The brand archetype – what is it anyway?

The concept of archetype, obviously, has not appeared for the first time in marketing. It became widely known in the first half of the last century thanks to Carl Gustav Jung, who used it in research in psychiatry and psychology. Jung noticed that all people, although they are not aware of it, recognize certain patterns, repetitions, universal patterns in their environment. He called these instinctively recognized patterns, in some way simplifying the world we live in, archetypes. They help us find ourselves in a very complex reality in a similar way as stereotypes.

Other researchers continued to consider patterns in the collective unconscious, noting, for example, that they appear very often in fairy tales and myths – both in the plot and in the construction of the characters. Let’s look at it for a moment. In the classic fairy tales we know, all characters are either extremely good or unimaginably evil. In addition, it mostly applies to the same types of heroes. If the mother appears in the story, she is good and affectionate, but the stepmother is always a black to the bone character, a jealous, greedy and self-righteous person. The main character must be innocent, noble, pure-hearted, and usually he is rewarded for these qualities – often the prince of a fairy tale appears as a reward here.

How brand archetypes work in marketing?

But let’s go back to the marketing field. Two researchers, Margaret Mark and Carol Pearson, introduced the archetype to this area of science in their 2001 book The Hero and The Outlaw. Building Extraordinary Brands Through The Power of Archetypes. There, the authors noted that currently producers have very little chance to stand out on the market. Competition can easily copy their solutions, more and more brands produce the same or very similar products, leading to a situation where the only solution seems to be to keep lowering prices. Seemingly, because in fact there is one more solution that can be used – to give your products and the entire brand a special meaning. Making buying from this manufacturer an experience was associated with adhering to certain values and principles. This is how the theory of archetypes found its place in the story of the brand.

Archetypes in brand communication

Mark and Pearson noticed that when brands communicate with their audience, they say a lot about what they do and how, but their message is missing the most important question: why ?. Why are they doing what they are doing? Why exactly this way and not otherwise? Why this product? By telling its potential customers about it, the brand has a chance to present a motivation other than earning money, show the values that guide it, and thus establish a bond with recipients for whom the same issues are important. However, building such a coherent brand image is not easy – that is why it is worth reaching for archetypes.

Talking about fairy tales, myths and values may seem a bit pathetic and out of place in modern free market realities. In practice, however, brand archetypes are nothing more than another marketer’s tool. They allow you to define how the brand should look like in the eyes of the recipients, and thus build certain guidelines for communication on the website, in social media or in advertising. The archetypal theory is used by most well-known brands such as Disney, Pepsi, Nike. Apple or Volkswagen. Thanks to this, their promotional activities are not random or chaotic – they form a harmonious image that provides them with millions of devoted customers.

Twelve brand archetypes

The classifications of archetypes differ somewhat from one researcher to another, but there are always twelve and they have similar descriptions. What archetypes can the brand identify with?

Innocent / Dreamer
Brands of this type prove to us that the world is a beautiful, safe place where everything is possible. They promise us nothing but positive emotions, kindness and predictability, but not one that is boring, but one that provides comfort. They never talk about sad, unfair or terrible events, they surround us with a bubble of beauty, harmony and acceptance. They strive to make the recipient feel that nothing bad can happen to them. They radiate optimism and energy at every step.

Coca-Cola and McDonalds are examples of brands that use this archetype. They are based on very positive messages, often calling for enjoying even the most ordinary moments. Each advertisement is based on the celebration of joyful experiences and good emotions, and the visual identification is created in optimistic, saturated colors. All this so that we know that nothing unpleasant can happen to us with these brands.

Who can build the image of the Innocent? There are probably industries that perfectly match the image of the Innocent and naturally find themselves in this type of communication with the client. These include cosmetic brands (especially with natural cosmetics), producers of healthy, organic food, companies producing children’s products, sweet drinks or snacks.

