Your brand character and you

In our last two posts we asked Which seasonal personality is your brand? and we discussed Colour psychology for your business. Here, we move on to talk about how your brand character and your own, are two separate things, and how to distinguish between them.

Someone with a personal character that is organised, calm and aspirational, might own a business creating work that is highly creative, expressive and bright. So for example, to use brand colours that were calm, muted and clean, to express that 'summer' personality would not at all reflect their work, which would be much more about a light, bright palette, in that 'spring' vibe.

I think that the key thing here, is to remember that your brand first and foremost needs to communicate the personality of the product or the service that you offer. That's not to say that your values as a person aren't important to your brand however - I think that they are - it's that old saying that 'people buy from people', and I think that it adds a vital and unique quality to a business. But we don't want to put too much of that across - strip back and strip back some more, and stay on-point, or else you'll confuse selling your product / service with selling yourself.

Visually, your brand should be one definite season, with perhaps undertones of another if appropriate. For example, a high-end creative whose work is exciting and bright, would be mainly a spring personality, with an edge of winter, to really get across their expertise. This edge of winter wouldn't have to be communicated with colour, but with font, texture, illustration style or surface pattern that represents that season - all of which make up a well styled brand.

Non-visually, your brand needs to carry that personality through your processes, communication and multi-channel marketing, and this is where your values can seem to overlap your brand character. A spring personality for instance is open, inclusive and reliable - your own personality may resonate with these values and characteristics or may not, but either way, to keep your branding strong and consistent you will have to be sure to communicate these characteristics through your processes.

Photo sources - craft tags Eat Drink Chic, desk space Polagram.