What do Richard Branson, Kim Kardashian and Beyoncé all have in common? Read on to find out...

Giving your brand its own personality is essential if you want your business to stand out from the crowd. Brand personality engages your audience by capturing their interest and drawing them into your message. It establishes a connection between you and your audience and it turns a boring marketing message into something a lot more interesting. But how can you add personality to your brand?

1. Become a storyteller

On their own, facts and figures do very little to engage the imagination of your customer which is why you need to become a storyteller. The key to storytelling in business is about sharing a story that relates to and engages your audience, making them want to learn more about you.

Social media has made consumers feel comfortable interacting with brands. Business updates sit in between updates from friends and photographs of our loved ones. Stories are memorable – how many times have you heard a story from one friend and told another when you bump into them in the street?

2. Show you are human

This point is especially important if you run a business that is predominantly or only online. Your business isn’t run by a team of robots, so show that you are human in your content by talking about what the members of your team are working on or sharing good news from inside your company.

You could take the idea a step further by putting a real, human name on your blog posts, tweets or status updates to show your audience that you’re not a robot. By doing this, your posts will stand out from the others in a sea of automated sales pitches. Customers may also feel more confident replying to a post if they know the name of the person they are talking too!

3. Listen and respond

As awareness of your brand increases, you may find that your customers send you questions and comments via your social media accounts. It is important that you take the time to respond to each message – including any negative messages – and make each person you reply to feel important. The sooner you respond to messages from customers, the more active and engaged your brand will appear.

4. Be visual

Another great way to add personality to your brand it to use videos and images, after all, your customers are looking to build relationships with people, not logos. Social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter and Instagram are perfect for sharing visual content. Why not share photographs of the team hard at work or a video of someone demonstrating your latest product?

So what do Richard Branson, Kim Kardashian and Beyoncé all have in common?

Simple - their personalities are their brands!

If you would like to give your brand a voice but you’re not sure where to start, r//evolution would be happy to help.