Discoverer
Brands that identify with the Explorer archetype want to be seen as adventurous, exploring unconquered paths and lands. Freedom and unrestricted freedom are very important in their communication. They often play in their advertisements with frames with vast spaces that emphasize the lack of restrictions. They like to challenge them, encourage them to live their lives actively and overcome their own barriers.

Brands that communicate with their audience using the Explorer archetype include Jeep and GoPro. They show us at every step that we can do more with their products, that our lives will become more interesting, full of fascinating journeys and amazing experiences.

Who can build the image of the Explorer? The Explorer Archetype is directly created for brands selling sports equipment (especially for extreme sports), travel agencies offering exotic tours or producers of off-road vehicles.

Wise / Philosopher
Such brands take on the role of a mentor, a teacher who helps the audience understand the world. In their communication, they do not use opinions, but pure facts. They like to present figures that show why their product is the best. By creating advertisements or posts, they share knowledge, research results and statistics. The key to communicating like a Sage is gaining authority in the eyes of your audience. Brands that choose to do so must be sure that they present true, unquestionable information and that they serve their wisdom in a way that customers can understand.

Communication in the style of the Sage is usually carried out by large brands with an established position on the market, such as Google or the BBC. They provide a lot of information that most recipients treat as proven, not requiring verification. In the case of Google, the mentoring aspect is also highly developed – the company provides a lot of materials for free, thus educating its customers. This is a profit for the recipients, but even greater for the brand, which thus strengthens its image as an expert.

Who can build the image of the Sage? Information websites, companies creating educational materials, brands selling industry courses, schools, universities or people offering their services as consultants can appear as Sages.

Clown
The name Clown may not be very well associated, but the very concept of communication behind it is extremely attractive to brands. It is based on food, mockery of authorities and the joy of life. Jester-brands can sometimes hover over the edge of what’s falling out and what’s wrong and making jokes about serious topics. However, they never have bad intentions – there is no bitter cynicism or irony in them, but the sheer joy of life itself. They want to bring a smile to their recipients, which is why they can use, for example, memes, funny viruses, etc. in their communication.

A brand that uses the Jester’s potential as a textbook is, for example, Skittles with its adverts with a rainbow and a milked giraffe. However, this archetype can also be attributed to Pepsi, which is thus playing a game with its main rival on the market, Coca-Cola. This can be seen, for example, in an advertisement depicting Santa Claus – a character entirely created by Coca-Cola – sipping Pepsi on vacation.

Who can build the image of the Clown? There is basically no limit to what brand can become a Jester. Most often, however, producers of snacks and sweet drinks, beer or toys decide to create their image in this way.

Everyman
Everyman is simply an ordinary person, similar to all of us. Brands that want to be like this do not try to shock, stand out with sharp wit or creativity. They do not say that their products are unique, but say that they are comfortable, safe and known. They simply accompany us all the time, supporting us in everyday problems. Such brands are not a star, they are part of the group to which their recipients belong. They do not put pressure on us that we must be better, more brilliant, that we must achieve something extraordinary in life. These are brands that accept us.

It may seem that this is a completely unattractive archetype for brands – after all, each of them wants to stand out from the competition. In reality, however, the opposite is true – there are companies that have achieved the championship and huge financial benefits by posing as Everyman. An example here is IKEA with its furniture and accessories for every home, affordable, simple, easily accessible and always up-to-date.

Who can build Everyman’s image? This archetype works best for companies that produce everyday items, home and garden items, workwear, practical family cars, groceries, etc.

Lover / Admirer
Brands that want to be a Lover make their products desirable in recipients. In communication, they use sensuality, intimacy, the promise of pleasure, perhaps even a bit sinful. The advertisements show us beautiful women and handsome men who tempt, seduce and attract like a magnet. They often use references to love, romance and bodily pleasure. They want to show themselves as worthy of the moment of oblivion, as a temptation worth succumbing to, because it brings unforgettable experiences.

