There are two aspects to any business. The first is the internal processes. This is what you must do to ensure all the gears within your company run smoothly. It is production, management, strategizing, campaigning, and so much more. You cannot exist as a business without having a great company culture that places its employees’ well-being as its priority so that everyone can collectively work together towards a more successful future.
The other aspect of a business is its public face. Even if you don’t necessarily sell to the public, and are instead a B2B operation, this still applies. This face is the branding, the voice, the logo and your persona that you share with the world. Customers don’t buy from the team behind your brand; they buy into the brand. That is why you need to create a brand persona.
What Is a Brand Persona?
A brand persona is very similar to your brand identity. In fact, the two could not exist without each other. Your brand identity is the aesthetic choices you make and keep, which help customers recognize you on whichever platform they use. It means finding a signature look, right down from your choice of photos, to your logo, to even your font. Doing all this work but not crafting a brand persona, however, is a huge mistake.
Your brand persona is not the face of the company, but rather the voice of it. Many companies have found ways to successfully build a rapport with their customers by being funny, or by providing consistent, excellent customer service. It is especially important in the written word, as you will need to use more literary devices to convey the right tone. Your goal is to create a character for your company that feels genuine so that people will genuinely respond to your brand. Doing this will boost your social media engagement and help you build a lifelong relationship with each customer.
It is important to note that these conversations will be public. That is why your brand persona is so important. It isn’t just you talking to one person; it is you talking to one person with an audience. The better, funnier, or more helpful your brand persona is, the more you can advertise your company to everyone who glances at the comments.
Why Create a Brand Persona?
Brand personas are key for business online marketing. They are how you connect with customers. The more organic and genuine your company’s voice is, the more people will create a bond with you. This personification is what will set you apart from your competition. People are used to hearing the standard “business-speak” that conveys professionalism and enthusiasm, and while this is an acceptable persona to adopt, it simply doesn’t stand out. That is why companies that are funny can go viral. Notable examples include how Wendy’s roasts users on Twitter, or Netflix’s snarky remarks. These lighthearted jokes make people laugh and have gained international recognition.
Your brand persona should be unique to your company. It should feel genuine, and most of all it should be memorable. Building a great brand identity and persona is how you will create loyal users who see your company as their friend, rather than a corporate entity.
Having a unique brand persona can also be key to a small business. That is because people expect your operation to be small, and therefore will assume that who they hear is the owner. Use your digital voice to make friends, and you will be surprised at how much you can increase visibility and sales.
Start with Your Brand Identity
If you are not sure how to create your brand identity, start with who you are as a company. This means knowing what you do, what your values are, and what your goals for the future will be. Together you can find a theme that compliments who you are as a company. If your product is bold, use bold colors. If it’s environmentally conscious, natural tones will work well, and so on.
Once you have your brand identity, you will have a few options on how you can build your persona. You will want to play on expectations, and either cater to them or completely subvert them. If you subvert expectations, you will have to be prepared to be funny in all of your posts. When Netflix of Wendy’s roast people on social media, they are subverting the expectation we give to companies. That expectation is professional and kind. You can subvert expectations in other ways, as well. If your brand aesthetic uses a lot of pastels and bright colors, you can subvert the expectation of being girly by making your persona is more hardcore, using short sentences, periods, and darker language.
It is important to note that you won’t get your brand persona right immediately. If you are subverting expectations, it will take awhile to find the right note that most people find funny. If you want to rely on professionalism, you might tweak how you speak and engage as you go in order to be more genuine, and so on.
Find Your Voice
If you are a new business, start before you launch to find your voice. This voice will take time to develop, just like any writer’s voice does. Small business owners or sole traders should aim to use their own voices. They can be part of the face of their company, and in doing so should present a version of themselves to the world.
Your voice can be anything you like, but you need to remember to tailor it as you go so that you get the most engagement. People want to have a real conversation when they go through the effort of commenting or reviewing your company. By creating a persona it doesn’t matter if you are a sole trader or if you are the social media manager in a large company, your customer will feel as if they are engaging with the persona that is your company.
Engage, Engage, Engage
Of course, developing your persona is useless if you aren’t going to use it to engage with others. Captions should be tailored to encourage engagement by asking questions, but if you don’t then respond to the answers given, you aren’t building relationships.
That is why you must always engage. Aim to answer as many people’s comments as possible. If you are on any other platform other than Facebook, try going to the commenter’s profile and finding their first name so that when you respond, you can tailor it to them and them alone. No one wants to feel like their comment was replied to with a bot. The more you can do to sound unique and to pull in personal data that shows them you care about them as individuals, the better.
This is especially important if the comment is a complaint. You want to take care of the issue professionally and promptly because when complaints are published, you will have others reading the comment thread. By dealing with the matter personally and professionally, you advertise your skills in customer service. You can be funny all you want, but when a genuine complaint comes through you must deal with it professionally.
Offer Value
Being funny and offering great customer service through engagement are not the only ways that your brand can benefit from your persona. You could, for instance, offer insider’s information in your caption instead of the traditionally professional enthusiasm or even wit. The more value you provide, the more you will be able to create a community of loyal followers.
Train Your Employees of Consistency
Once you have found the sweet spot for your voice through trial and error, it is time to train your employees. Though you should only have one person or a small team working on social media engagement to keep your voice as consistent as possible, that doesn’t mean you don’t have to worry about other areas in your company. Customers will send in complaints through more traditional means like email. Though professionalism should always be your priority when these private messages are concerned, that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t try to make it feel like they are still speaking to the company persona. If your persona is enthusiastic, add that. If your persona is passionate about your values, add that in, and so on. These shouldn’t detract from the customer service, but they should be added in small doses to keep your brand consistent.
There are so many ways to build up your persona. What is important is that you work on your persona and tweak it as you go. You won’t get it right from the start. In fact, you cannot get it right from the start. That is because you need to have your customers engage with you for you to find the sweet spot that works best for you and your company. Create a compelling, helpful, and memorable persona and brand identity, and users will see you as a friend, rather than a business, and that is when you will know you have successfully created a lifelong customer.
