In this episode of The High Profit Event Show, I’m joined by Michael Hunter, branding expert, founder of PersonalBrand.com, and former Chief Marketing Officer for Brendon Burchard. During his time with Brendon, Michael led efforts that brought over 30,000 attendees to live events—at a time when Brendon himself wasn’t actively creating marketing content. That kind of impact doesn’t come from a flashy logo—it comes from strategic branding, intentional messaging, and unforgettable experiences.

Michael and I dig deep into how branding functions as a strategic directive, not just an aesthetic or design element. He explains that true branding lives in the minds and words of your audience. It’s the emotional and psychological perception people walk away with after attending your event—and it influences whether they’ll sign up for your next offer, recommend you to others, or come back again. If you’re only focusing on colors, fonts, and logos, you’re missing the bigger picture.

One of the core takeaways from this episode is Michael’s insight that bigger isn’t always better. He challenges the default mindset that more people equals more success. In fact, he’s seen smaller events—25 to 100 highly aligned attendees—outperform thousand-person gatherings in both engagement and revenue. The real key is attracting the right people to your event with clear messaging that aligns with your values and expectations.

Michael also shares a series of tactical strategies to elevate your event experience and build momentum. From curated welcome moments like red carpets and step-and-repeats to leveraging event videographers for real-time content capture, he explains how these small but powerful details create lasting impressions. Events, he emphasizes, should never be a single point of failure. When done right, they become brand assets that generate buzz, testimonials, and future enrollments.

Whether you’re planning your first event or optimizing your next one, Michael’s insights on branding, quality-over-quantity, and experience design offer a refreshing perspective. He also shares a peek into his signature 3-day intensive, the Brand and Business Breakthrough, designed for entrepreneurs in the $500K–$1.5M+ revenue range who are ready to solidify their brand and scale with purpose.

Tune in now for a masterclass in brand-driven event leadership—and walk away with strategies you can apply immediately to create high-profit, high-impact events.

Want to connect with Michael?

Book Your Discovery Call - Website: http://personalbrand.com/

LinkedIn*: https://linkedin.com/in/michaelrhunter

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*Follow Michael on Instagram or LinkedIn, and send him a DM and he will send you a link to a video training on the fastest path to doubling your event business, and it's not what you'd think.

Welcome to today's episode. We have a special guest with us, Mr. Michael Hunter. Welcome, sir. I'm really excited to have you here today. You and I connected as recently at an event, of course and one of the things that really impressed me about you, of course, professional accolades and also personal, but professionally you were the former chief marketing officer for Brendon Burchard, where you helped put 30,000 butts in seats, as they say, or acquired 30,000 attendees for over the course of two years for events. Those are actually two years where he wasn't even available for like a whole lot of asset and marketing creation. You were like having to get super resourceful and super creative on how to go about doing that and that's pretty remarkable. The 30,000 butts in seats, that's a very uncommon task to take on. But you've done that. Since then, you've gone on to establish two remarkable companies, one around branding, which we're going to talk about today. Personalbrand.com and also one payment processing called Spiffy. But both companies you're working with some of the top influencers, creators, speakers in the world. I actually had the opportunity to see you speak just a few days ago and I was impressed by your delivery. In fact, I signed up for your next branding course, not the next one, but the one after that in Phoenix, Arizona, this coming September. So for our audience here, guys, Michael is Superhunter. But I think you should lean in because what he has to share here is pure gold.

Oh, thanks so much, Rudy. Yes, excited to dive in and share some nuggets. I have a lot of experience, hands in the trenches. I've helped people make their first dollar online and I've also run eight figure influencer businesses. So my biggest superpower is distilling complex things into simple practices. The 80 20s that we can all implement to get the biggest results.

Awesome, everybody wants the 80 20. One thing I'll mention here, and I think this will help set the context for branding in the subject here is you and I were talking in the green room here a bit and about why brand is everything when it comes to events, when it comes to selling tickets, actually getting to attend, having them sign up for your next program and coming back to future events. Brand is a core part of all of it. I'm so excited for you to share with us your expertise in branding and how to get the right people in the room.

