The difference isn't the technology, it's whether leaders understand that AI adoption is a change management challenge wearing a technology costume. I want that to sink in with people. Because that's exactly what the AI world is: change management. We're not ready for this kind of change. We're used to doing things a certain way at a certain time, a certain rhythm, a certain harmony. Now AI is changing. It's a disruptive force. And you cannot just go back to what you're doing before and slap AI on top of that. You're gonna have to change some things. Because if you don't, it's not going to, it's gonna fail, or you're not gonna get the outcomes you were looking to gain because you haven't really changed at your core. So that's very specific. And what I call that is a lived experience from the founder point of view, and that became a big differentiator. So when it comes down to vision, they begin to publish that foresight, begin to get it out as content, right? The three waves of healthcare AI adoption, why your AI role model failed without this, and on and on and on. They positioned themselves as guides to a future, not participants in the present, right? Every piece of content gave health system leaders language and frameworks they could actually use. And that led us to execution. Here's the kicker, right? Every piece of thought leadership connected to a clear next step. Where do we go from here? Every LinkedIn post had a call to action. Let's talk about your AI readiness. Every article had a next step, every speaking engagement converted into conversations, right? They built a repeatable follow up system. They tracked how authority contributed to pipeline, sales pipeline, sales opportunities, which leads us to results. What happened? They had a 40% increase in their lead generation from thought leadership that continues, it's like a flywheel. It continues to grow for them versus just cold outreach, right? Who wants to just bang up on uh cold emails and phone calls and actually get through to your target audience? It is it's very difficult to do. Very difficult to do. This is a much easier process to get you there, right? 25% of their new client contract came from inbound interest. See, instead of them reaching out, they're reaching back in. You push out knowledge, information, experience, wisdom, what you can do, and it attracts those kind of new clients that are coming back in you from inbound interest. And that's a growth rate from I think before was maybe 8%, now grew to 25%, right? And then a 75% improvement in brand recall around other CIOs. So if somebody says your name and context, you're not there, people actually know who you're talking about. That's just 75% improvement. It's kind of like, well, who are they? What do they do? I don't know nothing about it. I never heard of them. You don't want that, especially when you're not there. That is what branding is all about. Brand is in the mind of your ideal client. And if you don't exist in that thought process, then you do have a problem. That's an authority gap. And they also experience a 50% increase in digital and direct engagement. So they're getting engagement across all those different chains. Remember, this is happening constantly. Constantly. I've been doing podcasting for five years. I have over 260 episodes. I have over 50 some thousand uh uh people have downloaded that those particular episodes over time. It's constantly selling on my behalf without me having to physically be there in real time. And guess what? I get contacted all the time. Whether it's a DM, a direct message, is a phone call, it's the email. Grant, can you work with me? I like what you're talking about. Can we set up a meeting? This is constant. This is what you want because that is already vetted, people that are just not interested in what you're doing, to people that absolutely are interested in you doing, and you're spending more time with those types of clients. And that's the power of the Brave framework in practice. And here's what's important about this case study I just talked about. It's not just a you know, a fancy personal branding agency. They're not talking about that. They're not, and they this particular tech company, they're they were not a consulting firm. They had a bunch, you know, whether they were doing it for celebrities or influencer marketers or anything like that. They were a real B2B IT company, very practical, very results-oriented. And when they applied these five pillars, their entire business model shifted. That's what I call what I call authority delivery or authority branding in this world, even for business and personal. That's what it does for you if applied correctly. Right. So,

