Turning your cogs about the inner workings of brand personality?
I like your style.
Y’know, brains and brands aren’t too dissimilar.
In fact, the way our brains view brands is much like interacting with a real life person.
So it makes sense that beyond the informative, valuable and down right mind-blowing business content you share…
Your brand personality’s got some serious pulling power in the connection space. Not to mention conversions.
In fact, 45% of a brand’s image is said to be the result of “what a brand says and how they say it.”
(Emphasis on the how).
So what does it look like in action? Let’s stage-dive in.
Is there really a psychology to brand personality?
Got a mate who’s always up for a good time?
What about another who you *know* will complain about the traffic before the door creaks closed behind them?
Then there’s Carol, who always happens to link her thirst for something new on the weekend back to her astrological sign (how very *Sagittarius*).
Much like the personalities you experience in your everyday, brands exist in a way that helps us:
- Predict interactions
- Feel a li’l somethin’
- Grow connections that matter
And there’s an intricate psychology to how the whole shebang comes together.
Flamin’ hot tip: *even if* shakin’ a brand personality isn’t a focus for you, you’re already sharing one. So why not fuel that bad boy with psychological superpowers?
After a mind-bending psychology degree, I’ve learnt a few key pointers about brand personality.
Here are my tippy tops:
1. The Mere Exposure Effect
Liking something or someone more, simply by seeing it numerous times. Commonly, preferring things that are familiar.
The mere exposure effect guides many things in our lives. Our connections, beliefs and sometimes even who we’ll marry.
So when it comes to brand personality, rockin’ a consistent message isn’t just a way to concisely share your differentiators…
It’s also a powerful psychological tool to woo potential clients and grow an audience of raving fans.
How to apply the mere exposure effect to your brand personality:
- Develop core traits – personality traits are the emotive edges of your brand
- Develop core language – your words and terms original to you become liked the more often they’re seen
- Develop core messaging – create one personality-infused message to increase memorability and connection
Flamin’ hot tip: check out this brand personality trait cheat sheet.
2. The Power Of Non-Verbal Communication
“The way you listen, look, move and react.” Think: facial expressions, gestures and touch
I know what you’re thinking.
“Dan! How the hell can I make my brand personality non-verbal?
Especially if my biz lives 100% online?”
Yep, get that.
But the thing about non-verbal communication is that for brands, this comes down to how you share what you share.
Let me explain.
Even the teeny-weeniest elements of your brand communicate with *some type* of personality. Whether you mean to or not.
Your brand personality visuals work to complement your ‘verbal’ personality in a whole lotta ways.
Think:
- CASE – is this brand YELLING AT ME, Making A Point or speaking ~softly?
- Questions – where you’d otherwise give a knowing nod that they have questions, position an enquiry box
- Images – what emotion is your reader wanting or feeling? Choose images that reflect their emotional state
- Colours – like non-verbal communication in real life, your colours and visual feel shouldn’t contradict your message
Flamin’ hot tip: Mirror neurons fire off when we observe another human’s emotions. These little babies are designed to assess intention understanding. Which is precisely why sharing imagery that reflects current or aspiring emotions helps build a closer connection between brand personality and reader.
3. Cognitive Empathy
Feeling closer to someone who mirrors your feelings back to you. “Providing an emotional bridge”
It’s no secret that perceiving and understanding emotions is a superpower when growing connections. So including cognitive empathy in your brand personality is a killer way to shimmy into your dream peeps’ hearts.
What emotions guide your potential client’s buying decisions? Are they tired of same-same and wish for a cutting edge approach? Are they overwhelmed after shopping around and need concise info that s-p-e-l-l-s out your inclusions? Or do they wanna work with you and only you because you’re approachable/kind/creative/data-driven/polished?
Spoiler alert, the only way to know for sure is to:
- Interview dream clients – echo the way THEY describe their problems, frustrations and hopes right back at ’em
- Fine-tune your writer-reader relationship – Justin Blackman runs an excellent workshop on this. Your relationship will help to build out exactly how you relate to, speak to and empathise with your reader
- Stage-dive into problems – by talking about your client’s problems in your original way shows you understand them (and potentially their best solution)
- Objections over the speakers – rather than avoiding talking about why someone may not wanna buy from you, use this to guide your messaging. By showing that you understand their thought patterns with your original personality, you’ll grow a closer connection between two thinkin’, feelin’ people. Plus your reader and your original way of chattin’ hesitations.
Wanna roll out a rockin’ brand personality?
Check out these 3 killer examples of personalities that rock, read up on where personality sits with voice and tone, or discover your own brand personality by taking the Brand Personality Playlist Quiz.
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