Case Study | Personal Brand vs. Professional Company Brand: When Owner's Public Persona Affects Business Results & Three Public Persona Principles

Companies, brands, influencers, and celebrities by their nature, usually have a public facing brand persona. Consumers tend to resonate with humans, and may even flock to powerful owner-influencers, as fans. Yet, many brands would be better managed by separating from the owner’s influence and personal persona as the face of the brand. Historically there have been many companies with owners that interact haphazardly in the public sphere, and their companies suffer because of the owners’ decision to act authentically, without realizing their brand of authenticity would damage their business. The reality is, most company brands would be well-served by differentiating their professional personas from their owner’s persona. Prior to any public relations snafus, a decision to separate the entity from the owner’s personal persona using comprehensive a brand persona can save a brand from turmoil and ultimately dissolution.?

An example of this shift can be seen from yoga brand, Lululemon. Lululemon’s founder, Chip Wilson was a public-facing key opinion leader; he made a name through his business prowess. He is well-known as a serial entrepreneur, and by most intents and purposes, a successful owner. However, his style of ownership (and leadership) lacked the polish that would ensure that his business wasn’t affected by his personal persona. After Lululemon faced public strife because of Wilson’s comments, Wilson removed himself from executive positions, before eventually, the company distanced itself from Wilson, eventually fully ousting him from his role on the company board. A non-exhaustive list of examples of Wilson’s conversational mishaps are listed below:

• He had been interviewed as blaming customers for the thinness of leggings during a scandal in which Lululemon legging fabric was sheer enough to see skin. “It’s really more about the rubbing through the thighs, how much pressure is there over a period of time, and how much they use it,” he stated in an interview. ***
• He stated in a 2005 interview for Canada’s National Post Business Magazine, that he chose the name LuluLemon specifically because Japanese people couldn’t pronounce the “L” in the name. ***
• In a 2009 blog post, Chip suggested a link between birth control and breast cancer, and in the same article suggested that increasing divorces were also linked to the prominence of birth control.

His statements forced LuluLemon into constant triage of PR crises until 2015, when he resigned from the board of directors.

Chip Wilson’s opinions are his own and he is assuredly allowed to have them. However, in these comments he commits a variety of business owner social blunders. He places blame on customers for a product’s malfunctions, alienates another group of customers, and then posits medical information that while might be true (I don’t have the journal articles, or clean and perfectly sampled data), Chip had no public authority to share comments on the record to the public. He is free to say whatever he wants, of course. However, his comments had no medical proof or statistical grounds. His commentary affected consumer favor, company stock prices, and reputation in a major way.

Other examples of owner celebrities and owner key opinion leaders that have had negative effects on business include:

• Tesla’s Elon Musk - SEC pressed charges on Musk for fraud after a tweet that he was “considering taking Tesla private at $420” . The charges resulted in stock price dropping 13%. ?
• American Apparels’ Dov Charney was accused of sexual harassment by brand models, and former employees. His lack of self control being exposed to the public meant that stock prices fell nearly 25% and spent most trading days in 2014, trading at less than $1, before he was fired in 2014. Once valued at? $1 billion in 2007, American Apparel filed bankruptcy in 2016.?
• Best Buy’s founder Richard Schulze initially fought the e-commerce trend, while Amazon and other competitors embraced the internet shopping trends. The store became popularly recognized as an electronics showroom, because potential customers would evaluate options in-store and purchase the cheaper options online to the tune of $10 million in losses. Once Schulze became publicly implicated in having knowledge of inappropriate colleague relationships, he resigned and retired . ?
• In 2017, Dolce & Gabbana’s Chinese market (about 30% of the brand’s revenue, according to Vogue ) was leveled after the Italian luxury fashion house aired a series of promotional videos that featured a model eating traditionally Italian food with chopsticks, while another individual spoke “slick”(read: innuendo-filled) Mandarin to the model. These videos were meant to promote a show that was happening three days later, that was planned in honor of the relationship the company had with Chinese consumers. Key leaders were warned by local D&G teams that the promotional videos should not be used. However, they were aired. Chinese consumers felt that they were disrespectful, and displayed racist stereotypes. Influencers and models began to be pulled from the show. Because of the public outrage, the videos were deleted less than 24 hours after posting. The planned one hour show show was cancelled. The namesake designers of the brand did not initially apologize, and instead completed their own bouts of leaked direct, crude racism on their personal social accounts. Many influencers began posting videos of themselves destroying their Dolce & Gabbana goods, and e-commerce platforms distanced themselves from the troubled brand by dropping their label from platforms entirely. Two days after the cancelled show, designers Dolce & Gabbana issued a public apology video. Six years later, their business reputation is still affected by the fallout of the controversy. However, their consumers seem to have somewhat forgiven them.

Internationally, mindful owners, CEOs and the like, interact with discernment in public because they operate with the knowing that a behavioral misstep could be detrimental to their company’s brand reputations, to the livelihoods of employees that placed their belief and trust in the company, and the company’s market safety. When company key leaders know this and act with this idea in mind, a well-developed brand persona becomes highly valuable.

To that end, professional leaders may complete trainings, like media training , and enact a series of public identity protocols to create a margin of safety for the business, including developing a well-rounded personal brand that is distinguished from their company’s brand. If you’re just getting started, this level of brand management may not be a possibility yet. If that sounds like you, but you’d still like some support, check out the free worksheet at the end of the article (Available as 'Persona Worksheet' in the original post.).