Totally. If you ask 10 different people what a brand is, you're going to get 10 different answers. So a lot of times people hear the word brand and they just immediately tune out. But when you do brand right, it's a deep strategic initiative throughout your entire organization. It helps get the right people in the room. It helps fill the event. When you fill the event with the right people, they stay engaged and when they stay engaged, they buy. So when you dial in your messaging and you really speak to getting the right people in the room, just not as many people as possible in the room. That's a really big mindset shift because usually our thought process, our natural thought process as humans is like bigger is better and that's not always the case. Ultimately, I always like to start with the end in mind and reverse backwards and there's nothing wrong with having a big event. That's just a really great experience if that's what the intention is of having a big experience, getting people, having a big event, getting people in the room and creating a great experience. However, if your goal is to also have that convert into becoming a highly profitable event, then big events aren't always best and ultimately, when it comes down to messaging, small messaging tweaks can drive significant differences in the end result. Just the difference between messaging your event as people are going to come to attend, to learn and for you to be the guide, for them to be the hero in their own story versus for them to attend, to learn from the guru who's going to solve everything for them. Those two different messaging tweaks are going to shift the type of person that's in the room. Fewer people are going to show up when you're clear about they have to go do work than you having the magic bullet that's going to solve everything for them. But you're going to have drastically different people that show up and that's going to translate into drastically different results as far as retention and profitability.

Yes, okay. That's controversial right there, man. It's like most people just want to get as many butts in seats as possible. That's what they ask. How do I get more butts in seats? How do I get more people there? The only oftentimes, unfortunately, to discover that some people that show up, not all, but some that show up have misguided expectations or they expect a magic button or they join the program and they become a pain in the butt in your next event or your mastermind program or something of the sort. So I love how you're saying, hey, with the right messaging, the right branding, sure, we may not have, we might not get the egotistical bigger event. Thinking bigger is better. But hey, we may have a smaller, more profitable event because we've attracted the right people with the brand message. That is, yeah, that is not a popular thing to say, but I think it's, you know, that's what the experience has shown for you.

Yes, exactly. Now, I've been, I grew up in the event industry. I went to my first personal development event when I was 17. It was like a sales conference where I got introduced to public speakers. I've been the butt in the seat for hundreds, if not, I don't know if I've crossed the thousand threshold yet. I don't know if I even wanted to admit to it, even if I did. But I've been at hundreds and hundreds of business events and personal development events, networking events. I've seen dozens of presentations. I've just been immersed in this world of events. I've seen really seen, attended really great events and also experienced ones that missed the mark. So through client work and then also being an attendee, I've been able to see events from all different sides that you see the big events. You see the conversion numbers behind the scenes and even what we learned this past weekend from Alex Moskow's event, you can drive some significant, highly profitable events with twenty five, thirty people in the room. Again, just from case study of the testimonials and what we witnessed, like I've seen small events out convert and be out profit a thousand person events. So bigger isn't always better is the point that we're driving home.

Bigger is not always better. Thank you. Yeah, I love it. Thank you for that. Love to hear from you a little bit more about when it comes to filling events, any specifics you'd like to share with us as far as branding and messaging or your experience when it comes to filling events or branding, because I think that's like probably top of mind for most event leaders is how do I get people to event? And hopefully now they're asking, how do I get the right people to my event?

Yes, people that are putting on live events right now and crafting amazing experiences have a massive unfair advantage going into this new world that we're all evolving into with AI and everything being super analytical and precise and perfect. Humans are going to value connection. They're going to value experiences and they're going to value community and live events are something that touch on all three of those things. So when you do live events well, it can be a strategic multiplier for your business, meaning you put on an event that creates an experience that attracts the right people to buy the ticket. They have an amazing experience at the event, which engages them and most likely guides them to take the next step with you. But also just making sure you're leveraged at events. There's different tactics of events that are really easy to cut costs on that actually create all of the magic of the event that cause people to talk about it long after the event is over, that cause people to post on social media about on social media about your event while they're at the event after the event. Things like having a videographer, having a photographer, having a red carpet, having a step and repeat at the welcome experience, like guiding people through something that makes them feel special and something that isn't at every single event. These are small details that we actually implement with a lot of our client events, like a recent book launch party that we just did for a client. So, again, not a big event, but something where we crafted an experience where we just had a follow up call with them two weeks after the event. They're still getting text messages saying that was the best event they've ever been to.

