Brands and objects are
often inanimate and can be hard to describe. It is far easier to relate to
people, so by describing the brand as a person, it becomes easier to articulate
what the brand is about. Personification provides valuable information on
images and characteristics of products, brands or other subjects. Participants
are asked to imagine the subject as a person, and describe the personality,
lifestyle and other characteristics. For example:
A common variation is to ask respondents to
imagine the brand as an animal, or as a car, or as some other object, and again
to explore the parallels they are thus drawing.
As with all projective content, it is useful to feed
participants’ responses back into the discussion.