If your favourite brand were a person, who would it be?
Is the Fiat 500 brand for example a beautiful young woman, who knows how to accessorize down to the last detail, such as her car? And is the BMW brand then a successful executive, who always wears a suit and a great smile?
See there you get a glimpse of my
perceptions, and that is exactly what a brand’s personality is – a tangible
representation of the perceptions each of us attaches to a brand[1].
I find the notion of brand personality
intriguing because research have shown, that we as consumers are prone to seek
out brands, and commit to them, if we find their personality desirable or
admirable[2].
In other words, we want to be friends
with brands who appear, as we would like to appear.
So how can we as marketing professionals
uncover the personality of our brands, and does it even make sense to do so, if
it is merely a subjective representation depending on the individual consumers
interpretation of the brand?
In our study, we (my thesis partner and I),
applied association exercises in our in-depth interviews. And we were able to uncover,
that our narrow defined group, overall shared a perception of the Fairtrade
brand as being a caring and responsible person, who could appear either
superior to others or unattainable as a friend[3].
Who would not want to be friends with a
person who cares for others and does a lot of good in the world? And deep down
most people would even admit, that being friends with the cool guy is quite desirable.
But what if the gab is to wide, and the brand person appears too far out of
reach for us. Instead of being a desired or cared for friend, the brand instead
becomes annoying, and only reminds us of all the things we ought to do – of the
person we ought to be – who we will never become?
Seeing a brand in the perspective of its
personality, therefore opens the door for a deeper understanding of not only
which meaning we as consumers assign to a brand, but also to whether or not we
find the brand appealing and inviting in terms of forming an relationship.
It is widely argued that in order to
create value, companies must connect to their consumers and build relationships[4].
Brand personality, is to us a relationship facilitator. By forming the brands
identity to be a person with who the consumer would want to be friends with,
the first step towards a meaningful relationship is made.
In this social media world we live in now,
the possibility to connect brands to consumers is most certainty there, it need
only to be grasped. In my next blog post, I concentrate on identity
construction and in this connection the use of social media. Also I will tie it
all together with my insights on brand personality, so stay tuned.
If you want to know more about the Fairtrade study
I mention above, you can find the entire publication at http://studenttheses.cbs.dk/handle/10417/1867.
It was written in a brilliant collaboration with Caroline Marie Tetzlaff
Ebbesen and CBS.
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