Artist Branding Playbook - Part 3 - Perfect Your Persona

What do you want to be known for?

What makes you stand out from everyone else?

Why should anyone care? 

If you read the last post and completed the first stage of the branding process, you now have a deeper understanding about who you are, what you are all about, and why you are going on this journey.

The first stage in the branding process was designed to make sure your brand is authentic and worthy of your deepest commitment to see it through. You can think of that stage as the ‘internal lens’ through which you see your brand and your commitment to building it.

You can think of the second stage as the ‘external lens’ - the lens through which the world will experience your brand. This post will shift focus to what you can do to shape your brand so that your ideal customers want to interact with it.

Notice I said IDEAL customers…

Your ‘brand persona’ will attract a certain type of person, so it is crucial to be intentional about who that person is.

After all, you don’t want to end up with a bunch of customers or fans that you cannot relate to or that don’t truly value what you are offering. A good example of how this can go wrong is when someone who has good looks builds their audience around posts relating to their appearance when they are really hoping to gain fans for their music. They might build an audience who want to see their pictures, but they probably won’t gain many fans who want to listen to their music.

It is a very common trap that I see music creators fall into, so beware!

Now that you understand why this stage of the branding process is so important, let’s dive in with some exercises designed to bring you new levels of clarity about how your audience will relate to your brand.

Let’s start with the first question, ‘what do you want to be known for?’.

Remember, what you choose at this step should absolutely relate back to your core values that you uncovered in stage one and should feel completely authentic to you. 

For instance, if you discovered that you value thoughtfulness and intelligence, but you want to be known as a crazy rebellious risk taker, it will be very difficult for you to build a strong brand. It won’t be authentically aligned with who you are and what you value at your core. And people will see through the facade.

Now let’s imagine that, after going through the exercises in stage one, you have discovered that your sense of purpose is leading you to ‘create fun, funky music that makes millions of people dance and let go of all their worries.’ 

A purpose statement like that is a good start to answering the question, ‘what do you want to be known for?’ It basically boils it down into three important characteristics of your brand persona (fun, funky, dancing).

Now let’s answer the second question, ‘what makes you stand out from everyone else?’

A useful term to introduce here is ‘brand pillars’ which are the touchpoints that set you apart from others and help you connect with your audience. Your brand pillars can be thought of in many different ways, but one school of thought says that they should inform 3 areas:

1. Your personality

2. Your behavior 

3. Your communication

So if we are using the (fun, funky, dancing) example that I just mentioned, we could relate those 3 words to each of these three brand pillars.

1. Your Personality - A key thing to remember is that people are attracted to other people and brands that they feel are similar to them.

   This concept is called brand affinity. Brand affinity is when consumers (or fans) believe a particular brand shares common values with them. Therefore, describing the personality of your brand will also help you understand exactly what kind of people you are going to attract with that brand.

   Again, this is another reason that it is so important to make sure you have gone through the stage 1 exercises on core values. It is very common to see people create a brand that accidentally attracts the wrong kind of customers and creates all sorts of problems for their business. So take some time to think about the personality of your brand and describe it in as many words as possible, using words that you would use to describe another person.

   A few more personality traits that might go along with our previous example of someone who feels their purpose is to create fun, funky dance music could be:

   • sexy

   • care free

   • party-lover

   • extrovert

   • fitness

   • stylish

   • fashionable

   • urban or cosmopolitan

   • night owl

   Can you see that those personality traits would authentically fit someone who makes fun funky dance music?

2. Your Behavior - Your behavior is extremely important, because as they say, actions speak much louder than words.

   Even though you may write a great bio about your brand and can describe the personality in detail, that does not mean that your behavior is actually reflecting the brand persona in an authentic and compelling way.

   For instance, if you can’t even dance… do you expect that people will believe that you are passionate about dancing? So, the important takeaway here is that, while clarifying your brand personality, you make sure that you can back it up with consistent and authentic behaviors.

3. Your Communication - Your communication can be thought of as part of your behavior, but it should also be considered as a separate category that needs clarification.

   The reason is that communication is the primary way you will be connecting with your audience. Even if you are posting a lot of photos on social media, there will still be verbal communications in the posts, videos, comments, texts, direct messages, emails, and on your website.

   If you are a songwriter, your communication is most importantly conveyed through your lyrics. By intentionally choosing how your brand communicates, you also choose how your audience communicates… you will set the tone and they will mirror it back to you. 

