Determining your brand’s personality is a crucial step before you start a logo design or web design project for your small business or non-profit. Yet, it’s a step that many organizations skip, either because they’ve never worked with a professional to create brand guidelines or because the branding professional just wasn’t that professional.

Give Me an Example of Brand Personality

Think about Nike and Lexus. They have two completely different brand personalities. Nike appeals to athletes and the everyman while Lexus desires to be more exclusive and luxurious. If Lexus suddenly designed their sleek, metallic “L” logo with camouflage instead of silver (or platinum), the world would wonder if someone from Duck Dynasty had purchased the company. And that just makes me laugh. Next thing you know, Lexus would come out with a line of four wheelers painted with American flags. The simple use of camouflage in their logo would denote a change in brand personality.

How Do We Determine Our Brand’s Personality?

When we’re helping a client with branding, we use an exercise from Brand Deck. On the front and back of each card are words that might be used to describe your company. For example, “basic” on the front and “high-end” on the back, “professional” on the front and “playful” on the back, and “scientific” paired with “artistic.”

Through the exercise, you sort the cards/words into three piles: You Are, You Are Not, and Does Not Apply. By the end of the exercise, your goal is to have around 3 cards in the You Are pile and 3 cards in the You Are Not pile, because it’s just as important to understand what your brand is not.

This is not an endorsed blog post or an affiliate link. We just really love these cards and this brand personality exercise, and clients love it, as all. The process of determining which cards You Are by talking it out with your team (or just with us), is invaluable.

Ok, We Know Our Brand’s Personality, Now What?

Now, you can create!

Almost.

Do you also know your buyers’ personas? Tomorrow, I’ll be tackling that topic.

But you are one step closer to being able to successfully design that logo or develop that website or write that ad copy. Knowing your brand’s personality and your buyers’ personas is the combination you need to consistently represent your brand to the right people every time.

Need help understanding your brand’s personality? Contact us today!