Personas for Branding

Personas are fictional examples of a customer segment presented in a context as a story. They have been mostly used for product development but lately they have found application for brand builders.

In this case the persona will not portrait a user but the buyer of a product. Nowadays demand is shifting from products or services in isolation to experiences, what could be called the experience economy "...a new economic era in which all businesses must orchestrate memorable events for their customers that engage each one of them in an inherently personal way..." (Joseph Pine & James Gilmore,2005). In order to provide experiences, products must appeal to emotions and customer knowledge has to go from segmentation profiles to a much deeper level and this level could be achieved by developing a branding persona. Mike Moser (United we brand) hightlights the importance of emotions to build strong brands, knowing "the peopleness of people" as he refers to it. Developing branding personas could be an effective way to get insights on where a brand fits in people's lives and what kind of core message could resonate with our customers.