Ann Hiiemaa: AI Has Killed the Mediocre Personal Brand

Just a few years ago, the logic of building a personal brand was relatively simple: polish your LinkedIn profile, make yourself visible, talk about your field and grow your network. If a Google search of your name produced the right impression and people associated you with a particular topic, much of the work was already done.

Then AI arrived and changed the game. Suddenly, sounding professional became remarkably easy. In a matter of minutes, anyone can write a sharp LinkedIn post, create a polished presentation, summarise ten research papers and sound like an expert.

It is worth remembering, however, that a personal brand is not built online alone. It is shaped by every interaction people have with you. What results do you deliver? How do you make people feel? Would they recommend you to others?

If your digital presence promises a sharp strategic thinker, that same sharp strategist needs to show up in the meeting room. If people encounter two different versions of you, there is a risk that a gap will emerge between your real-life and digital identities.

The More AI We Use, the More the Real Person Matters

AI will not attend a client meeting on your behalf. It cannot read the room, respond to an unexpected question or earn someone’s trust for you.

That is why skills that are difficult to replicate with AI are becoming increasingly valuable: independent thinking, verbal communication, courage, presence, a strong network and the ability to build trust. There is also a growing sense of fatigue with content that has been polished to perfection. When everything sounds equally correct and professional, we begin to notice the qualities that make someone stand out as a human being: fresh thinking, an unexpected perspective and the courage to express a genuine opinion.

This is particularly important in Estonia. We are a small market, and word of mouth remains one of the most powerful channels for building a personal brand. A strong personal brand means that the right people associate your name with the right topic at the right time – even when you are not in the room.

Now, another participant has joined this chain of recommendations: AI. What conclusions does it draw about you? If someone asks an AI tool to identify experts in a particular field, what you say about yourself on LinkedIn is no longer enough.

AI does not have a single, magical “expert score”. When it draws on online sources to generate an answer, it can use publicly available and discoverable signals about you. Is your name consistently associated with a particular topic? Do you have a demonstrable track record? Are you quoted in the media? Is your expertise validated by independent sources?

Someone may have 20,000 LinkedIn followers and still fail to appear in AI-generated lists of recommended experts in their field.

Estonia’s Competitive Advantage

Companies are currently investing heavily in teaching people how to use AI. It feels as though a race is underway to see who can bring their employees into the AI revolution fastest. This is, of course, important for both efficiency and business performance. But we should not lose sight of another question: who is developing the skills that AI cannot perform on people’s behalf? Do your experts have opinions of their own? Can they articulate them clearly to a client, a management board or an audience? Are they memorable? Do they know how to build a network?

Making an organisation’s best people visible is no longer merely a matter of communications. It supports sales, strengthens the employer brand and gives talented people an opportunity to build their professional capital within the company as well.

This is where Estonian companies have a major advantage: our market is small. To become a recognised expert in a particular field in Estonia, you do not need to reach a million people. It is often enough for the right few hundred or a few thousand people to consistently associate your name with the right topic.

We have relatively few market participants, specialist media outlets and conferences. In many fields, there are also surprisingly few people who have established a clear position as an expert. This means that while competition for attention may be intense, competition for a distinctive expert position is often far less fierce than we imagine. We all want fresh perspectives and new faces.

If you build your personal brand consciously and strategically, have the courage to express a clear point of view, and communicate with purpose, you can establish a strong reputation as an expert in Estonia surprisingly quickly.

Ann’s opinion piece was first published on the TULI website.