How to Humanize Your Brand: 5 Valuable Techniques

By Russell Smith

The public doesn’t generally like businesses. They find them untrustworthy, immoral, and likely to put profits over people. While extreme, these opinions are not always completely unfounded, with revelations of tax dodging being a particular source of resentment.

Of course, not all companies are involved in anything but fair and honest business, but it’s hard to trust something without a face. To appear trustworthy and be likeable—and not be seen as a faceless corporate machine—you need to show there are real, genuine people behind your brand, people who care about more than just money.

Humanize your brand with these strategies

Now, we aren’t suggesting you give away all your profits and become a non-profit--businesses must make money after all. Rather, we are suggesting that by making a few simple changes, you can humanize your brand and become a likable business with a personality that customers can connect with.

1. Find a voice

Having a distinct voice or message is part of being human; it displays our character traits and lets people know the kind of person we are. Whilst you’re business isn’t human, that doesn’t mean it can’t have a personality. By giving your brand a voice that matches either your own outlook and ethos, or that of your customers, you can engage with consumers in a more human way.

Your "voice" is the language that you use to communicate with customers, be it through press, conferences, social media, advertising, web content, etc. It needs to match the type of business you are, the type of people who are behind the business.

It's also important to be genuine as people can spot a fake a mile away. Let’s take, for example, a loan company. If you run a loan company that deals with people in serious financial situations, but you use a humourous and light-hearted voice, people are going to be deterred from using your services, as your voice doesn’t match the serious and responsible way they expect you to behave.

Once you have a genuine and appropriate voice for your business, you can display its character to customers, offering them an insight into the humanity behind the logo and showing them you are the business they should be using.

2. Utilize social media

Social media is one of the most powerful marketing tools of the digital age, and the ultimate way to humanize your brand. Let's take a look at Old Spice.

This is a brand that sells masculine toiletries, thus it engages its predominately male audience with a voice that appeals to them and matches Old Spice’s values and products: in this case, humorous and overly macho. The company's use of social media to convey the brand's character has turned Old Spice into a household name and made them a much-loved brand.

Social media allows you to communicate in a way that you simply couldn’t through any other method, as it opens up channels for your business to engage with its customers on a very human level. Unlike press or advertising, social media enables a genuine back-and-forth with consumers, not only helping to convey your voice, but also show that you will take the time to react and comment to things that are important to customers.

3. Get involved with your community

Community involvement depends on the type of business you are and what community you are part of. Let’s assume business owners reading this are in SMEs operating one or two locations. For these types of business owners, most of their customers are likely to come from the local community, offering another way to help humanize their businesses.

Getting involved in local events, such as festivals, meetings, charity events, etc., or through charitable contributions, funding, or volunteer work, can provide you with the perfect opportunity to illustrate your connection to the local community. Giving something back to the people who have helped make your business successful is an excellent way of demonstrating that you are a business that cares about people, and the interests of your customers.

Sponsoring or funding events also open up the door to reach new customers, either through face-to-face encounters or the marketing benefit that comes with having your brand attached to a public gathering.

4. Keep your promises

Nothing is going to break consumer trust quicker than a broken promise—that and the aforementioned tax dodging.

Promises come in all shapes and sizes: no hidden fees, easy refunds, project completion dates, etc. Whatever promises you make to customers, it’s imperative that you keep them. Failing to do so will result in a negative reputation, which could potentially spread.

While a negative reputation doesn’t turn you into a faceless corporation, what it does is essentially add bad attributes to your business's personality. Just like a person, the more bad qualities your business is given, the harder it becomes to find it likeable and trustworthy.

If you are unsure about your ability to keep a promise, don’t make it in the first place.

5. Treat staff well

People talk. Just like bad reviews can ruin a movie's box office success, so too can they ruin your business's customer base. However, bad reviews don’t always come from consumer encounters.

Employees are people too, and even if they don’t outwardly claim to dislike your business (for fear of being fired), if they are not being treated very well, customers are going to hear about it sooner or later--especially if you either live and work in a tightly knit community.

The simple answer is treat your staff with kindness, respect, and dignity. By offering a workplace you yourself would be happy to work in, your staff is going to go home and tell of good things, not bad. Good stories may not spread like bad ones, but they leave your reputation and likeability untarnished, and nobody wants to be doing business with a company that doesn’t take care of the little guy.