Tuesday afternoon at the SWAY LIVE conference in Boulder, Colo., was devoted heavily to helping attendees build their personal brand. Back-to-back speakers Caleb DeLon and Johanna Walker shared a couple of unique ways to do so in either writing a book or doing a TEDx talk.
Delon, COO of Paperback Expert, explained how to use a book—authored by you—to grow a brand and build a business. Paperback Expert, a book publishing firm for business owners and entrepreneurs, has helped nearly 300 business owners become published authors.
DeLon talked about what causes buyers to pick you instead of someone else—and, citing research, said the biggest factor is a good reputation (even above an existing relationship).
How do you build that reputation? Through the use of “brand artifacts”—something you make that puts your brand on display. DeLon went on to note that not all brand artifacts “weigh” the same, and went on to classify various types as feathers (business cards, brochures, social media posts); paperweights (professional designations or certifications, articles you write or are quoted in, or professional videos); or anvils.
He said the use of brand artifacts that are feathers or paperweights can add up, “but they are unlikely to be the reason why somebody chooses to hire you at the end of the day.”
But then you have the anvils. Their weight derives from their difficulty, as in how much effort you have to put in to create them. Only a few brand artifacts qualify as anvils, including a thoroughly professional website, a live event like SWAY, a regular newspaper or magazine column you write, a tenured podcast, or his obvious favorite—a book.
“A book is the heaviest anvil you can drop,” DeLon said, loudly dropping an actual anvil on stage to make his point. He then provided four reasons for this: history (books have been around for thousands of years); gravity (books are physical objects in the real world with weight and a “thump” factor); density (allow you to explain concepts in detail); and heresy (nobody ever throws a book away).
While many successful financial professionals have written or thought about writing a book, DeLon admitted that writing a book on your own is a difficult and time-consuming endeavor, particularly for non-retired financial professionals running their practice.
But in addition to the solo “DIY” way, there is also the “DWY” way, which stands for “done with you.” Companies like Paperback Expert will handle the hard parts by conducting multiple interviews with the “author” to record their stories and insights while a writer turns those interviews into a book manuscript. The editing, proofreading, design, printing, and making it available on Amazon are all taken care of the by company.
“All the business owner had to do was have conversations,” DeLon said. “You don’t have to do anything besides your zone of genius, delivering the content, getting the genius out of your head.”
We went on to explain various ways to use a book to build your brand before closing thoughts.
“Your personal brand matters. It matters to you, and it matters to your buyers. If you are committed to making your brand visible through brand actions and brand artifacts, the ‘weightiest’ way to do it is to take everything you are and all that you believe and put it in the pages of your own book,” DeLon concluded. “Stop tossing feathers. Get a book—drop the anvil.”
TEDx an ‘anvil’ as well
Another “anvil,” Walker said during her subsequent session at SWAY LIVE Tuesday, is doing a TEDx speech.
A TEDx is an independently organized local event that brings people together to share a TED-like experience put on by those who seek to uncover new ideas and to share the latest research in their local areas to spark conversations in their communities.
Walker, who has done a TEDx talk, noted that people doing them are not professional speakers—they are people with ideas who want to share those ideas.
“At the heart of TEDx is an idea,” Walker said. “When you change the way somebody sees something, you change the way they do something.”
She then challenged SWAY LIVE attendees to crystallize the idea they would want to be known for—one that has the potential to shift the perspective of their audience. “What do you want to stand for, or what do you see or understand that others might not?” she said.
She provided examples of five different “fill in the blanks” frameworks to help the audience crystallize their ideas—and the audience came up with and shared a wide variety of ideas built via those frameworks.
The next question, Walker said, is “how do you know this is true? How did you come to believe this? That’s the story.”
“When you say that thing that you know needs to be said, what will be possible? For you, for your audience, for your community, for the world?” Walker said. “Share your idea. Share your story. Go change the world.”
She closed by calling on SWAY LIVE attendees to “cross that moat” and say what needs to be said—whether it’s on a TEDx stage, at a conference, in a boardroom or to a client.
SWAY LIVE founder Sheri Fitts announced that next year’s event will be held in Cleveland, Ohio, Aug. 1-3, 2027, and the 2028 event will be in Asheville, N.C. in early August.
SEE ALSO:
• Sheri Fitts: Personal Branding a Focus at 2026 SWAY | LIVE
• Sheri Fitts’ SWAY | LIVE Brings Personal Branding to Boulder in Early August
