24 Aug Hero Branding

Did you know that your brand has a personality?  Belinda Vesey-Brown – branding expert from #RealReach – says this is one of the reasons many people get their branding wrong.

Topic – #RealReach – Brand Strategy

Mentor – Belinda Vesey-Brown

• Creating a brand
• Branding is more than a logo
• Understand the emotional response

Transcript:

Kevin Turner: Well the final in our series this week, we’re talking to some of the experts on the Real Reach panel. All the details available of course through the website. Our final guest this week is Belinda Vesey-Brown. Belinda is a brand strategist and founder of the strategic brand agency, Brandonian, and hosts on the Real Estate Reach a course on brand archetypes. She joins us.

Kevin Turner: G’day, Belinda, how are you?

Belinda V-B.: I’m great thanks, Kevin.

Kevin Turner: Good, we’ve got you racing between meetings so we’ll be brisk here. Could you tell me what brand archetypes are?

Belinda V-B.: Brand archetypes, or another way of describing it is you can say brand personality. So archetype is actually the formal word for … Carl Yung, it’s a word that Carl Jung the Swiss psychiatrist came up with. And so an archetype is a character that he said that we are born with an understanding of. So if I say to you, Kevin, “Hero,” you would write a page of descriptions on a hero. If I was to do the same, we would have a similar type of description as to what a hero is. So when you then align that with a brand, and if you’re a hero brand for example, it’s the characteristics of that brand and the characteristics that you carry through the way that you service your client, the stories you tell, the types of people that you put on. It’s basically living and breathing what it is to be a hero brand.

Belinda V-B.: What I love about it is that it tapping you into that fundamental human belief, or fundamental human understanding that we all have that happens unconsciously where it feels right. So when people are making a buying decision or relating to a brand they have … Their getting that sense of feeling through you, a competitive advantage.

Kevin Turner: So-

Belinda V-B.: That’s why I love it.

Kevin Turner: So, it’s … I guess it’s a brand … You called it a brand personality did you?

Belinda V-B.: A brand personality.

Kevin Turner: Yeah.

Belinda V-B.: It’s a formal worded archetype.

Kevin Turner: Okay. So, in developing this personality how do I go about bringing that into my brand? Do I have to understand with the personality is first?

Belinda V-B.: Yeah. So, we … well, how we do it is we like to think about, well, where are you and what are you really selling? So, as a business where you at? What are your goals for the next five, 10 years? And then think about, well, then what’s the underlying personality that we then need to align with, or that you need to feel, bring out more of in order to have a behaviour around so that you can deliver on that.

Belinda V-B.: And is that’s something that you, first of all, understand what you’re really selling. And that’s never features and benefits. I can’t stress that enough, it’s never, you know, we have this so it’s great service. God, I wish I had a dollar for every time someone said we did.

Kevin Turner: Hmm.

Belinda V-B.: It was great service. It’s what you really … And all of that comes back to an emotional response that is fulfilling on your clients wants or needs.

Kevin Turner: So, this has got to be something that you live and breath and … Can you actually put it into words? Is it a standard that you live by?

Belinda V-B.: Well, I look for them everywhere, if you think about the brands that you love the most, or the people that you really resonate with that work for those brands it’s that, you know, are they motherly? Are they, you know … Do they, almost like a wizard do they transform things? And it’s that feeling that you get. I guess sometimes it is a little hard to explain because what were really trying to get … All the brands that we work with, or the people that we work with to understand is it’s what’s the emotional response you want your customers to have when they think of you, or when they’re dealing with you.

Kevin Turner: Is it the look and feel of a logo/ is it a positioning statement? What is it?

Belinda V-B.: It’s … And it’s never … When I say brand I’m not talking about a logo. I’m talking everything. So, your brand is really your identifier. So really, Kevin, it’s everything. It’s the way you answer the phone, it’s messaging that you have on your marketing collateral, on your website. It’s every little thing. I have this phrase that I use as my take which is, it’s the death by a thousand cuts. It’s the 100 things that you do that support the who you are and what you stand for in the business as if you were a person. So we actually think about a brand, it’s like the brand or the person walk through the door now what would they be like? And that’s part of what we do now in our workshop and it’s quite fun. It humanizes it. So, people relate because we’re used to dealing with humans that we talk to.

Kevin Turner: Fascinating concept. And you’ll learn a lot more about that on the #RealReach course that Belinda has put together. Brand archetypes, it’s there for you now. #RealReach is the online training platform for real estate principles, or people who wants to get into the industry and own their own office.

Kevin Turner: Belinda thank you very much, and thank you especially for your contribution to #RealReach as well. It’s been a pleasure having you in the show.

Belinda V-B.: No worries, thanks Kevin.