We see this type of communication, for example, in Victoria’s Secret commercials that are based almost entirely on beauty, desire and seduction. The brand that plays these patterns masterfully is also Chanel with its fragrances that promise delight to the senses. This image has been created with great consistency since the time when the face of Chanel was Marylin Monroe – a sex icon of the 1950s and 1960s.

Who can build the image of a Lover? This archetype fits perfectly with cosmetic and clothing brands that sell underwear, but also sweets (sinful pleasures), exclusive jewelry, expensive wines and perfumes.

Creator
Brand-Makers want to be perceived as creative, innovative, and turning dreams into reality. They like what is original, unique, they are visionaries who strive for continuous development and improvement of their products to fulfill even more functions. They do not follow others, but they make new paths themselves. They communicate to their audience that they are creating something valuable and lasting. They often pose as artists, but also those who know business well.

Brands that use this image-building scheme are, for example, Apple and Lego. The first one shows itself as a company that creates products of completely new quality, technologically advanced and beyond any competition. The second one creates blocks that allow the buyer to create whatever he wants, even transferring him to a different, more colorful and creative world.

Who can build the Creator’s image? This archetype is most beneficial for brands producing high-tech equipment, marketing companies, copywriters, architects, artists, all of these companies create something innovative.

Guardian
Creating the image of the brand-Guardian is particularly demanding because it requires maintaining authenticity in communication based on empathy and altruism. Such companies care about their audience and show that they are willing to sacrifice to keep them safe. They put themselves in the role of a guardian who protects against evil and helps in achieving goals. The features visible in such brands are warmth, gentleness, caring and cordiality.

Which brands use this archetype? For example, organizations such as UNICEF and WWF. They show that they care for the weaker, the needy, that they do not act for their own benefit, but only for the common good.

Who can build the image of the Guardian? The Guardian is a natural archetype for nonprofits, medical companies, insurers, clinics, and even banks as the Guardian enters wherever someone needs help.

Lord
Ruler is the archetype for strong brands that are already high in the industry. They have everything under control, they radiate self-confidence, an aura of invincibility and success. However, they are not perceived as self-righteous, because they bestow loyalty and protection for their consumers. They care for them, not out of empathy like the Caregivers, but out of a sense of responsibility. They strive to make the recipient want to be in the group they protect, because it is an elite group, available only to the chosen few.

The Brand-Ruler is, among others, Mercedes, which bases all its communication on creating a leader, a winner, a class in itself. He always presents his cars in such a way that they look as impressive as possible, and the entire visual setting shows that not everyone can afford a vehicle of this brand.

Who can build the image of the Lord? Luxury brands such as expensive watches, jewelry, cars, designer clothes and shoes will benefit the most from this archetype. However, it is also a good way of communication for high-standard hotels or spas.

Hero
The protagonists are those brands that face challenges. In their communication, they show that life can be tiring, difficult, full of obstacles, but persistence and determination can overcome them. Their task and main goal is to persuade the recipients to act, take risks and make efforts, because taking them is profitable. Sometimes the Hero-brand protects the weaker who are unable to fight for themselves, but this is not inherent in this archetype. The motives most characteristic for the Hero are overcoming his own weaknesses and hard work, thanks to which he can achieve what is most important to him – mastery.

The Hero archetype is used, among others, by Adidas and Nike. They both show us that we want to be able to do so and that it is only up to us whether we will become winners or losers. They show people who, despite failures, make new attempts and finally achieve their goals thanks to persistence and perseverance.

Who can build the image of the Hero? Of course, this archetype best suits brands that offer sportswear or sports equipment. However, the image of the Hero can also be used by those companies that offer support in crisis situations, for example roadside assistance, mechanical facilities or physiotherapy and rehabilitation rooms.

Rebel
Brands with this archetype do not agree to the existing reality. Their domain is struggle, they want to instigate a revolution, and overthrow stereotypes. They don’t care about rules, and they value freedom above all else. Sometimes their communication is accompanied by anger, even a bit of vulgarity, although of course there are exceptions. However, there is no taboo for them and they like to be blunt in their messages. They fight to make life better, but they also enjoy the anarchy they create.

