Last Updated on February 25, 2024
The Merriam-Webster dictionary defines personality as a combination of qualities forming an individual’s distinctive character.
For example: “Her sunny personality is very engaging.” Non-human entities can have personalities too.
In much the same fashion, giving your website a personality is simply a matter of infusing it with a combination of qualities to radiate a distinctive character.
1. It Starts with The Look
Your choices of color, font, graphics and photography serve as a welcoming beacon for new visitors to your site.
People are visual creatures, when they see something appealing they tend to investigate it further. Take some time to get to know your ideal customer.
Determine everything you can about their likes, dislikes, and psychological makeup. These insights will tell you what look to employ to make them feel welcome when they hit one of your landing pages.
Designing your website to please your target customer gets them to stick around and shop once they find you.
2. Make it Sound Like it Looks
The look of the site must be supported by its voice. Personality in your copy is essential to earning customer’s trust, converting visitors into buyers and staking a claim to your own space on the net. First and foremost, your written content should be conversational in tone.
In other words, seek examples of the way your target audience speaks and deliver your copy in the same fashion. If you’re not of that group, recruit a member of your target audience to go over your content and adjust it to fit their vernacular.
Keep in mind IT HAS TO BE AUTHENTIC. Poseurs are dismissed out of hand and discarded. Don’t fake the funk.
3. Be Authoritative and Opinionated
Always sound like you’re an expert on the products you offer. Wishy-washy won’t cut it. Use active language, leave passive at the curb.
With that said however, be careful to get right up to the line of arrogance without crossing it. It’s cool to know it all and let people figure that out from the way you conduct yourself. It’s not cool to know it all and tell everyone you do. In other words, show it—don’t say it.
If you have strong opinions about your products and services (which you should) express them. If you have strong opinions about religion and politics, keep them to yourself. Who you voted for is irrelevant when you sell electronics.
However, why you favor one brand of headphones over another is highly relevant. If people tell you your sense of humor is great, infuse it into your site. Making people laugh is a great way to get them on your side. Actually, eliciting any positive emotion is a plus.
4. Tell Your Story
People want to get a sense of the nature of the individuals with whom they do business, so tell them who you are in the simplest terms possible. Avoid slipping into industry jargon, even where you feel it might enhance your credibility.
Pare the narrative down to the bare essentials to avoid imposing a rambling tale that goes on forever. Telling your story is all about capturing the reader’s attention right away and showing them why your experience matters to their situation as quickly and efficiently as possible— in terms to which they can relate.
Combining the above elements is key to giving your website a personality. It’s also the secret on how to build a brand online.
People want to feel somehow related to the entities with whom they shop. Advancing a distinctive personality for your site accomplishes this, while also helping to instill trust and confidence in your visitors.