Omaha Accelerator And Authority Infrastructure

SPEAKER_00 41:32

as we now get into this next phase, especially here in Omaha, Nebraska, as I get ready to launch our first cohort that is the Omaha AI Marketing Accelerator for small businesses here in North and South Omaha. So we've been talking about this, you know, this Brave Authority Index, like it's a framework, and it is, but it's also real world proof. That's what my accelerator is. And this is where this framework gets tested in the field. We launched this program, I think, when I first got here and got, you know, we wanted this eight-week cohort. We wanted 10 businesses per cohort. We focused on North and South Omaha neighborhoods that have been traditionally underserved by the entrepreneurial support systems that are out there. And this is how we're going to use Brave. So every single participant we touch and talk to about these AI tools, they understand how they're going to be able to use it. We're going to talk about automation tools. We're going to talk about the marketing software. We're going to talk about how the Brave Authority assessment works and how we're doing it with our business partner, which is BizHack, who's been doing this for a number of years and gotten government recognition at the federal level. So they can find out are they clear or are they generic in their current branding? Are you a single platform? Are you a multi-platform business? Is your voice authentic or is it polished? Is your positioning future ready or is it reactive? Does your visibility convert to outcomes? And then say to yourself, okay, now it's time to build. I understand where we're at, and I also understand where we need to go, right? Because here, what I learned here so far at Omal, that is critical. AI access alone is not enough. Entrepreneurs need more than just tools, they need authority and infrastructure. They need to know how to explain who they are, what problem they solve, why customers should trust them, and how their business creates value, and how to follow up on that business opportunity. And we built the accelerator around this brave framework, also the lead building system. System from BizTach Academy. So every week we're going to address these types of things. We're going to address your positioning. Is it bold enough? Do you have a market thesis? What is your personal story? Who do you serve and what problem do you have? We're going to talk about in week three your resilience. Are you building proof? Do you can you build case studies? Can you create customer or do you have, can you curate customer testimonials? And do you have any type of third-party validation? Someone else has to say you are good. You know, from someone from a authority asset that says, hey, I'm an authority in my field, and this person here is good, and they'll be able to help you. That is what a third-party validation is. We're going to talk about authenticity. Again, your voice, your values, making sure your brand reflects your reality. When we get into your vision and your AI readiness, are you really ready to deploy AI in your business? Are you just really just curious about it? Are you ready to roll up your sleeves and actually get out there, right? So you can have a future-facing positioning that's going to help customers understand where the market is going. You have to have a relevant story, an interesting story, something that's insightful and authentic that comes from your expertise. And then we're going to execute on that by creating content. We're going to look at your CRM, which is your customer relations management tool, your follow-up systems, converting visibility into business development. And then we've got to get into integration. We've got to bring it all together so we can measure the return on investment of investment time and investing capital. And that's what we're doing right now in Omaha as we build out these cohorts. If you're not in the first one, don't worry. We're going to do this over at least a two to three year period. And you're going to be constantly having cohorts sign up, get involved, and upskill on these levels. And we, these are the three things I want you to understand. You have to have tools and understand these tools, but you must have skill sets. I'm transferring a skill set to you. So at the end of the day, you will be able to utilize these tools at scale, right? And they have the mind shift change that needs to take place because this is a platform change, right? So your mindset, your skill set, and your and your tool set have to be in congruence with what you're doing as you look at the design, the creativity, and the analytical outputs that you're going to have from an AI perspective. So if you're coming right now from you know a generic business consulting, messaging, whatever it may be, and what that looks like, we need to take this to another level. We need to understand proof of work. So it's just not a theory that you're talking about. You're talking about real-world application in real neighborhoods with real businesses, with real outcomes in your messaging. And that's what the Omaha AI Marketing Accelerator is central to what my mission is as we start to build out this business to be businesses to be a center of excellence here in the Midwest, because authority building isn't a luxury for many businesses or executives, it's infrastructure for everyone. As you heard over and over, they've building out the all these big data centers all over the world to create this AI platform, right? This is infrastructure. What is the infrastructure that you're building out? Just on that on the tool set, but in skill set and in mindset is very, very important. And that must include you. It must include our entrepreneurs in the Omaha area. It's very, very important. So if you understand that Brave is about building authority and what that really looks like, and what you can get out of that when you start to really do your assessment around your brand or your authority gap.