The brand that chose the image of the Rebel is, for example, Netflix. He uses his social media and even products to promote tolerance, speaks loudly about the problems of modern societies and refuses to be discriminated against. However, there is no pathos of the Hero or the altruism of the Guardian in it – there is a lot of humor and simple disagreement with the existing situation. The brand is also rebellious in its very premise – in a way, it ended the stage of television domination and started the era of streaming platforms.

Who can build the image of a Rebel? The image of the Rebel is perfect for companies that introduce a completely new, revolutionary product to the market. It also works well in the promotion of brands promoting avant-garde fashion, motorcycles or in the case of alternative media.

Wizard
Wizard Brands show us that the world can be beautiful, but they do it in a different way than the Innocent – they bring magic into our lives. They promise thrilling, fantastic adventures, they prove that the only limits that exist are the limits of our imagination. They are charismatic in their communication and reveal new possibilities for us, thanks to which we can reach the stars.

The company that masterfully implements this archetype is Disney. It naturally takes us to a fairy-tale world, but proves that everything is possible in ours. This can be seen, among others, in the Dream Big campaign, Princess, implemented by the brand, in which Disney showed girls that they can achieve anything they dream of.

Who can build the image of the Wizard? This archetype is very natural for brands that produce toys, animations for children and all products associated with rest and relaxation. According to the principle that a sufficiently advanced technology is no different from magic, it can also be used by companies producing modern gadgets.

How to use brand archetypes?

Brand archetypes are not meant to be cages for brands that stifle their freedom. On the contrary – they should be a signpost facilitating communication with potential customers. Many companies do not limit themselves to using one schema, but combine the characteristics of two or three archetypes – and that works well too. An example can be Coca-Cola, which neatly interweaves the features of the Innocent and the Wizard, or Apple, which is part Creator and part Rebel. However, it is important to think through your communication strategy as carefully as possible and implement it consistently in all channels.

However, many marketers and SEOs forget that the Google network, although by far the most popular, does not handle one hundred percent of internet search traffic. The presence and good presentation of the company’s website in competitive search engines is also important – it will allow you to attract traffic and potential customers from sources that are sometimes ignored by the competition.

Microsoft Bing

The second most popular internet search engine in the world. Bing was founded in 2009 as a development of previous Microsoft services, such as Live Search, and even earlier MSN Search – you could say that the Redmond company made an ordinary rebranding. The name of the search engine is sometimes ironically referred to as an abbreviation of Bing Is Not Google, which apparently functions in Microsoft itself as an internal company joke.

Please note that the search engine is built into Windows – the most popular desktop operating system in the world. Thanks to the agreement between enterprises, Bing also largely powers the Yahoo search engine – this former Internet hit (although mainly in the US), according to StatCounter, today has about 1.5% of the market share.

Naturally, due to the common producer, Bing supports search using the Microsoft Cortana virtual assistant. Less obvious, however, is that Bing is what Amazon Alexa uses.

Bing is a search engine that is part of a large package of services. For marketing and e-commerce, we get the entire Microsoft Advertising infrastructure, which works in a similar way as Google Ads – it has millions of customers and huge sales potential. However, even in its basic form, it is worth taking care of proper positioning in the Bing search engine – it is a service associating millions of users around the world.

Bing is set as the default search engine in Microsoft Edge and can be selected as the main search engine in Firefox, Edge, Google Chrome, and Safari.

Useful tools for the marketer:
– Bing Webmaster Tools
– Microsoft Advertising

Yandex

Yandex has existed in various forms since 1990, but as yandex.ru it was officially presented in 1997 – so it was formally established a few months earlier than Google. According to one theory, the name is self-ironic and comes from the Yet Another Indexer (another indexing tool).

