People, Brand, Personality and Story

Late last week, in the post Are People Your Brand? I promised to write about a post David Alston, VP at Radian6, made back in February entitled People Define Brand Personality. He says that he has been talking a lot about “becoming an unmasked brand. Basically, I’m referring to the process of putting real faces to the brands we know and love – the people that make up that real brand.” He points out that brands have been hiding behind carefully crafted images all these years. Images that have clearly been built by their carefully controlled messaging. And we all know that carefully controlled messaging is in the toilet in this day and age of social media.

David goes on to point out that “It’s a known fact that people are attracted to faces of other people – we’re programmed that way.” You bet! How else do you explain the rise of all of those canned photostock people that we see in ads all across the web? Crafty marketers, in charge of that brand messaging, have been using those images, and letting them speak for their brand, for quite some time. David says “Social media has also added something to these universal equations – the ability to crowd-source the process for uncovering the “real” in any situation.” Let’s see now, real people, who work at a company vs. photostock people? People we might know representing their brand vs. people we start to see over and over, representing different brands that they have no affiliation or affinity to. Hmmm…

David then goes on to list “some of my favorite unmasked brands and more importantly who the amazing people behind each of these “brand personalities are.” That list is amazing. And so too are the comments that follow. If you haven’t already, you might to jump over there and browse through it and then come back and see how the idea of story complements all of this.

Pretty impressive list of brands and people isn’t it? Some great conversation going on in those comments too, don’t you think? So, where does story come into play in all of this? I would suggest to you that it is the thread that ties the people and the brand together. If your people are your brand, or as David says, if it’s time to unmask your brand and show it’s personality, it’s the stories that those people tell, and the stories that you tell about them, that will inform us about your brand or your company. While we are attracted to people’s faces as David pointed out, those faces are brought to life through their stories. Their stories breath life into your brand.

I was lucky enough to meet Anna Cupp from Goosecross wines last week via Twitter. She had responded to one of my posts on story and put up a picture of their “brand ambassador” telling us to check out his dimples. Nothing else, just the picture. But I immediately wanted to connect with the guy and know what his story was. How was he related to Goosecross? How had he come to be their brand ambassador? And geez, with dimples like that, he’s got to drive women crazy. Where’d those come from? And, as I find out more about him, I find out more about Goosecross, the company, the brand and their products.

Take a look at the image at the top of this post that I pinched from David. I recognize three of the four from following their blogs and tweets. The one I don’t recognize I want to know about. What’s his story? What about the rest of you? Aren’t you curious about the people in the image? Who they are? What they do? What brand they help to define? (And by the way, Amber, I’d be curious to know if you ever paid David back for this photo. And for those of you who don’t know her, I’m betting that you can tell from this which one she is in the picture.)

So, what do you think? Are people your brand? Is it time to unmask brands and companies and reveal the people who are their personality? And if so, is story the thread that ties it all together?