Five Gaps And The Free Assessment

SPEAKER_00 48:02

I want you to understand the visibility gap. A leader is active online. That could be you. You're posting, right? You're visible, right? But they're not known for specific idea. They're just out there, they're very generic. That could be alone to anyone in their field. Anyone can own that. Intellectual property, copyright, trademark. Well, anybody can just scrape that, as they would say, because you haven't differentiated yourself. So you got to get bold. You got to develop a signature marketing thesis and own that specific problem. Gap number two, the credibility gap. A leader must make strong claims. I'm an expert in AI adoption. I help health systems transform. I am the best at X. But if you lack proof, no case studies, no testimonials, no third-party validation. Well, guess what? You're not going to be believable. So you got to build that resilience. You got to create the proof architecture and get external validation. Number three, the authenticity gap. And a leader's content is published. It could be polished. It's professional, but it lacks lived experience. It lacks voice. It lacks human resonance. It sounds like it could have been written by anyone or by AI, or honestly, who knows? But you've got to strengthen that authenticity. You've got to connect your story to your expertise and let your voice come through. Very, very important. Gap number four, the strategy gap. A leader produces content, a lot of content, but it doesn't connect to a business development system. Do you have a system is very, very important. You can be visible, but visibility isn't converting to sales pipeline. Build execution. Connect every piece of content to a clear offer. Create a repeatable follow-up system, which is going to lead you to number five, which is the AI readiness gap. And a leader who uses AI, he could be using CheckTBT, Gemini Clark, ProPlex. There's a ton of them out there. There are all kinds of tools to produce content and marketing, but they lack a responsible, trust-centered framework for how AI supports their brand, their content, their sales, and their client delivery. So we've got to fix all of these things. And you've got to be able to utilize all five of the Brave pillars to create a framework where AI enhances human authority, not replacing it. Here's the thing: most leaders have at least one of these gaps, maybe maybe three. So the Brave Assessment is designed to help you see what gap is yours. And then we give you a roadmap to close them. So if you are looking to enhance your personal brand, you can go to my assessment at five starbdm.com. If you're looking to enhance your business brand, you can go to the business brand questionator. All of these are a couple of assessments that'll help you. And then right on my website, 5 starbdm, you have my AI agent. You can ask it anything, it will be able to help you. Sentinel is there to help you to get started, to begin to understand. So when you engage with me, you're ready to put for the best effort. And this is why this matters right now. And let me be absolutely clear why I'm bringing this to you right now in 2026. There are three forces reshaping how authority works. Force number one, AI is democratizing visibility. Anyone can create content, anyone can automate messaging, anyone can personalize at scale. This used to be impossible, but now today it's easy. And that is good. It's democratizing a lot of things, but it's also creating a lot of noise. Right? Number two, force number two, buyers are getting smarter. Buyers now conduct reputation due diligence before they ever talk to you. They search your name, they review your LinkedIn, they scan your podcast appearances, they look at who trusts you, they can spot inconsistency and they can see when something is performative. Right? So number three, force number three is trust is becoming scarce. Trust is becoming scarce in a world of infinite content and infinite noise. The one thing that become that is becoming scarce is trust. So the market is asking a different question now. Not how visible are you, but how trustworthy are you. And that's where Brave comes in, because you can't manufacture trust, you can't automate it, you can't fake it, you build it through clarity, through consistency, through credibility, through authenticity, through vision, through discipline execution. That's why the Brave Authority Index is all about. And that's what I'm committed to giving to each and every one of you. And this is what I'm inviting you to do right now. Go to Five Star BDF, right? Go to where it says there on the services. Take the personal brand questionnaire or take the business brand questionnaire. It's free, it takes about 10-15 minutes, or as much time as you're going to go into. It's about 12 questions each. You'll get a score. I will then bring that back to you. I'm going to give you this assessment free of charge. It's going to be a very in-depth study at a mature level. It's going to show you your strongest and weakest pillars and some recommendations. You don't have to act on anything, but you'll know where you stand. And I would say as you read through it, you're going to get a better understanding of where you need to go. You're going to get a better understanding of where you sit. And that's very important to understand where you sit now in relation to your goals, right? So, and if you're interested in the workshop, please email me. You can see it actually on the website itself on the business uh accelerator. We're taking we're building out our cohorts. There's a wait list there as well. You can sign up, you can take our assessment, we'll begin to get back to you and make sure that either you're in the next cohort or the one that's coming up, but we'll be able to help you. And if you want one-on-one consulting with myself, I will work with you as well. So this program is built for you to help you execute that scale. We're going to build up your positioning. We're going to create some proof architecture. We're going to develop your content strategy and we're going to integrate it into your back-end systems and follow-up systems. So if you're in Omaha, definitely we want to give to you to the accelerator. If you're someone else, please, I'm involved with accelerators out of Miami as well. And that those are more national in scope in about a four-week course. So there's a lot of things happening now. I'm helping you to upskill where you're at. So understanding where the tool sets are situated in your business, how you can utilize them, the skill sets that you're going to acquire. Because at the end of the day, if you don't acquire a skill set, you're just going through theoretical knowledge. I'm into applied knowledge. So if you are resonating with applied knowledge in the AI world to grow sales, marketing, and revenue, then this is something you might want to get involved in. So please contact

Closing And Where To Find Everything

SPEAKER_00 56:22

me. I'm going to sign off right now. Again, this is our fifth year of doing this in the follow brand. We're going to we're looking forward to another five plus years in doing this. So I want to thank everybody for tuning in today. Continue to be watchful for what we're doing in the future. And I will keep you up to speed because we are in a changing dynamic world every single day. And I want to thank you again for tuning in to the Follow Brand Podcast. Remember, you can see all the episodes that we've ever done at five starbdm.com. That is the number five. That is Star S T E R B for Brand, D for Development, Informasters.com. Again, this is Grant McGall, and I want to thank you so much for being with us.