As a search engine aimed at the Russian-language market, it has achieved considerable success, currently serving more than 50% of traffic related to Internet searches in the territory of the Russian Federation. Naturally, of all search engines, Yandex is the best at processing Cyrillic characters. Like Google or Microsoft, Yandex offers a number of other options and functionalities in addition to the search engine – from a web browser, through a GPS-based navigation system, cloud storage space, to an extensive display advertising network.

The version for the Russian market can be found at yandex.ru, while the western version can be found at yandex.com.

If your customers are located in the Russian Federation, you cannot afford to disregard the search engine used by tens of millions of Internet users. Yandex also supports the Yandex.Direct network, which is a system that displays ads, among others, on the search network – similar to Google and Bing.

Yandex can be set as the default search engine in the Microsoft Edge browser and (when added to the list) in Google Chrome.

Useful tools for the marketer:
– Yandex Webmaster Tools
– Yandex Metrica – yandex equivalent of Google Analytics, completely free, just like GA
– Yandex.Direct

DuckDuckGo

DuckDuckGo is a search engine that was established in 2008. Its original name comes from the popular children’s game. The search engine is also available at the easier-to-enter addresses duck.com and ddg.gg. DuckDuckGo is gaining market share slowly, but is growing steadily – in 2021, nearly 100 million inquiries are entered into it every day.

DuckDuckGo uses a completely different model than Google or Bing. DDG does not collect data about the user and does not profile search results – it displays the same results to everyone, regardless of the previous activities of a given person in the network. Focusing on privacy is the main reason why the project is steadily increasing its popularity – some Internet users do not feel comfortable with the fact that various websites, search engines and applications collect a lot of data, even if they are anonymised and do not allow the identification of a specific user.

Disabling profiling has both advantages and disadvantages. The user is thus cut off from the content (or at least not getting it right away), which statistically most likely hits what he was looking for. Profiling in the context of searching for products or information makes purchasing sense and clearly facilitates finding data quickly.

DuckDuckGo mainly uses its own solutions, such as the DuckDuckBot crawler, but also many external sources – including Binga. This means that by optimizing the page to best meet the requirements of Microsoft’s search engine, you also help in positioning the site in DDG. The above-mentioned Bing Webmaster Tools comes with the basic help – with it you can check errors and see useful tips.

If you run a local business, make sure you have Apple Maps in your maps – DDG uses the AM database for this purpose, thanks to which your business will be displayed to users of both search engines.

In Google Chrome, Firefox and Safari, DuckDuckGo is one of the default search options – just select it as the main search engine in the settings.

Amazon

Interestingly, when it comes to searching for products, Google has been losing to another big player – Amazon for several years. According to Jumpshot reports, already in the second quarter of 2018, the e-commerce giant reached 54% of internet shopping traffic. For this reason, Firefox has allowed the use of Amazon Search as the default search engine for a long time. It does not matter much for the service sector or content websites, but when it comes to the typical sale of products on the Web, the presence on the Amazon platform is of great value for producers and stores.

YouTube

In many cases, YouTube is also an important source of traffic. Although it is not strictly a sales portal, as the largest video site in the world, YouTube is a great tool for increasing brand awareness. Millions of customers look for reviews there, watch unboxing, discuss product quality or customer service. Therefore, it is worth at least monitoring the buzz around the brand on YouTube, and it is best to focus your content activities on constant presence on the platform and proper brand exposure.

Google Tag Manager – what is it?

Google Tag Manager is a tool that allows you to easily add scripts (or tags) to the website, remove or modify them. In other words, thanks to it, you can manage all the tags we need from one place to analyze data from the website more effectively, increase conversion, track traffic sources, etc. Using GTM, we do not have to interfere directly with the website every time we want to implement a new script. site code. It is a kind of intermediary, thanks to which you do not have to insert any tags “rigidly”, burdening and slowing down the page. It also allows you to avoid errors that may occur when you try to implement the tag manually.

