Ciara O’Neil is the founder of Brandfulness and a psychology led personal branding strategist helping founders, executives, and teams build real authority on LinkedIn and beyond. With an academic background in psychology, Ciara focuses on trust, reputation, and consistency as the foundations of strong personal brands. Her work goes beyond content creation and platforms and centres on shaping how people are perceived, remembered, and trusted across their career, business, and professional relationships. In this episode, Ciara shares her journey from law to psychology to personal branding, and how she grew her LinkedIn presence from zero to over 18,000 followers in a year. She explains what it truly means to apply psychology to personal branding in a practical way, from showing up with clarity and intention to building authority that earns trust over time. This conversation also explores growth mindset, career pivots, and how to attract aligned clients and opportunities without burning out or chasing visibility for the sake of it.Connect with Ciara:https://www.linkedin.com/in/ciaraoneil/https://bio.site/brandfulnesshttps://brandfulness.co.uk/Timestamps: 00:00 - Psychology as a buzzword vs real understanding 01:10 - Welcome to the podcast 01:22 - Who Ciara O’Neil is and what she does 02:52 - From law to psychology to personal branding 04:40 - Why changing careers isn’t failure 05:58 - Why trying and pivoting matters 06:55 - Going back to study and building credibility 07:33 - Studying AI, motivation and human behaviour 09:17 - How AI has evolved since her research 10:10 - Using AI as a tool, not a replacement 10:37 - Why psychology is Ciara’s competitive edge 12:37 - What people get wrong about “psychology in content” 13:27 - How Ciara rediscovered LinkedIn 14:49 - Intentional growth vs trial and error 15:31 - The truth behind “overnight” LinkedIn growth 16:50 - Why highlight reels distort reality 17:27 - How to grow consistently without going viral 19:00 - Defining your goal on LinkedIn 20:01 - Why chasing trends leads to burnout 21:23 - Consistency as a trust-building tool 22:40 - How to find your first clients 24:14 - Why conversations compound over time 25:28 - Why personal branding is a long game 28:24 - The most common personal branding mistakes 29:54 - Repurposing content without burnout 31:12 - The story behind Brandfulness 32:31 - Introducing the Authority Collective 33:57 - Launch timeline and testing digital products 34:50 - The psychology behind green branding 36:03 - LinkedIn vs Instagram vs Substack 37:19 - Milestones, growth and intentional slowing down 38:35 - Digital products and future plans 39:42 - Running, hobbies and switching off 42:04 - Book recommendations and Start With Why 43:58 - Where to find Ciara 44:38 - Final thoughts and closing Connect with Tomas:X: https://x.com/TomasLoucky⁠⁠⁠Stan: https://stan.store/TommenLinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/tomasloucky/⁠⁠Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thisistommen/⁠⁠More:Links: https://linktr.ee/produced_by⁠⁠⁠Newsletter: ⁠⁠⁠⁠https://producednewsletter.substack.com/⁠Tools & gear that support the show:Neon Now: https://neonnow.co.uk/Metricool: https://f.mtr.cool/HRJBZKUlanzi: https://www.ulanzi.com?aff=2611Apex Comfort: https://apexcomfort.co.uk/Favikon: https://www.favikon.com?fpr=tommenRA Optics: https://ra-optics.myshopify.com/discount/TOMMEN?rfsn=8803777.591d19Some links are affiliate links, which means I may earn a small commission at no extra cost to you. If you find them useful, using these links helps keep the podcast running. Thank you!  Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.