Rita Enosegbe’s playbook for building a brand as a founder in Africa

When you see that 11,000 people follow Rita Enosegbe on X, It’s hard to imagine that she had only 11 followers a few years ago.

It was a frustrating time for her. She had failed at network marketing, struggled for 11 months as an affiliate marketer, and had just lost the opportunity to pursue her master’s degree in the UK because there were no funds.

May 17th, 2023, was the day everything changed. That day, she made a decision: she was going to start something on her own and see how it goes.

By the next day, she hosted her first Twitter Space. Within 49 days, she hit 1,000 followers. Today, she’s helped over 100 business owners build their brands, worked with clients locally and internationally, and serves as Internal Communications Officer at one of Nigeria‘s leading microfinance banks.

But what’s more valuable than her growth story is the lessons she’s learned about personal branding in a landscape where most African founders struggle to get seen. She’s discovered that personal branding isn’t about having the perfect setup or waiting until you’ve “made it.” It’s about starting where you are, being real about your struggles, and helping the person one step behind you.

Attention follows value, not follower counts

While trying various strategies to grow her personal brand, Rita discovered something many founders miss: “Attention will always follow value. If you position yourself as someone of value in whatever field you find yourself, the right people will connect with you.”

She didn’t chase follower counts. She focused on helping people. She shared what she’d learned as an affiliate marketer, posted her real stories, and showed up authentically. “I was just being real with people. The people who could relate to my stories, who saw the authenticity and relatability, they began to come close.”

It took her 49 days to hit 1,000 followers. People started asking questions: How are you doing this? How are you growing so fast? She could see the struggle, so she decided to help with the little results she had.

The lesson for founders here is to stop optimizing for being real and share stories that could help your audience. The attention will follow.

Authenticity isn’t a performance

Authenticity is the buzzword of the century. While everyone knows it’s important for their personal brand, few people know what it really looks like in practice.

Rita points out that too many founders think they need to perform to be liked, to present themselves in a certain way to be respected or accepted. They want to be seen as a certain kind of person they’re not. But Rita learned early that this approach doesn’t work.

“If you build on a foundation of lies, you have to sustain it with more lies. The day you tell one truth, that castle will fall like a pack of cards.” The truth always finds its way out, and maintaining a facade requires constant effort that drains energy from actually building.

Branding isn’t about creating a new person. It’s about amplifying who you already are. Your uniqueness is peculiar to you. There is no other you.

This doesn’t mean sharing everything about your life. Rita is clear about boundaries. But it means showing people the real you. “Stop playing the ‘I want to be loved by everybody’ game. Everybody cannot like you. So just be yourself. Show people the real you, be authentic.”

When you’re authentic, something shifts. The people who connect will connect. The people who relate will relate. The people who see themselves building with you will come around. “It’s only a matter of time.”

 

Building without burning out: the 9-to-5 founder

Rita believes you don’t have to sacrifice your effectiveness at work to build a brand.

The key has been managing time strategically. One of her biggest struggles was balancing her work and brand building. She tried to-do lists and task prioritization, but realized something deeper: “It’s not about having to-do lists. It’s about doing what you say you will do.”

Her solution? She doesn’t create every piece of content from scratch. “Sometimes I just repurpose. I repurpose content that I’ve put out before. Say it in another way or sometimes say it in the exact same way.” This has helped her during crunch time, especially with a full-time job demanding her attention.

When consistency becomes difficult and she feels like quitting, she looks back at why she started. “It just keeps me going. Even when there are challenges, I know that this is a phase and it will pass.”

Where personal branding is going in Africa

Rita doesn’t want to say branding is everything, but it’s beginning to look like personal branding will shift from optional to essential.

Her advice to founders waiting for the perfect moment: “Stop comparing your day one to someone else’s day 100. Just start. Don’t have the fancy tech setup? Start. You don’t have the massive results, the cars, the flashy whatever? Just start.”

She’s learned that clarity comes with time. The more steps you take, the clearer things get. “If you are waiting too long because you want everything to be perfect, you may never start.”

Start with what you have, help the person behind you, be authentic, and don’t wait for perfect. The time to build your brand is now, not when you’ve “made it.” Because by the time you think you’re ready, someone else who started imperfectly has already built the audience you’re waiting to deserve.