A little book launch party that had 100 people there. We crafted an experience with really awesome small bites and a welcome experience and just artfully crafted an experience that was memorable and something that people wanted to talk about and share about. So the event isn't most of the mistakes that we see people make is placing way too much emphasis on getting as many butts in the seats versus understanding what we're talking about before getting the right butts in the seats, then also making sure that event isn't necessarily a single point of failure. You're getting a lot of marketing collateral with a videographer. You're getting testimonials at that event. You're getting a lot of word of mouth from that event, and you're spending just a little extra money on that event that might seem unnecessary, but is actually crafting a better experience that's going to build the brand so that your next event is easier to fill.

Yeah, building the brand with the first event for the next event being easier to fill. We'd love to hear a little bit more about brands and love to hear a little bit about your mind when it comes to brand, maybe some specific, I don't know, steps, strategies or techniques, how you think about developing a brand in order to attract the right people to. The event, that event or the next event.

Yes, great question. So like I mentioned before, you asked 10 people what a brand is. You probably get 10 different answers. Most people conflate branding with brand, and people think that brand is like your logo, your color scheme. It's making something look really flashy and cool, and it's just something surface level and fluffy and nothing could be further from the truth. Brand is a deep strategic imperative. Your brand isn't what you say about you. It's what your customers say about you. What you say about you might be true, but what other people say about you is almost certainly true. So this is why, like throwing your first event, is always going to be the hardest event that you'll ever do, because it takes a lot of time, energy and effort to get the vendors, to create the experience, to craft the content, the slide deck, the workbook, all these different assets. If you don't capture that with video and photography and testimonials to allow your customers, your attendees, your clients to speak life into your brand and to use their words to communicate what your brand is. That's where you miss the mark. It's very, very important to understand that concept that through the process of branding and messaging, we can influence our brand. But our brand is actually something that we don't have control over. It's something that lives in the words of your customers.

Mm. Yeah, I like that the brand is not what you say, it's what your clients say about you and is a strategic directive, not branding, but it's something that they do strategically. That's one of the reasons I signed up for your three day branding program. I don't remember the title of it.

You can share that is the name of it. The Brand and Business Breakthrough. It's a three day intensive where we dive deep into these concepts. Nothing exposes your brand like a live event. Everything from it being an engaging experience online when they're registering for the event, making it look like something that they want to come to. So making things look appealing is an aspect of branding. And those aspects are important. But to think that that's all that brand is the differentiation that I'm looking to make. And so, like I said, everything brand, nothing live events expose your brand in ways that other other aspects of business don't because you have the registration experience, you have the decision on guest speakers, the everything down to their name tag. Like, is it just a hello? My name is scribbled. Sharpie slapped on their shirt when they walk in. Or is there intention around that to make them feel special? So, again, depending on what caliber of event that you're running, there's small things that you can do that really emphasize and create an energy and an experience that people will talk about for a long period of time. Also, with events like especially bigger events, it requires team and staff members. So your brand should be something that inspires you as a leader to inspire your team to facilitate a world class event and then also should inspire customers to get the right people in the room. So it's definitely something that runs deeper throughout the organization, through your team, and then also getting the right people in the room.

