How to find your authentic Brand Persona

Brand Strategy

Jan 23

There is a huuuuuge talk all the time on socials about staying authentic, being real and showing up as yourself online. But as a business, running a business account, the line can become blurred with sharing too much and not sharing enough.

The buyers drive has shifted drastically from 30, 50, 60 years ago. Before, consumers would buy something based on the cost and the convenience of it. They would shop at their local grocery store because it’s close and the prices are good. Now, in the 21st century, where every market out there is saturated, buyers are also looking at WHO the business is and whether they feel emotionally connected enough to purchase something. They want to know what your business values are (are you a sustainable brand; do you focus on natural homegrown items; is your coaching based on helping for the long term and not a quick fix), they have the desire to know who they are working with or purchasing from (are you down home; are you city; is humour your go to or are you serious), and they want a glimpse at what it would be like to have a conversation with you, as the brand (business) owner.

Your Brand Persona is an extension of you the way you want to portray yourself online. It’s a combination of these things:

your tone of voice
your mission
your values
your connecting anchors

Because you are in the drivers seat of your business, your business(brand) is going to be an extension of you, so of course you want to show up authentically! But here’s the thing: there’s a limit on the nitty gritty parts you should share.

Here’s an example - as a parent, within 1 hour you can feel happy, blissful, angry, frustrated, motivated, inspired, tired and full of love. If you showed up on your socials, your business page, in each moment of that your audience would get serious whiplash! And instead of building trust and stability with your potential clients/customers, you’re showing that life is CRAZY for you and you maybe don’t have a solid footing on things.

I’m sure you’re thinking But I want to keep it real and show that i’m a human too!

10000 times yes! And you can do this in a way that still builds trust and loyalty.

Here’s another example - my husband works away in the winter, often times my kitchen is a mess and my laundry is piled up, I don’t want to show this on social media every day, but I can snap a quick picture of me and say “hey! this is my reality! sometimes the dishes don’t get done because i’m solo parenting and my kids were crazy and I had meetings and chickens to tend to, that’s okay!” and here’s what this is doing: it’s creating connecting anchors with my audience (kids, solo parenting, chickens), it’s showing that i’m real and human, but it’s not a constant thing I share.

Your tone of voice, your mission, your values and your connecting anchors all drive emotional buy in for your potential customers/clients. So finding cohesion and a strategy that aligns is imperative to building trust and loyalty. Here’s what I recommend you do:

spend some time thinking about and listing what parts of you in your personal life you want to share as connecting points with your ideal audience (hint: it should be connecting points with them too)
then figure out where your tone of voice is - are you more professional online than in person? does that represent your brand? do you use humour and crack dad jokes?
then uncover what your mission is as a business - what the heck kind of impact are you trying to make?
and finally — highlight your values.
Within these 4 areas, you can uncover your Brand Persona. Now bring CONFIDENCE to the game. You know what you’re going to share about each day to build connection because you’ve found your anchor points, you know how you are going to share information with your tone of voice, you know what your mission is - so talk about your services and offers - and you can speak your values in what you do and walk the walk.

Go get em tiger,

Cheryl