How to establish a unique brand personality

A brand personality is a set of human characteristics that are attributed to a brand’s name which a consumer can relate to. An effective brand can increase its brand equity by displaying a consistent set of traits that a specific consumer segment would approve of and admire. This is a value-added qualitative personality that a brand would gain in addition to its functional benefits.

Here are some of the ways of developing a unique personality for your brand.

Develop a personality plan

You need to first think about how you would describe your business to others. What are the words that come to your mind? In order to develop emotional associations of the brand, you need to build a plan around those keywords or phrases.

Your business might either be established and traditional or energetic and modern. In the case of traditional and established businesses, use strong colours, symmetry and typefaces with a more formal personality in order to -communicate your message. Modern and energetic brands can go for a trendy design that have a light tone and use brighter colours.

Create a voice

The same words that you use to determine your brand personality will also help you in creating your voice. The way you speak to customers is known as the brand voice. The voice should be consistent throughout all the content that the company generates, starting from the design to the videos and other marketing communications.

Strategically use a list of key words in communications. Choose unique phrases from your strategic plan or mission statement in your marketing material, advertising, social media profiles and on your website. You can also create a blog where the voice of your brand will come alive and communicate to customers directly.

Give a persona to your business. For example, is it light or serious, male or female, young or old? Develop on these guidelines to express the benefits of your business.

Choose a set of identifiers

A huge part of personality and identity comes in through the design process. The company logo and your website are going to be the biggest identifiers for most of your customers. The images, typography, colour and other elements you use are sure to impact brand personality.

These are a few common design allocations:

Colour: Cool colors are more calm and relaxed while warm colors are happy and stimulating.

Typography: Sans serifs are more modern while serif typefaces are more mature and formal.

Images: While landscapes leave room for customer interpretation, customers tend to connect strongly with photos with faces included in them. Shape: Round elements are considered casual, while hard edges are more formal.

Space: Tightly arranged elements are chaotic while open space seems inviting.

Create a style guide

Once you have made a final decision about your brand personality, write it down and create a book of images that showcase it right. Creating a brand style guide can help detail everything about your business, including colour palette, images, voice, copy and tone guidelines, typography options and usage standards.

Every business has a personality and it is fun to identify and understand yours. You can make your brand instantly identifiable by just being consistent. Your business will stand out because of your unique personality.