How To Make Your Brand Words Powerful
- August 22, 2023
- Nicole Andrew
Table of Contents
Brand words are more than just a collection of keywords or catchphrases; they are the essence of your brand’s personality, values, and voice. If you’ve felt stuck at how to bring about your brand words to life, you should look at them from a different perspective.
Rather than merely trying to shoehorn these words into your marketing content, you need to breathe life into them, make them part of your brand’s DNA. You first have to understand who your character brand is to then be able to speak like them.
In this blog post, we’ll explore the vital steps to make your brand words not just words on a page, but the living expression of what your brand stands for.
STEP 1: Identify Your Audience Archetype - what it is and why it matters
An audience archetype is a ‘profile’ that represents your target audience for your brand. It matters because it helps you create targeted messages, resonating with their characteristics, values, and needs helping you communicate better and building your brand trust.
By focusing on two picked audience archetypes rather than one, you can understand both the characteristic combinations and the deeper emotional layers of your audience’s challenges, fears, and desires. This will better your brand’s identity in creating more impactful, rich-filled, and human-centered messages.
Combining two audience archetypes is a strategy that puts your customer at the heart of your brand, leading to stronger connections for your long-term success.
Your Audience’s Challenges, Fears, and Desires
It’s not just about selling your offer(s); it’s about addressing real human emotions and needs.
By identifying and speaking to these three aspects, you’ll demonstrate empathy and understanding, showing that your brand is not just about transactions, but about relationships.
You can then craft solutions that genuinely address their pain points, alleviate their fears, and fulfill their desires.
Identifying their needs, desires, and pain points requires research, empathy, and analysis. That means intentionally communicating with them is the first step in how to understand them. Plan it all out and put in the research to learn their demographics and psychographics.
Your research can include surveys, focus groups, and understanding your customer’s feedback. Recognize what they require, wish for, and the problems they face, enabling the creation of your offer(s) and the messages that connect directly to their interests.
Your listening and interpersonal skills will make the MOST out of understanding your target audience.
STEP 2: Identify Your Brand Archetype
Because your brand operates like a HUMAN, it’s also based on an archetype(s).
By identifying with a particular archetype, your brand will take on a PERSONA. That means you’re able to articulate its values, mission, and messaging, creating a coherent and appealing brand image when engaging with your audience.
Understanding the role that your brand plays is a fundamental aspect of building a successful and coherent brand identity.
Your Core Brand Plays An Important Role
Understanding the characteristics of your brand means diving into what makes your brand unique, including its purpose, values, mission, and personality. Identifying with a specific archetype allows your target audience to quickly grasp what your brand stands for and what they can expect from you.
Just like your audience archetypes, these characteristics about your brand provide a foundational infrastructure for all your marketing efforts, ensuring consistency and rich-filled communication across every touchpoint.
***Read these related articles if you haven’t written your: Brand Purpose, Mission Statement, Vision Statement, or Values.
Expressing your brand’s character allows you to communicate more powerfully and connect more deeply with your audience.
STEP 3: Visualize the Person Your Brand Has Become
Visualizing your human characteristics and nature means:
- You’ll become more approachable, engaging, and memorable.
- You’ll be able to craft messages that speak like a human, not like a faceless corporation.
If you want your brand to become more personable, answer these questions,
- If your brand were a friend, what would they sound like?
- What would they care about?
- How would they interact with others?
Answering these questions helps you create a voice, tone, and style that feels natural and authentic. THAT IS WHAT MATTERS when in relationship with your audience.
When your brand becomes HUMAN, you’ll turn your brand into a living entity that connects, communicates, and builds lasting relationships with your audience.
Express Your Brand
Focusing on how your brand expresses itself is an essential aspect of creating a cohesive and resonant brand identity. It’s not just about the words you say on a page but the whole personality and image your brand embodies. Remember to be consistent.
Here’s how you might approach these two aspects:
- What type of tone are we using
Your tone of voice is one of the most critical elements of a brand’s expression. It sets the mood and conveys your brand’s attitude. The choice between funny, serious, formal, casual, or any other tone must align with your brand’s values, audience expectations, and the context in which your brand operates.
- Visualize how your brand would move its body, express its face, and clothes it would wear
Visualizing the brand as a person extends the concept of brand identity into a more tangible and relatable realm. It’s a creative and powerful way to explore and define the brand’s personality further:
Body Movement: How would your brand move if it were a person? Gracefully? Energetically? Confidently? The way the brand “moves” can translate into the design, flow, and feel of everything from your website to your in-store experience.
Facial Expression: Is your brand’s “face” friendly and welcoming, stern and authoritative, or quirky and mischievous? This can guide the visual imagery you use, such as graphics, photos, and video content.
Clothing Style: What “clothes” would your brand wear? Elegant suits? Casual wear? Trendy or classic? This can inform the design aesthetics, including colors, fonts, and overall style.
STEP 4: Using your brand words in your brand marketing:
Once you’ve created your brand words, here’s a process on how to use them.
- Have your brand words list readily available (from your brand guidelines) and stick to the strategic direction. It was created intentionally with you in making this all possible.
- By learning your words, seamlessly weave them into all forms of content marketing. This means not just including them but crafting sentences and narratives that naturally incorporate these words.
They should enhance the content, not feel forced or artificial. Consistent use across different platforms, from websites to social media to email campaigns, reinforces your brand’s voice and identity. - If you’re creating videos, consider how your brand as a person would sound and act. Use voice-over or presenter styles that align with your brand’s personality. Visual elements, like design and imagery, should also reflect the brand words, creating a cohesive visual and auditory experience.
- Your brand may grow and evolve, and your brand words list should reflect this growth. Regularly review and update your list to ensure it stays aligned with your brand’s current stage. This includes not just adding new words, but possibly phasing out words that no longer fit. Keeping your list up-to-date ensures that your content continues to resonate and accurately represents your brand.
- Ensure that everyone involved in content creation understands and uses the brand words list. This may require training, collaboration, and ongoing communication to keep everyone on the same page.
Need help in your Brand Words research?
Crafting the right brand words and integrating them seamlessly into your strategy can be a complex process. It’s not just about selecting words; it’s about understanding their impact, their alignment with your goals, and how they fit into the larger picture of your brand.
Contact us to help you find the right voice for your brand and bring your words to life. Your brand deserves to be heard, and we’re here to make sure it’s a ROARING success.
Nicole Andrew is a 20 year brand designer, Level-C certified brand strategist, educator, and co-owner of 28Lions, a branding & marketing agency that helps service-based entrepreneurs turn their expertise into powerful brands.