Brand strategy and brand persona are two sides of the same coin, inseparable and complementary. Your brand strategy is the overarching plan that outlines who you are as a business, what you stand for, and how you aim to serve your target market. It's the 'what' and the 'why' behind every business decision you make. The brand persona, on the other hand, is the 'how.' It's how you express the core tenets of your brand strategy, how you interact with customers, and how you differentiate yourself in the marketplace.

Imagine your brand strategy as the skeleton of your business. It defines the structure and provides support. Your brand persona is like the flesh and skin that go over that skeleton, making it relatable, attractive, and, well, human. Without a well-defined skeleton—your brand strategy—the flesh and skin—your brand persona—have nothing to cling to. The result? A disjointed brand that confuses rather than captivates.

Taking the time to develop a brand strategy first ensures that when you get to the persona part, you'll know exactly what attributes and qualities that persona needs to embody. Without a strategy, you risk wasting time, energy, and resources crafting a persona that may need to be completely reworked—or worse, scrapped entirely—down the line.

Skipping the Strategy piece would be a disservice to you and your business. Strategy first, persona second.

First off, let's dispel the myth that creating a brand persona is akin to "faking it." Think about how you act around different groups of people—your family, your friends, and your business associates. In each context, you're still you, but you highlight different facets of your personality to fit the situation. Similarly, a brand persona isn't about creating a fake character; it's about choosing which genuine aspects of you and your business to amplify and showcase to your audience.

A brand persona serves as a focused lens through which your authentic brand is viewed. It's about cohesion and consistency. If your brand were a person, its persona would be its most salient and attractive qualities—the things that make it unique, relatable, and trustworthy. A brand persona humanizes your business, making it easier for customers to form a connection with it. That's not faking it; that's smart psychology and even smarter marketing.

We're not inventing a persona out of thin air; we're codifying what already exists within your business culture, your values, and your mission. By solidifying those into a tangible persona, you streamline your communication. Instead of laboring over how to phrase each piece of copy or design each visual element, you'll have a ready-made guide that aligns with your true brand. This ensures that the "you" that shows up in every customer interaction is the best, most focused version of your business.

Think of it less as an ‘alter-ego’ than an ‘aligned ego’.

You wouldn't step into those trenches without a strategy, right? Similarly, a brand persona isn't a frivolous embellishment; it's a core component of your business arsenal. When you're swamped with a thousand tasks, having a solid brand persona can be a form of triage—it helps prioritize your efforts by aligning them with your business's core values and goals. Plus it can save you loads of time and money that would otherwise be wasted on unconvincing or unaligned sales and marketing efforts.

In the thick of running a small business, time is your most valuable resource. One might argue, "I don't have the time to develop a brand persona!" The paradox here is that investing time in developing a brand persona now will save you heaps of time later. How? By eliminating the guesswork from your marketing and customer interactions. Every piece of content, every social media post, and even every customer service query can be handled more efficiently when channeled through the prism of a well-defined brand persona.

Ask any successful business owner. Time spent on sound, relevant strategy is the very thing that will get you OUT of the trenches and back in command of your business and your time.

I get it. I’ve run businesses for 10 years now. I’ve been there and I’ve bought the T-shirt; every dollar counts. But investing in your brand isn't just another expense to manage. It's a long-term play for exponential growth. The question you should be asking isn't "How much does it cost?" but "What's the ROI

- What’s the value of doubling your conversion or close rates?

- What’s the value of turbocharging your marketing output?

- What’s the value of spending the time you’re otherwise spending on procrastinating, procrasti-working, rewriting and second guessing yourself on increased client delivery?

- What’s the value of the savings you could make if your marketing efforts were laser focused and converted like crazy?

- What revenue generating activity could you be engaged in if you had a team of people executing the work you don’t enjoy or never get around to efficiently and without the need for hand holding?

I also want you to consider what's on the other side of this coin—the cost of not investing in your brand persona and strategy. Mediocre branding doesn't just fail to add value; it actively undermines your business. Every potential customer lost to a confusing brand message or inconsistent presentation is a hit to your bottom line.

Brand Strategy is a high-impact investment with high dividends for your business.

ChatGPT is amazing, no doubt. It can generate copy based on algorithms and data patterns, but it can't replicate the nuances of human understanding. Customer psychology, cultural subtleties, and emotional resonance are areas where AI falls short. AI isn't programmed to "get" people. It's programmed to process data. It has no real world business experience to draw from and it’s terrible at understanding subtext.

ChatGPT doesn't have the ability to understand your business in the way a human strategist does. It can’t tease out your values, your most compelling character traits and your funniest stories and it can’t extract your vision. It can churn out text, but it can't map out a comprehensive brand strategy.

If you’re a middle manager at a mid-tier company seeking average results, ChatGPT might be all you need, but as any successful business owner can tell you, ‘average’ is where businesses go to die.

AI has limitations in interpreting real-time changes and trends in your industry. It operates within the confines of its programming and the data it's been trained on.

ChatGPT is brilliant at doing the grunt work that used to take up a large chunk of a brand strategist time, but it needs a human to guide it. At Clevr Copy, we use a combination AI/human hybrid process to give business owners the best results in the fastest, most cost effective way.

Size doesn't determine the need for branding; ambition does.

First off, every major brand you see out there started as a small venture. They didn't wait until they were "big enough" to worry about branding. They began crafting their brand persona and strategy from the get-go. Why? Because a strong brand isn't just a tool for scaling; it's a prerequisite.

Trust is hard currency in the business world. Studies show that 81% of consumers need to trust a brand to buy from them. Branding isn't just about looking pretty; it's about building that trust. Even as a small business, establishing trust can be your unfair advantage over the big players.

A 2019 study by Lucidpress indicated that consistent branding across all platforms can increase revenue by up to 23%. That's right; effective branding is not an expense but an investment with real, calculable returns.

Even solo entrepreneurs need a brand. Actually, especially solo entrepreneurs. When you're a one-person show, you are the brand. Having a well-defined brand persona can simplify your marketing efforts and help you connect more effectively with your target audience.

The only thing small about ignoring your brand is the missed opportunity for something much, much bigger. When it comes to branding, size doesn't matter; impact does.