BRAND IS DEAD. LONG LIVE CHARACTER. I just came out of a live video presentation by Miami Ad School with Andy Pearson VP of Creative from Liquid Death and it got me thinking about the landscape of brands in Jamaica and how this concept could revolutionize local marketing strategies. Jamaica’s culture is rich with characters—whether in our music, our sports, or our everyday interactions. In today's world, it’s clear that what resonates more powerfully is character—a unique personality that goes beyond a logo or tagline. Its time to consider the characters we want to emulate and allow room for more fun and spontaneity in our marketing. Incorporating character into branding isn’t just about being different for the sake of it; it’s about evolution. It’s about stepping into the future of marketing, where the lines between brand and character blur, allowing for a more engaging and dynamic relationship with consumers. I'm looking forward to seeing more character and less 'corporate'.
you can have a character but without the brand it won't not mean much. we need brand worlds to make sense and belong to, so do the logos and the characters and the stories.
You should totally consider listening to this podcast: https://www.linkedin.com/feed/update/urn:li:activity:7229837376393510912
If you don't know your brand's coffee order, you don't know your brand. Build out that personality!
Jamaican brands need to embody the true spirit of their culture. This means avoiding stereotypes and clichés and instead focusing on genuine, relatable characters.
As nice as a snappy comment bait line that is, it doesn’t make sense. It’s akin to saying ‘cars are dead, long live wheels’. Character is a facet of brand for sure, but not a replacement. Without character a brand may well be ailing, but it’s brand as a whole is made from many elements including character.
Character is an inseparable part of the brand. Character is another name for the brand personality. It is the most important part of the brand since it allows us to understand how the brand acts, reacts, talks, behaves, looks like, and predict where it is heading.
These two things ARE NOT mutually exclusive. Brand IS character. If done correctly.
There's some primal misconception that says something has to die before something else can rise up to replace it. Maybe brands are dying because they lack any character? Or the vast majority of brands have very little character and therefore mean nothing to their audiences. We have the opportunity to design character into a brand, but in most cases people are afraid to use the most interesting character attributes. It seems risky to be creative, but some have said it is actually more risky to be less creative. Either way, its a good conversation to have with a character like Andy.
Isn't a brand that lacks character (corporately vanilla'd) simply a brand destined to fail, while an enterprise with character (culturally anchored) is destined to become a successful brand?
VP of Creative at Liquid Death
3moHell yeah.