   If you communicate with positivity and excitement, your audience will too. If you communicate in very proper and formal ways, so will your fans. It is also important to consider the platform or medium you are using to communicate and adjust accordingly.

   For instance, if you start a Discord community, you will already be opting in to the way that people on that platform communicate with each other - using emojis, GIFs, and shorthand abbreviations. If you start a blog or newsletter, you will probably be expected to communicate in more thoughtful and informative ways.

   The medium you choose will basically frame the conversations and set up the foundation for the relationship to grow. So be very intentional about your communication methods and channels to avoid coming off as inauthentic.

   Going back to our previous example, if you claim to make fun, funky dance music but your messaging sounds really serious or sad, your brand will not be consistent. On the other hand, if your music is dark, sad, and serious, your best communication channel may not be TikTok, which is primarily geared towards funny and silly content. 

Now that you have put some thought into how to stay consistent with your brand personality, behavior, and communication, let’s answer the third question - ‘why should anyone care?’

People might like your music, but what makes them care enough about your brand to seek it out over and over again?

To answer this question, let’s look at another useful way to think about brand pillars, specifically as they relate to social media and content creation. 

This analogy has been very helpful for me personally in thinking through how I can narrow my focus on what kind of social media content to create.

The analogy goes like this…

Remember not everyone likes the same kind of food, and we like it when we know what kind of food we’ll be eating… we want to know what to expect if we are going to spend our time or money with a business. If you get invited to a restaurant, it usually starts with a question like ‘do you like sushi?’ Or someone says something like, ‘I know a great vegetarian restaurant.’

Consumers need to know what they are getting themselves into, and your brand pillars give them a clear understanding of what they can expect from you.

And just like table legs, there should not be very many, 3 at minimum and 6 maximum. The sweet spot is 3-4 brand pillars that each represent a category of content that you regularly share.

The takeaway here is that you want to avoid being one-dimensional.

We have all seen artists and bands who ONLY talk about their music, and that can get really boring really quickly.

Be sure that the brand pillars are not too similar. In other words, it would not be ideal to make the three pillars ‘lyrics’, ‘melodies’, and ‘production’. Those are all music related.

So, going back to the previous exercise about brand personality, you could make one of your pillars ‘fun funky music’. What would the other three be?

The goal here is for you to find two or three categories of interest other than music that are authentic to you and give your audience completely different reasons to engage with your content.

Using our previous example, one of your pillars is ‘fun, funky dance music’ and your other three brand pillars might be ‘nightlife, fitness, and fashion’. Can you see that, by regularly putting out content related to those other three brand pillars, you will attract the type of people that are also likely to resonate with fun, funky dance music?

And because you are sharing about multiple topics that they are interested in, they will keep coming back to your brand even if they aren’t currently in the mood to listen to your music. They won’t get bored with you putting out the same type of content over and over again.

They will come to you to find out where the best nightlife is, to learn new workouts and dance moves, and to get the latest fashion tips. And because there is so much ‘brand affinity’ you will always be at the top of their mind when they are in the mood to listen to fun and funky dance music! 

This strategy will help you create a ‘sticky brand’.

A ‘sticky brand’ is a useful concept, and it is defined by branding expert Jeremy Miller as a brand that accomplishes 4 things:

1. Your audience understands your brand.

2. Your audience chooses your brand first.

3. Your audience comes back again and again.

4. Your audience brags about your brand and shares it with others.

Can you see the power in this idea?

It is especially powerful for music creators to understand and work to attain this level of ‘stickiness.’ I am sure we can all think of times when we have discovered an amazing new artist, product, or restaurant that has become sticky in our own lives… and times we have gone out of our way to brag about being ‘in the know’ on something special and sharing it with our friends.

Accomplishing the 4 goals of a sticky brand will add up to a very successful business. So make sure your behavior is constantly working to help your audience understand who you are, why they should spend time with you versus others, what they get from re-engaging over and over, and how your brand can positively impact the lives of others who they share it with. 

For more insights about how to create content that people find valuable, be sure to revisit my recent post ‘How to Serve Your Audience’.

Now that you have a consistent brand persona and understand what kind of content your audience will find valuable, the next post will dive into the process of creating your unique value proposition.

Follow along and do the exercises to build a brand that keeps your fans coming back for more!