How to avoid the LinkedIn pyramid scheme

I’ve seen an interesting trend over the past few months, it’s like a LinkedIn pyramid scheme and if you’re active on LinkedIn or other social channels, you’ve probably seen it too.

Big influencers are out there teaching you to how grow your brand, offering you a sure fire way to build a massive following and be just as “successful” as them. Just sign up to their masterclass, join their paid community, or subscribe to the content creator club…

When I first saw this, it got me thinking with my cynical hat, if someone is supposedly the "leading expert” in their field with all these people hanging on their every word, why is their primary revenue stream now selling profile optimisation courses?

Aren’t they busy with multiple requests to consult on the best projects in their specialty, or managing patient lists longer than Santa on Christmas Eve?

Well, it turns out they’re often not, because many of these people can’t monetise their own audiences. They may have thousands of followers and hundreds of likes, but their biggest source of income is selling the dream to someone else.

Their model isn’t built to deliver value, it’s built to replicate itself, just like a multi-level marketing scheme. This is fine, and well done them, they’ve taken something that wasn’t making them an income and they’re doing their best to change that and support themselves.

But this is where you need to be careful. If you copy leading influencers or big profiles in your space, if you build your brand based on their methods, you’re simply lining yourself up for the same loop.

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Here’s how it plays out.

Jane goes viral, builds a huge following and launches a course to teach others how to do the same.

Simon takes that course, gains a mid-sized following, and then starts selling his own version of how to grow your profile.

Patrick signs up to Simon’s course, gets a slightly smaller following, and then sells his course to... you get the idea.

Nobody is adding real value to the world in this loop. It’s a branding echo chamber where everyone is shouting, but no one is listening.

So how do you avoid this trap?

You start by understanding one critical fact. Building your brand is a tool, it’s a means to an end, not the end itself.

If you’re going to invest your precious time, energy and money into building your brand, it must be aligned with specific outcomes. Whether that’s attracting consulting work, securing investment, building a company, or gaining clinical or academic influence. Your brand must be built with that result at the forefront of your plan.

Always remember that followers, likes, and shares are not a currency you can cash. Yes, they feel good and occasionally they may open doors. However, unless those doors lead to actual, tangible opportunities aligned with your goals, you’re just spinning wheels.

I’ve had several physicians with large audiences come to me for help in recent months, at first you might wonder why they came for a branding program.

Outwardly, everything looked great, polished profiles, high engagement, even a few speaking invites here and there. But underneath it all, the real story was much more bleak, no clear strategy, no conversion, no return. They were struggling to monetise anything and make ends meet.

They weren’t building businesses or fulfilling their goals. They were stuck in what I call "performative branding", posting and engaging just to stay relevant, without a plan to turn any of it into something meaningful.

If you build your following of 100,000 people first, and then create your plan to monetise it after the fact, you’re probably doomed. That audience signed up for your funny stories, your memes, or your clickbait headlines. As soon as you attempt to sell them something, they’ll run screaming into the abyss, because that’s not what they signed up for.

Here’s what I tell every client from the beginning.

Get clear on your end goal and your reason for doing what you do.

What do you want to achieve over the next 12-24 months? Is it a job change, more autonomy, startup growth, speaking roles, consulting?

You cannot build an effective brand without knowing exactly what success looks like for you.

1. Identify your ideal audience.

Who needs to know about you? Who holds the keys to your next opportunity? Where do they spend their time? What do they read? What do they care about?

2. Build your brand around value, not visibility.

Instead of chasing metrics, focus on delivering meaningful insight, thought leadership, and clarity on your area of expertise. This is how you become a trusted authority.

3. Avoid templates and shortcuts.

Your voice is your power. Using someone else’s template or voice not only dilutes your authenticity, it makes you replaceable. Influence doesn’t come from sounding like everyone else.

4. Put infrastructure in place to capture value.

Are people finding you? If they are, can they understand who you help, how you help, and how to engage with you? Do you have a clear service or offer? A next step? This is where most people lose opportunities.

5. Review and refine regularly.

Every quarter, revisit your brand strategy. What’s working? What isn’t? Have your goals shifted? Are you getting traction with the right people?

I recently worked with a physician who had been applying for roles in a specific niche for over six months with no success. We rebuilt her brand entirely based on her goals and redefined her presence online and offline. Three months later, she secured a role that aligned perfectly with her clinical interests and values. The crazy thing is she didn’t even apply, she was handpicked because her brand and her approach resonated so strongly with her new employer.

Another client had been unsuccessfully searching for investors for over a year. We built a strategy that spoke to investor concerns, showed proof of traction, and demonstrated domain authority. He got his first meeting within a month, and the investment came soon after.

Neither of these clients needed to have 20,000 followers to achieve their goals, they only needed to have enough of the right people seeing their value regularly.

This is why the Physician Branding Program is so valuable, because it’s not just another brick in the LinkedIn pyramid. It’s not a course in how to look good on social media or a predefined content plan to attract likes and shares. It’s a unique blend of coaching and mentorship, grounded in real world insights and experience.

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I start every client’s journey with why you’re here and what you want to achieve. So many of them find clarity for the first time in years as we go through this process.

When you’ve found your clarity, if you want to be a content creator, that’s fantastic and I can help with that. But most of the physicians I work with want impact, income, autonomy or growth.

That requires more than a following, it requires a specific, bespoke strategy and the right mindset to execute it and follow through.

If you want to learn more, check out www.veritybarrington.com/physicianbranding for more details.

Let’s build something that matters.

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