Yeah, I couldn't agree more. It's more of a strategic directive. In fact, one of the reasons I also signed up for your program in September, it's kind of around our annual planning and I'm going to have members likely we're talking about tentative right now, like members of my team get together either before or after or maybe even during and we're going to talk about as a strategic directive, not just say, hey, what are our colors going to be? Strategically thinking through the branding, the messaging, et cetera. So it's imperative. I couldn't agree with you more. Anything else you maybe want to say about that three day program? Maybe somebody listening to this might be interested in going as well. I know we weren't jumping on here to talk about it, but I think it came up. So I think it's worth talking about.

Thanks for looping back and providing the opportunity to speak about a little bit more. So, it's a brand and business breakthrough. It's a three day intensive that's in Phoenix, Arizona and this is for people that are already well established. They already have an offer that's converting, definitely more of an advanced workshop diving into these deeper principles because there's a right time to focus on your brand. I call it the Goldilocks zone. You can do your brand too early where it’s actually super fluffy and it is very generic because you don't know who your target customer is. You don't know the difference between a good client and a bad client. You don't know who your ideal avatar is. You haven't had a bad hire yet. So if you do it too early, it forces you to create these words that are too generic where they don't mean anything. If you do it too late, it creates a lot of unnecessary complexity. So if you're in that five hundred to seven hundred thousand dollar range all the way up to one point five plus million dollars in revenue, that's what I call the Goldilocks zone. By no means do you, you can absolutely attend the event if you're earlier on in that journey. But that's really what it's designed for. We're rolling up our sleeves where it's an intensive. This isn't a conference where you're going to have fluffy speakers. It's not a pitch fest with 20 different speakers all speaking. Not saying there's anything wrong with that. I'm just describing this experience as a deeply immersive guided process with experts. You're learning from my chief brand officer, Jonathan, who has Fortune 100 brand experience, and we're bringing billion dollar brand strategies and concepts to the event space and then to the author, speaker, coach space. So that's just a little bit more about it. If you want more information on it, feel free to go to our website, personalbrand.com forward slash Bbb. Bbb brand business breakthrough. You can sign up and attend and Rudy, super excited that you'll be there in September.

Me too, man and for people also who maybe just want to learn more about personal branding and how they can use it to help attract the right people to their next event. I know you guys offer a 15 minute call on personalbrand.com. Can you tell us a little bit about that and how they can go about doing that?

Yes, just go to personalbrand.com and book a 15 minute call. That'll actually be a discovery call or have a conversation. Everyone can benefit from personal brand, but there's a right time where it's actually a strategic multiplier. If you have the most amazing, beautiful, aligned messaging dialed in, but no one's seeing it, then it might not be the next best step. And so we have other services that we can offer as well. Other events and things of this nature where depending on where you're at in your journey, let's just have a conversation and make sure that we're serving you in the best way.

Wonderful, man, wonderful. Yeah, I'm looking forward to that experience and just kind of open rip here. Any specific word of advice or recommendations you'd make to our audience?

I think the biggest recommendation for the event space is finding a way to create a memorable experience. You might have your core event, but one of the tactics and strategies that we use to help create a little bit of exclusivity, help fill room blocks and also get butts in the seat is having some type of unique experience after hours of the event. So, for example, using my past role as CMO with Brendan Burchard, Brendan set the way to write his book, High Performance Habits. When we were launching that book, we were able to coordinate instead of having the book launch party be a separate event that we had to coordinate, we actually put it at the night of one of the days of one of his four day events. So what that did was it allowed us to sell more tickets to the event and it was a bonus if you stayed at the hotel. So it allowed us to fill our room block, got butts in the seats, created a curated experience, created a memorable experience, and then also got a lot of word of mouth about being at Brendan Burchard's book launch party. So that that little tactic was something that seems quite small, but actually had quite a few benefits from it, especially if you're doing larger events at hotels. You have F&B minimums. So it really didn't cost us much extra to throw that event. But the result of that event and what we got out of that event from a marketing perspective and then also strategically getting people in the room and fulfilling our commitment to the hotel was a pretty cool little ninja tactic that hopefully might spark some ideas for people listening in.

