Absorb what is useful, reject what is useless, add what is essentially your own.
– Bruce Lee 

 

VOICE is the level where you define how you want your brand to interact with the world. The way I see it, in today’s world, you have to think of your brand as a living and breathing entity – a character, person or animal. The traits of its personality should be set in its foundation, but they should also be evolving over time.

 

Ivory Coast’s football team features an elephant. Their logo is also in the shape of the country’s borders.

 

Imagine watching a film where you just got introduced to a character you really got into. You see some of the traits of their personality, you like the way they talk, deal with different situations and  the unexplored complexity of their identity. The more you watch the film, the more you learn about them and want to learn about them. That is the emotion and response you want to invoke when others are interacting with your brand. And it all starts with the VOICE.

 

One of my all time favorite characters… Doesn’t really say much.

 

What works really well for me is writing a short story. This short story talks about the character of the brand. It can also talk about the way it holds dialogue, reacts to various scenarios and the way it thinks about certain problems. This way you construct more dimensions to your creation as the persona evolves together with the scenarios which increase in complexity. It is a bit of a longer process but this will help you understand the brand’s personality on a deeper level.

 

I highly suggest this course to anyone who would like to dive further into storytelling. Neil Gaiman’s Masterclass.

 

With NiceCactus, due to a very interesting name, I was inspired to create a sort of an adaptive personality behind the brand. The cactus is a plant which manifests itself in 2,000 different species. NiceCactus is a platform that doesn’t have 2,000 iterations, but caters to 10+ different gaming communities.

When it comes to those specific communities and their unique aspects, the complexity of the task increases. You can’t approach NBA gamers the same way you approach DOTA ones. Each gaming community has their own language, their own world.

 

Some initial thoughts I had around NiceCactus branding and what my main concern was.

 

We had a big challenge ahead – how do you communicate multiple events with similar messaging, in different games, to the community through one platform. How do we make sure these events stand out? We were worried that the fans won’t recognize the events they are interested in, so I started looking into species of cacti and doing my research more thoroughly.

 

Mini-moodboard for the art direction of NiceCactus.

 

I imagined NiceCactus as a big grinding gym space for work out, where the boss of the gym would be the tough guy who would be the brand leader. Under his roof, the brand ambassadors of all games would work out. As an example – the totem pole cactus species, to me, was immediately tied to the NBA at first glance. So I continued assigning different cacti species to different games and wrote a short explanation why it makes sense and how we can communicate to different fans in a different way on one platform.

 

Totem pole cacti grow up to 12 feet tall. Bol Bol on the right.

 

Funnily enough, Mata, our Art Director also had similar thoughts and when he was developing potential logos he also tried to explore the visual side in an equally diverse way as I did with the character behind it. That’s why we make a great team.

 

 

I always look at the role models and usually shortlist (up to) three which will influence my character’s traits, behavior and serve as the pillars of its identity. Sometimes, the character behind the brand I am working on will have a dual personality. Let’s say I work on a brand called ‘StarLord’s Rainbowmakers’. It is a highly established esports brand with a serious following and a highly competitive team. Top 3 in their community. I want to be taken seriously during match days, so my voice would be serious, similar to a general leading an army to a war. Very short, concise, direct and full of pride and dignity. Eyes on the prize, the ultimate victory matters and nothing else.

 

A shortlist of the potential role models for one of the brands we worked on. Each of the team members suggests the characters/stories based on the brand narrative we are building.

 

Social Media post after OG’s first major win.

 

During the off days though, I might shift the brand into a more pleasant direction. I would have an eloquent way of talking to the community. I would listen to them, be their drinking buddy and their ‘pat on the back’. This might help you evolve your brand even further and also reach more people that would like to engage with you.

During the off-days, we had lots of fun with the community :.

 

The documents that support the voice of the brand are both your Branding guidelines and Social Media strategy. Both of these documents have their foundation set, but should be evolving over time and should be looked at a minimum of every six months. That’s why I like to call them living and breathing documents :.

Initial steps in figuring out the NiceCactus brand identity :.

 

Initial steps in figuring out the Subliners brand voice :.

 

A good start for anyone who would like to learn more about creating a voice of the brand and character behind it would be reading ‘The Hero and the Outlaw: Building Extraordinary Brands Through the Power of Archetypes’ by Margaret Mark, Carol S. Pearson. This not only helped me understand the way I can build characters better, but also informed me about foundations for the ways of crafting stories :.