How To Create the Personality of Your Branded Content

There is no question that branded content creation is essential for companies of all sizes. If the online marketing world were a giant game of Red Rover, quality content would be like the big, burly kid everyone wants to have on their team. Not only is branded content formidable, but it is also capable of breaking through the stubborn ring of consumer disinterest and catapulting its way into the sunshine of online visibility.

Before your content can become a worthy competitor in the online marketing playground, it needs to develop a solid identity. Weak content without a likeable personality will probably be clobbered in the highly competitive world of online marketing before it ever reaches your target audience. Whether you’re writing content for website pages, advertisements or blog posts, developing a relatable brand personality should be one of your primary goals.

Does Content Personality Really Matter?

Is Nutella one of the most incredible substances ever created? Is the power of suggestion enough to make me go eat some right now? In a word, YES, content personality matters immensely. Many content writers make the mistake of focusing only on content quantity, rather than on developing a specific “voice” for their content. While churning out blog posts and other types of online marketing pieces on a regular basis is important, the effects fall short if the content seems lifeless and devoid of personality.

In order to reach your target audience and draw them in, your brands content needs to be relatable, energetic and likeable. Reading boring, wilted content is a lot like being on the receiving end of a “limp fish” handshake – unpleasant and memorable for all the wrong reasons. Nobody likes a limp fish handshake. Nobody.

Find Your Niche and Become a Mentor

Every business has its own niche and interests, and identifying yours will help you develop your content personality and appeal to your target audience. Having trouble defining your niche? Try asking yourself the following questions:

• What are your business goals and passions?
• What do you do best, and how do you do it better than others?
• Who is your target audience and what are their interests?
• What are the needs of your target audience, and how can you help fill those needs?

Once you have identified your niche and interests, become a figure of authority in your field. Offer helpful information that answers a consumer question or solves a need in your industry. If your content personality successfully paints you as a mentor and respected expert in your niche, you will have a much easier time connecting with your intended audience and becoming more relevant in their eyes.

Finally, by identifying your interests and subtly utilizing them when creating your content, your brand will become more lifelike and relatable. Just make sure you choose interests that are likely to align with the interests of your audience. For example, the brand manager of a trailer hitch company would be wise to subtly incorporate his or her love for the outdoors into his content, since individuals who pull trailers are likely attracted to the outdoors as well.

Turn Your Brand Into a Person

Take a moment to think about big companies that have successfully created epic brand personalities. The Old Spice Man, Mayhem from Allstate, and Budweiser horses probably come to mind. Whether you like her or hate her, even Flo from Progressive is a successful example of a brand personality. While you don’t need a physical person to represent your brand, creating the feeling of a personality in your written content can help set you apart from the many other companies like yours that are scrambling for the attention of the same audience. If you can successfully draw your customers in and engage them with interesting content that has your unique branded voice, then you have won half the battle!

A great way to create brand personality is to imagine what your brand would look like if it took human form. This exercise is most effective when multiple people contribute, so don’t be afraid to gather your entire team of content writers and hash out the ideal personification of your brand. What attributes would your “brand person” have? Would he or she be charming, witty, serious, sarcastic, fun-loving, cool, laid-back, or helpful? Would your brand personality wear a suit and tie, cute dress, or perhaps jeans and a t-shirt?

Once you have personified your brand, every piece of content you create should feel like it would naturally be spoken by your brand spokesman. That doesn’t mean your branded content should be boring, repetitive or predictable. It just means that each branded blog post and article should consistently sound like it could have come from the same person, rather than from multiple personalities. In fact, consistency is so important that it deserves its very own subheading.

Why Brand Consistency Is Essential

Would you ever willingly get involved in a relationship with someone who was constantly switching between various personalities? What if one moment they were witty and charming, and the next they were boring you to tears with monotone citations of random statistics? If your content brand is inconsistent, you will undoubtedly confuse your readers and fail to make a connection with them.

In addition to maintaining a consistent (but not boring!) voice, the importance of consistency also spills over into the frequency of your online marketing. The popular, well-written blog post you wrote six months ago is bound to eventually make its way to the cobweb-covered bins of the internet’s vast storage unit. If you have no new content to replace it, your brand will start to become stagnant and forgotten. Regularly coming up with interesting and helpful content is one of the most effective ways to remain relevant and develop a reliable brand personality. Since it has been estimated that about fifty percent of effective branding is simply awareness, your content needs to be regularly created and shared.

Build Emotional Relationships With Your Audience

Don’t be afraid to build emotional relationships with your audience. Figure out the personality types of your target audience, then develop your own branded personality to complement the temperament of those whom you are trying to reach. For example, if your target audience is made up primarily of competitive, driven individuals, you will have an easier time building a relationship with them if your content personality is honest, up-front and credible. If your target audience is composed of mainly spontaneous, emotional people, you will have more luck catching their attention with captivating content that speaks to their emotions.

Since most people do not fit into one simple personality category, your branded content should ideally be adaptable and versatile. Your goal should be to reach multiple personality types in your target audience with a single piece of well-written content.

Have Fun With It!

Building a personality for your branded content should ultimately be an enjoyable process, so make sure you have fun with it! Don’t be afraid to develop a charismatic content persona and interact with customers in a way that will make them smile. Even notoriously boring brands have been able to resurrect their relevance by incorporating tasteful humor into their branded content. Just be careful to never cross over into offensive territory when adding a dash of wit to your posts. Now that you know how to give your branded content personality, have fun and start writing!