Yes, thank you and I'm glad you shared that story because you shared at the event and I thought that was really ingenious how you went about doing that to create a little more exclusivity and urgency because one of the common problems when it comes to filling events and events is not just getting people to attend, but getting them to attend and commit earlier in their experience and getting them to stay at the hotel, stay nearby. So they're more likely to stick around that sort of thing. So, yeah, finding creative ways to create urgency and exclusivity is great. So I love the example you gave about in order to have been part of his book launch, you had to register by a certain time. You had to stay at the hotel on the room block, et cetera, to get that right. Anything we can do that's extra and special to incentivize people to enroll and sign up and stay is better, right? I think the saying goes. Left to our own devices, we're going to procrastinate, we're going to wait until the last minute. We need support.

Then also just understanding the natural lifecycle of events. I was actually having a conversation with another friend, a friend and a client, an official engagement. He has an event in August. It's April right now. He was worried because he got a bunch of ticket sales right away. But like it's crickets right now and as I say, most of your ticket sales are going to come within that 60 to 90 day window. It's totally natural to have a little bit of a lull here. The early adopters, people are going to buy. They've been waiting for your next event. They're ready to go. So how can you craft some extra reasons to reach out to them, having those deadlines for curated events to drive ticket sales so that you're not freaking out in that middle zone and you're not having to have this huge Herculean push at the end to fill the room. So always just think through how can you create unique experiences where everyone understands early bird pricing. But like what we were talking about before, extra experiences, exclusivity, a certain number of people for this certain event if they sign up in a certain period of time. So there's lots of small levers that you can pull that add value to your community, add value to your audience and also help you fill your event faster.

Michael, this has been great, man. I'm super insightful as we start to wrap up here. I just want to encourage our audience one more time if you're interested in learning more about personal brand, maybe here are the points that stood out to me. The team looks at your website and they're like a little bit embarrassed by it, or they say, hey, our website needs a little bit a little love or something. When I heard Michael said, I was like, OK, Yeah, I've gotten feedback. I'm going to do something about this. I'm going to sign up for Michael's personal branding workshop and also the point around not too early, not too late. There's like a sweet spot as well. So if you want to figure out where you're at on that sweet spot around when it's a good time to invest in your personal brand, make sure it's not too late, but also make sure it's not too early. I would encourage you to go to the website, go to personalbrand .com, book a 15 minute consultation with his team and see if they can help you, see if they can support you on clarifying your brand and your message. So, Michael, this has been great, man. I really appreciate you. Any final words as we wrap up our interview?

I just want to speak to your specific audience. It's something I'm deeply passionate about, like live events, change lives. And live events are one of the most difficult things that you can do. Filling live events is difficult, regardless of whether you have name recognition or not. I think just making sure that you have some type of system built in to remind yourself why you're doing what you're doing, why you're hosting this event. Live events have played, have completely shifted my entire life from the things I learned to the people I met. Most of my best friends are from live events. So whenever you bring, we spend so much time, energy and effort crafting these experiences. And there's also this space for magic to happen at live events, for serendipities to occur, for connections to be made that can never be strategically planned and crafted. And so when you host a live event, the impact of that transcends anything that we can expect. So just make sure to reflect and stay connected to that deeper mission and purpose and keep on keeping on. The live events aren't going away. It's going to be a massive competitive advantage in this next era. And people that are doing it and learning their lessons and building the brand and building the momentum over the next three to five years are going to have a massive strategic advantage.

Awesome, man. Thank you. Couldn't agree more. Appreciate you, Michael. It's been a great interview.

Thank you so much. Yeah. If anyone has any questions, please follow me on social media at Michael R. Hunter. You can search my name, Michael R. Hunter on LinkedIn, X and Instagram. And adding a lot of value posting on Linkedin primarily. So reach out, connect, ask questions. I'm here to help anyone I can.

Perfect. And we're going to include all those links here by the show notes. So whether it's the video or the audio, you can go down somewhere around here. Follow Michael. Check out his website. All the resources will be right here. It's been great, man. Appreciate you so much for being our guest.

Thanks so much for having me. Talk to you soon.

All right. Take