Steven Bartlett's personal brand strategy: what works and what I'd change

At a glance

Steven Bartlett hosts The Diary of a CEO, an interview podcast with its own YouTube channel. On Instagram he is @steven, and his bio lists Steven.com, FlightStory, Flight Fund and thirdweb, with "Investor: 100+ companies". His LinkedIn describes Steven.com as the creator media company he founded.

These are the numbers I (Tom Sharman) read from his public YouTube, Instagram and LinkedIn on 13 November 2026. The 30 days run from 14 October to 12 November 2026.

His top episodes and clips in the 30 days

The biggest long-form episodes and Instagram reels, as I (Tom Sharman) read them on 13 November 2026. Episode dates are YouTube publish dates.

Each reel above is cut from the episode that went out the same day: Zelenskyy on 22 October, Professor Robert Pape on 5 November and Dr Christopher Kerr on 19 October. The reel is the trailer, and the caption sends you to the full conversation.

What Steven Bartlett does really well

Five things I (Tom Sharman) would point any founder to, each with the number or the post behind it.

• The long form is the engine. Nine episodes in 30 days, on every Monday and Thursday, at a median of about 102 minutes and 5,222,291 views. The rhythm never moves, so the audience knows when to come back. When I (Tom Sharman) ran Secret Leaders, two premium interviews a week was the spine of the whole operation too.
• Guests are chosen, not booked. His executive producer, Jack Sylvester, has said in public interviews that a guest needs three yeses: Steven is interested, the guest is the expert and speaks well, and the audience wants it. Two is a no. They also hunt outlier guests whose interviews beat everything else on the channels they visit. I wrote it up as steps in a podcast built to repeat.
• One clip per episode, the morning it goes out. All 9 reels in the 30 days landed on an episode day, around 8am UK time, and each is a trailer: the four I opened run 92 to 119 seconds. 8 of the 9 passed a million plays. In my read, as Tom Sharman, the clip's job is to carry the episode to people who would never search for a 102 minute conversation.
• A comment keyword that routes to the long form. All four reels I opened in the window start the caption with "Comment ‘watch’ and I’ll DM you this conversation." The median reel drew 10,095 comments, and the 12 November reel drew 35,456. That turns a short clip into a direct route to the full episode.
• One caption, three platforms. The David Perlmutter caption ran word for word on Instagram and LinkedIn on 12 November, and the Katt Williams text ran on LinkedIn and as the YouTube Short description on 9 November. I (Tom Sharman) read that as a team that writes the idea once and spends its time on the clip.

Where each format sits in his funnel

Tom Sharman's read of the funnel: the Instagram reels and YouTube Shorts are top of funnel, there to win people who have never watched an episode. The two-hour episode is the middle, where trust is built, and it is where the brand really lives. The bottom is everything the brand carries: the book, the newsletter and the shop linked from the YouTube channel, and the companies and investments named in his Instagram bio and on LinkedIn.

LinkedIn plays a different part. Of his latest eight posts, three are written founder posts, one of them about a company he invested in. That is where the brand does its work for the businesses, in front of the founders and buyers who read there.

What I'd do differently

Five changes I (Tom Sharman) would make, each from the method I used to take Sam Stoffel from 0 to 500,000 followers in 10 months and to relaunch Secret Leaders. None of it is a fix for something broken. It is how I would get more out of a system that already works.

• Score every clip by views per follow. The scoreboard I use is views per follow: how many views it takes to win one new follower. With Sam the team cut it from 24 to 14 by iterating on format and hook. The Diary of a CEO channel description already says "69% of our viewers don't realise they don't subscribe". That is a follow problem, and plays alone will not show it. Follows per clip are not public, so I can't score Steven from outside, but his team can.
• Give each format one job. Today the reel does two: it has to reach new people and it asks them to comment for a DM. My rule, Tom Sharman's, is one person, one problem, one solution, and land on a hard line with no call to action. I would split the reels into discovery clips that ask for nothing and episode trailers that carry the keyword, and judge each against its own job.
• Post more of the clips that already won on Instagram. In the 30 days the channel put out 19 YouTube Shorts, against 9 Instagram reels. GET READY FOR THE NEXT EIGHT WEEKS did 1,538,072 views as a Short, and it is a proven clip ready for another platform. I build founders towards two to three posts a day, and 8 of 9 reels past a million plays says the Instagram audience wants more.
• Promote only the winners to LinkedIn. Both episode posts in his latest eight went up on release day, before anyone knew which clip would work. In my long form to short form method, a clip goes to LinkedIn once it beats the trailing 30 day median. With Sam I put the proven winners on LinkedIn, where the buyers are.
• Give the companies a named format. The brand carries Steven.com, FlightStory, Flight Fund and his investments, but in the 30 days of Instagram reels I read, they show up only in the bio. I (Tom Sharman) would give them one recurring format with one job, such as a weekly "what I'm building" post, so the audience the podcast wins can see the businesses behind it.

How this compares with Tom Sharman's builds

Two builds of mine sit either side of this one. At Secret Leaders I (Tom Sharman) was Head of Content from July 2024 to May 2025 and relaunched a legacy audio show as video first, with a studio built from scratch and two premium interviews a week. In my words: "We took a legacy audio podcast to number two in the UK business charts, behind only Steven Bartlett." It also taught me that views are a weak proxy for a business show: one episode did 2,000 views and was worth more commercially than videos with a hundred times the audience.

Sam Stoffel's build is the other side: no podcast, short form first, and a follow scoreboard from day one. I ran Sam's content as Head of Content from June 2025 to May 2026.

What this looks like when I build it

• Sam Stoffel, 0 to 500,000 followers in 10 months. As Head of Content I (Tom Sharman) rebuilt the team, found three formats and set a system that posted three times a day. The team logged views and new followers on every video and cut the views needed to win a follower from 24 to 14.
• Ben Heath, Heath Media. I ran personal brand and content for five months, from May to September 2026, and the content team I ran grew to 14. I launched the Skool community, which became the number one trending money community on Skool and the sixth trending globally.

If you're a founder building this

How I (Tom Sharman) would have a founder copy what works here, then where to start with me.

• Make one long-form show the engine, on a fixed day or two each week, and never move it.
• Book guests on three yeses: you are interested, they are the expert, and your audience wants it.
• Cut a trailer clip for every episode and post it the morning the episode goes out.
• Use a comment keyword on trailers only, and keep discovery clips free of any ask.
• Write the caption once and carry it across Instagram, LinkedIn and YouTube, then judge every clip by views per follow.

Power hour session, £600. This session fixes the fundamentals. The principles and systems behind 2B+ views, condensed and applied to you. You leave knowing what to make, who it is for and the format it lives in. Book a power hour session.

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How the numbers were read

I (Tom Sharman) read every number on this page on 13 November 2026. On YouTube that is The Diary of a CEO channel page, its latest 30 long-form videos (3 August to 12 November 2026) and its latest 48 Shorts (back to 11 September 2026). On Instagram it is his profile and his reels tab, and the 30 day window is the 9 reels from 14 October to 12 November. On LinkedIn it is his profile and its eight most recent public posts, from 3 to 12 November.

Plays are Instagram plays only, and views are YouTube views. Times are UK time. Steven is not a client, and this is my reading of his public content, nothing more. The Sam Stoffel, Ben Heath and Secret Leaders numbers are from my own case studies.