Does your brand make sense? Is it unified, cohesive, and coherent? If not, read on for the cure.
You love your brand, and would do anything to protect it from failure—then it ends up with an unanticipated mental disorder. Don’t panic. Let’s fix it!
How do brands build relationships with us? People can’t trust an inanimate object with no soul or feeling. They relate to and empathize with other people. You’ll need to humanize your business, either by putting a human face on it (spokesperson, salesperson, business owner, etc.) or by building a brand with a personality people can feel and interact with (which is also safer than a real person).
What happens when you end up with more than one personality in your brand? You get a brand with multiple personality disorder.
The Diagnosis
When it comes to your brand, multiple personality disorder can be defined as a state of communicating two or more personalities while targeting the same market segment. In other words, the brand is inconsistent. When a brand can’t decide whether to act funny or serious, humble or sophisticated, feminine or masculine, it ends up reflecting the opposite of each personality trait. When you’re dealing with a real person who shows a sudden change in personality, you’ll naturally have a hard time trusting that person.
How do you know when a brand has multiple personality disorder? Look at its touchpoints. You may find the brand name childish while the logo appears sophisticated. The business owner likes the name (because it’s cute) and logo (because it’s fashionable, just like Chanel). Social media offers a great way to identify brand diseases, especially in franchises whose local sponsors have little to no power over changing the brand. We’re all aware that what we say to our followers should not reflect our personality, but the brand’s personality. A serious Instagram post about health tips followed by a funny post means your brand is suffering from multiple personality disorder.
The Treatment
A brand’s multiple personality disorder means fewer loyal customers and less growth compared to what it could potentially do—and this requires immediate action. First, if you haven’t started a business, take preventative measures. Plan your brand’s personality before beginning anything. You should consider the nature of your business, your targeted segment, and differentiation (avoid copying competitors’ brand personalities.) Choose a name that fits your brand’s actual personality, not just your taste. Hire a good branding agency, and make sure they understand your company’s personality and follow it precisely. Many branding agencies will try to persuade you to change it. If you have a sound plan, stick to it.
If you already have a brand suffering from multiple personality disorder, try to gradually change it over to the right personality, because a sudden change may affect existing customer loyalty. Switching it too suddenly could cost you a fortune (changing signs, store interior, or even location). If it’s not worth the cost or you can’t afford it, at least alter your brand’s personality a little bit to suit existing work.
Social media is the marketing channel that most accurately reflects your brand’s personality. After deciding upon your strategy, choose a set of words to use: your way to greet, say thank you, and apologize for negative feedback. You can also use unfamiliar words to differentiate your brand within the market. Blaze Burgers, for example, uses “awesomeness” instead of just saying “great” or even “awesome.” You can also use more than one word for each reaction or response, like “thank you” and “thank you so much.” Your choices should be based upon the brand personality you choose, not how you usually respond to friends or followers on your personal account.
Different Segment, Different Personality
Since different segments have different needs, they may also require different personalities. I don’t really consider them personalities, however; they’re more like states of being. It’s the difference between how you act at work in front of your boss and how you act when you’re hanging out with friends. The state of your personality subtly changes when the places and people around you change, but the shift should not be obvious or absolute. Companies like Batelco, with enough resources to create new brands, play it safe by creating sub-brands like our old Simsim cards—and, more recently, the new U3, which targets young adults.
