Written in Partnership with Amir Bakian
A brand’s personality should be built to last. This series of human-like characteristics you convey through your brand can be built around your own personality — if you’re a small business, founder-fronted company, or solopreneur — or they can be crafted from your company’s values, your clients’ personas, and other factors.
Presenceology Founder and CEO Mila Yoli has been helping founders create compelling brand personalities since 2018.
Trained in clinical psychology, Mila shifted her focus to personal and company brand strategy after noticing many places where psychology could be applied to branding to create more robust results.
She advises those new to brand personalities to think of them as how you might describe a company if it were a friend or family member and not a professional entity. For example, is your company friendly, funny, serious, or knowledgeable?
The two most important parts of crafting a solid and engaging brand personality are to create something unique and to be consistent with how you present it.
“When building your brand, it’s fundamental to know not only what you value as a human being but also what your brand will stand for,” said Yoli.
For example, a potential client finds you on Instagram and loves your brand personality, so they quickly visit your website and other social media pages and discover a different voice and personality; it’s a bit off-putting. Or let’s imagine you have a post that goes viral and lots of people visit your page only to find a collection of posts that all seem to be written by different people; that’s a branding no-no. Yoli explains “It would create confusion in your audience’s mind and a confused mind does not trust”.
To help you understand more about how to develop a brand personality, Yoli shared her three favorite pieces of advice on the subject.
Your Brand Should Feel Natural
If you create a personality for a founder-fronted business, it makes sense that the brand’s personality should mirror your own. For example, it is alright and, in some cases necessary, for the brand’s purpose and mission that it showcases a more subdued phase of the solopreneur. The point to drive home here is that, for an extrovert who presents boldly, or even over the top, to have what feels like a subdued version of themselves for a brand is confusing and could cause a disconnect.
“When building a brand as a solopreneur, it’s important that your business stays true to who you are as a person,” said Yoli.
If you’re unsure how to distill your personality into a brand, Yoli recommends starting with online personality tests such as 16Personalities. Then, use what you discover to build your brand’s foundations.
Consider Brand Archetypes
Another way to build a personality for your brand is by using some of Carl Jung’s traditional psychology of the psyche. He identified a set of personas related to values, goals, behaviors, and patterns that is useful across a number of disciplines.
As a brand strategy expert and former therapist, Yoli often employs a variety of psychological teachings in her work to get the most personalized results. By deciding on which persona you want your brand to have, you can begin to understand how to present this image to the public consistently and with your own style.
The personalities outlined include archetypes such as The Hero, The Lover, The Jester, The Outlaw, and more. I recommend What Stories Are You Telling? by Carol S. Pearson as well, which delves as to how valuable content can be weaved into your own branding efforts.
Never Stray From Your Values
We all have personal values, which should reflect in your brand personality. To craft and leverage a strong brand personality that will attract the kind of clients you want to work with, ensure that your values and personality are reflected in everything that leaves your office.
For example, your brand personality shouldn’t include edgy jokes if you, as a person, are hypersensitive to hurting others’ feelings. On the other hand, if you can rarely resist making jokes on any and every topic, harness that fun-loving feeling in your brand to make it sound and seem even more natural.
Using these tips, you should be well on your way to creating a brand persona that clients will love as well as one that reflects your own values as well.
About Mila Yoli
Mila Yoli, CEO and Founder of Presenceology, has helped entrepreneurs reinvent themselves by utilizing her extensive psychology expertise. A former therapist, Yoli helps business leaders find their unique presence and offers that make them stand out as more than just another voice in the crowd with her signature program, “Stand Out Brand”. To learn more and discover the science behind Presenceology, visit www.presenceology.com
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