Everyone has a personality and it usually has two sides: how you view yourself and how others view you. For example, you may think you are a hilarious person with all the jokes you tell but others might disagree and even find you boring! Ultimately, others will form their opinion of your personality based on a combination of different elements. If you want to portray professionalism, then your words, actions, and even appearance should reflect that. This same concept applies to your brand or company. You must remember that everyone that comes across your brand will eventually develop their own perception of your brand personality. However, you have the power to influence that perception!
Why is Brand Personality Important
Whatever your brand or company may be, chances are there are infinite others that are similar. Potential clients will come across many options before choosing one over the rest. This is where your brand personality can come into play. If you can find a way to stand out from your competition, then you will increase your chances of drawing in all those potential clients. Imagine an employer interviewing candidates to fill an open position. Of course all of them are going to dress up for the interview, take their resume, etc. However, if there is a candidate that manages to stand out from the rest, they will have a higher chance of landing that job. As mentioned earlier, this can be done in a variety of ways. Perhaps it was something they said, or maybe they did a better job of highlighting their skills in comparison to their competitors. The same applies to your brand; you want to stand out from your competition.
How to Build Your Brand Personality?
Before you start introducing your personal brand to others, you need to have a clear idea of what you are trying to promote or want to be known for. If this is not clear in your eyes, it will certainly not be clear in the eyes of your target audience. What do you want your brand to say about you? What qualities are you trying to highlight or emphasize? A common mistake is to “bite off more than you can chew”. Do not try and overwhelm your audience by overloading them with information or products. Instead, start off with a specific focus and let your brand develop itself over time. A good way to do this is to make a list of traits that you would like associated with your brand. Some examples are things such as sincerity, excitement, and sophistication. You can always use a personal brand dimension framework to help facilitate this process. There are many that can be found online. They list the most common traits associated with different brands and then categorize them based of different sub elements. You should remember to order these in order from most to least important. You always want to start off with your strongest trait.
How to Communicate Your Brand Personality?
Do not commit the same mistakes that many businesses do. They find a similar business to theirs and use that as a “template” for their brand personality. That is a huge mistake, especially since the ultimate goal is to stand out from your competition. There are three main areas that you want to focus on to communicate your brand personality in an effective manner. The first is visual identity. If you goal is to communicate professionalism then you should choose fonts, colors, backgrounds, etc that reflect professionalism. The same applies to any logos and images you are planning to use. Just take a look at the logos for some of the most successful companies. They are not oversaturated with colors, words, or other things. The apple logo is one color and doesn’t even have any words, yet it is one of the most recognizable logos today! The next area you want to focus on is your brands voice. Remember that written words also have a voice. You word choice is going to be a crucial factor in determining this. For example, imagine two perfume companies advertising their new perfumes. One uses the phrase “new fragrance” and the other uses “new smell”. Which one sounds more like something you would want to purchase? More than likely you answered, “new fragrance”. That is because that phrase has a positive connotation! Therefore, you should be mindful of your word choices. The last area to focus on is your brand actions. This includes a variety of things. Some examples are the quality of your customer service, policies on things such as exchanges or returns, and warranty of products or services. You should put yourself in the “shoes” of a potential client and ask yourself, would you pick your business or company over your competitors?
Now What?
The next step is simply to get out there and start experimenting. Think of who your target market is and what they look for in a product or business. Take a deep look at your website or social media pages and analyze them to determine if they are portraying what you want them to. If not, you are going to need to make some changes until you are satisfied with your brand personality!