Conversely, to be clear, an aligned polished personal brand is not always an integral part of brand success for key professional leaders make, and they may still succeed. ? ??

Robyn ‘Rihanna’ Fenty is a great example of exuding her personal brand persona across her portfolio of companies. From 2007, she sculpted her brand to grow with her. As she grew up in the spotlight (started making records at age 16!), she developed music and businesses to be inclusive of her maturation, and made it a point to include her feminine softness and strength, and over time, her power and sensuality. The woman has range- her brands include Fenty Beauty, Savage x Fenty, and naturally Rihanna, her musician persona. She also has learned expertise, as the founder of Fenty, a luxury brand in the LVMH group, and having had collaborative partnerships with Puma, Armani, Dior, Tidal, and Stance. She managed all of these opportunities while standing in her polished but still unapologetically authentic power. She’s shared openly about her positions on specific political issues, her romantic life, ( or intentional lack thereof), and her love of family and her Barbadian heritage. For her public fanbase and consumers, it was only natural that she had public controversial comments, adventurous fashion choices, and the occasional public disagreement. While she shares things that may be seen as scandalous from an outside perspective, her musical persona has long made room for her to share those aspects of her life, authentically, without alienating her market.? |? My take on her success is that Rihanna’s fanbase has had the opportunity to see her as changing, imperfect, and malleable which makes her relatable and real. This worked well for her brands and businesses and continues to.?

Her target markets and audiences love Robyn, as much as they do her stage monoym, Rihanna. The difference in her success as a brand owner and collaborator comes innately from her. We know this because most brands that she’s touched are positively affected by increased sales and larger basket size. A stunning example is her collaboration with Puma, as a creative director and strategist, that started in 2014. She brought all of herself to the table and consequently, helped Puma recover their brand while increasing their sales by an estimated 40%, in 2017 .? A potential reason for this, may be that while Rihanna shares much of her personality with her audience, she also shares personality traits with much of her audience. She is a ‘Xennial’, a cross between generation X and Millennial, by generational market .? She is also an island gal, with a uniquely down-to-Earth approach to life, that resonates with her target market. Rihanna is well known to be hard-working, well-prepared in all of her undertakings, and willing to take risks. As a part of her critical decision-making, she and her team likely developed a public relations strategy so that she could be authentic in the public eye, without affecting her businesses.?

From all of this, it’s most responsible to note that in the public eye, there are while there are many options key business leaders have for their public personal persona, it’s helpful to remember these three key principles:

1. Speak and interact so as to be inclusive toward all.?

As a leader, most, if not all, leader’s communications experience scrutiny, so maintain high discernment. If you need to get extra perspectives on your messaging so that it comes across in the way that you intend, do it. The extra legwork is better than alienating loyal consumers, and losing sales (Think D&G). It may help to avoid all ‘critical’ topics, including politics, religion, alcohol, adult content, illegal products and services, tobacco, weapons and explosives, gambling and false or inflated advertising, dependent on your product and audience.?

2. Avoid providing commentary on subject matter that you don’t have expertise or factual proof of.?

As a public leader, or a public social developer, your words may influence your audience . While you may have strong viewpoints on specific topics, to be an ethical and effective leader, focus on giving information that is factually correct. In the United States, from 2016 through 2020 and beyond, misinformation was being constantly covered, and corrected. Many national figures, publicly gave incorrect information, regularly . While this public record information was typically revealed and ousted on public news channels, the spreading of false information, internal to the United States , and from outside the United States, created more unnecessary public division . In history, this time period marked a consistent review of the importance of ethics, and where they fit into United States American societies.?

3. Branch out. Allow your personal persona to be as well-rounded as you are. BONUS: Decide early and enforce how much and how you share your life. ?

As a human being- there tends to be a lot that goes into our daily lives that is unseen by the public eye. Much of your life you may want to keep to yourself, but find some way to branch out and develop a personality outside of your business. It doesn’t have to be all inclusive, especially if there are parts of your personality that may chase your consumers away. For example, if you’re a coffee aficionado, it can be supportive to include a daily “what’s in my cup?” Daily post. You may break down your roast of the day, the flavor notes, and how you enjoy it - whether cold brew, or hot with whole milk and honey. This allows you to maintain some distance from the more nuanced, gray-area aspects of your life, while offering your following a small window to learn about you, should the desire arise. It doesn’t have to be a large bay window. A bay window, or even a skylight may involve your weekend night out, inclusive of the whole night, starting with tipsy compliments in the bathroom, ending with someone resting their face on the porcelain throne. Take this with a grain of salt. If you provide hangover-recovery products, that may be exactly what your consumer needs to see!

Ultimately, the responsibility of business ownership and maintaining a strong company reputation is a nuanced and unique experience for every business owner. Business leaders, you will need to choose how involved your public image is with your brand. You will need to decide how much of yourself you show, and which parts are up for perception. One last word to the wise: Decide who you are privately and to the public, before the public can decide for you. If you need support in this arena, I’ve attached a free downloadable brand persona worksheet below. It’s a simple and fast exercise to help you discern. If you have any questions or if anything is confusing, set up a call or use the contact box at the bottom of the +ABOUT page

Originally posted on REIRMEDIA