You might heard that having your own personal brand is a “must have” nowadays, if you want to be your own boss and thrive in online business world. But what are the brand archetypes, you ask? Some people call it a brand personality. In short, it is a framework of common human characteristics, that include emotions, traits, fears, desires and more.
Defining your own brand archetype will help you to narrow down your messaging, find your own voice that attracts your audience and keeps your business in their minds.
People usually decide to do business with another person if they feel an emotional connection. Almost every brand you feel a special appreciation was build with alignment to one of the archetypes (intuitively or intentionally, we’ll never know). But if you want to grow your business, defining your own brand personality is one of the key ingredients in your marketing strategy. Let’s dive in and see how archetypes and branding are connected.
How & Why do Archetypes work?
We can experience emotional connection to a particular archetype or avoid some of them, depending on our personal preferences. For example, when a person is looking for an expert, that can provide quick and effective solutions, you’ll be more drawn to “Practical Helper” archetype (discover more below) than others. As this recognition process is intuitive, it can be used as a powerful tool to position your brand in your audience minds.
Harvard Professor Gerald Zaltman says that “95% of our purchase decision making takes place in the subconscious mind”. This is why brands with a strong personality, connecting on an emotional level with their audience, have a huge advantage over competitors.
Why do you need to use brand personality archetypes in your business?
- Stand out: You’ll be able to differentiate from the competitors. Even in saturated market you can build a memorable brand by adding a personality flare.
- Connect: Most of businesses are competing on price and features, but if you don’t want to get lost among competitors, you can build a deep connection with your audience.
- Clear messaging: With a chosen brand archetype it will be much easier to create a messaging framework and come up with a content ideas relying on your archetype character traits.
Six Brand Archetypes
If you’ll try to search more information about brand archetypes, you’ll notice that most of the articles are based on 12 brand archetypes defined by Carl Jung. But the archetypes described in this post are based on the spiritual knowledge of Gene keys by Richard Rudd.
I studied both concepts. And if you want to define your brand archetype based on Carl Jung theory, take this test – unreal-me.com.
The best part of the Gene keys concept is that you don’t have to take any tests. or choose your archetype blindly, because you were born with it. You can create a free profile that gonna calculate your personal gene keys on this website – genekeys.com. The one that determines your brand personality is at the top (the second number after the dot in your “Life’s Work”sphere). In my profile it’s number two. That means I have a “Passionate” archetype, and I absolutely agree with that.
Even if you don’t have time or don’t believe that you were born with the archetype that influence your behaviour, take a closer look at each of them and choose which one resonates with you more than the others. Down below you’ll find the description of each of the six gene key brand archetypes.
1. “Hero”
Number 1 is a Hero archetype. Hero has an open personality, vulnerable, deeply sincere, and at the same time remain strong. This is the kind of strength that instills a deep sense of trust in others. Hero archetype needs courage to share their thoughts and stay truthful to who they are. They need to gain knowledge before they start showing up for others.
But when they possess the knowledge on the deepest level, it provides a feeling of safety and comfort for others. Theirs calmness, confidence and strong spirit soothes everyone around them. Hero’s mission is to help other face their fears and inspire to take courageous actions.
2. “Passionate”
Passionate archetype has the ability to provoke, inspire and influence others with their passion. They can dazzle people’s imagination. The best way to express their full potential is to have a creative freedom.
This archetype most of the time related to the images. The aesthetics of beautiful and expressive images cannot leave people indifferent. One of the best ways to communicate with the audience for “passionate” archetype is to showcase all the beauty of the product and/or service. Express yourself naturally, share your passions freely, and don’t care what others think of you.
3. “Humorous”
Humorous archetype has spontaneous and warm personality, and at the same time has a great level of responsibility. If this is your type, you know how to laugh at yourself and teach others to do it. To promote your offers the best selling strategy is to make people feel good, make their tension go away and provide the sense of comfort.
4. “Heartfelt”
The power of Heartfelt archetype lies in authenticity and directness. They have a sincere personally that opens people’s hearts. Their mission is to remind others that business should have a higher purpose (philosophy) behind it. That’s why they are the most natural salespersons – because they build trust with the words and leave others dreaming of what they previously thought was impossible.
5. “Practical Helper”
They are a huge fans and promoters of the simple and effective solutions. Perceiving the world impersonally, they may seem cold – because they just don’t want to pretend to be someone else. But at the same time, the main gift of Practical helper is “practical compassion”. When they see someone’s struggle, they want to help with an advice to overcome the challenges, even if they can’t help personally, they can connect you with other people or solutions.
6. “Visionary”
Visionary has a gift to see a big picture and natural patterns. They are able to create an environment in which people learn to solve their own problems. They are the best teachers. And their main motivation is to teach others so that the teacher is no longer needed. To sell your offers – provide an education experience.
Archetypes’ Emotional connection
All brand archetypes are deeply connected to our emotions. In different situations we can be attached to some of them more than others. For example, if you have a “Hero” archetype, you will be attracting audience that is seeking for encouragement, for a person, who can reassure them and give a boost of confidence, providing a solid knowledge and good example. So your people just want to experience that feeling of courage, that you already have, no matter what kind of business niche you are at.
The main secret of successful personal brand is Consistency. Don’t play guessing games, trying to figure out what messaging will resonates with your audience, and constantly changing it. To attract more attention stick to one purpose and deliver your message over and over.
So stay true to your archetype, develop a strategy and messaging around it and continue sticking to it through the years.
P.S. I have “Passionate” archetype, creating beautiful visual brand’s aesthetic is in my DNA, it’s my superpower. So if you need helping hand to create an effective website, sales page or marketing materials – take a look at my services.
I hope this was helpful for you. If you think it’s valuable, I would appreciate if you share this post with your friends and fellow entrepreneurs who may benefit from it. If you have any questions or just want to say hi, let’s connect on Instagram.