Over time, we place more and more tags on websites. The most popular are the Google Analytics tag, thanks to which we can collect data on traffic and conversion on the website, the Facebook pixel that allows us to measure the effectiveness of advertisements, or the Google Ads remarketing tag. However, there are also many other scripts that are useful from a marketing point of view. Thanks to GTM, we do not have to place all of them manually on the website – we just need to implement the Google Tag Manager code once, and we can implement all other tags through it.

How is Google Tag Manager built?

In Google Tag Manager, the account is the highest in the structure – it collects all the smaller subsets in the tool. Within the account, we can create containers, i.e. figuratively speaking, separate boxes for collections of tags. Each container has its own code to be implemented in the code of the page. After its implementation, the entire collection of tags contained in it is active on the website.

The tag itself is a type of tracking code that, once installed on your website, starts collecting data – this could be information about traffic, conversions, etc. – depending on the type of tag. Each tag should have an assigned rule that says when the script should run – we can add a rule that the tag should work on all subpages or only on some of them – for example, when measuring the conversion, we will assign a rule that the script should collect data only from the purchase confirmation page.

Assigning permissions in Google Tag Manager

In Google Tag Manager, we can grant permissions both at the account level and at the level of the container itself. If we want a user to have access to all the containers we have created, we should give them account-level permissions. We have two types of permissions here: Read Only and View, Edit and Manage. However, it is worth knowing that the second type of permissions cannot be edited within the containers – it only allows you to see what settings have been selected for each of them.

If we want to give the user the ability to edit the container or do not want to give him access to the entire account, we should grant permissions at the container level. In this case, we have three options: View Only (view only), View and Edit (view and editing) and View, Edit, Delete & Publish (view, edit, delete and publish). Thanks to this, we can freely manage access to the account and maintain full control over the data it contains.

Why is it worth having a Google Tag Manager?

Facilitation when making changes to the website
Sooner or later, most pages need updating or even more radical corrections. If, however, we change the appearance of the website, CMS system or template, it is necessary to transfer all scripts implemented directly in the code. When there are a lot of them, it is easy to skip any of them or paste them incorrectly, and in addition, it is simply tedious and time-consuming. By using the Google Tag Manager, we have an easier task – you just need to move the code to the container in which we placed the tags from a given site to trigger all the scripts on a given page. Therefore, it is worth thinking about implementing GTM at the beginning of running a website – at first it may seem that there are not many scripts, so this is an unnecessary difficulty, but their number can quickly grow and make any changes difficult.

Faster website loading
Each additional script in the page code makes the site a bit slower, and the longer the page load time, the more likely the user will get impatient. Thanks to GTM, it is easier to keep order in tags and to easily remove those that we do not need, so as not to unnecessarily burden the site. However, using this solution has one more important advantage – thanks to it, tags can be loaded asynchronously. what does it mean? Simply put, faster loading scripts do not have to wait for others, which shortens the overall page loading time.

Container template import option
If we have prepared and implemented a set of tags on one page, we can easily import it to a new account. Thanks to this, we do not have to waste time creating a completely new container with scripts if we launch a second or another website.

Ability to disable tags
If we implement the scripts directly on the website, we have to completely remove them if we do not want them to collect data further. However, we do not always want to decide on such a radical solution – sometimes we are not sure whether we will need a given tag in the future. With the help of Google Tag Manager, we can simply temporarily disable a given script.

Ability to quickly verify the correctness of the script implementation
Google Tag Manager gives you the ability to preview and debug, so you don’t have to wait to see if the tag has been properly implemented. Otherwise, we would have to wait for the tag to collect the data to be sure the implementation was successful.

Possibility to implement tags without the help of a programmer
When it comes to tampering with the website code, most people prefer to seek the help of a specialist to make sure that the change does not cause problems with the website. The need to involve a programmer in the implementation not only extends the entire process, but may also be associated with an additional cost. However, if we use Google Tag Manager, we can implement new scripts ourselves, being sure that we are not threatened by a long-term failure of the website caused by the new tag. If, as a result of our actions, the website starts to work incorrectly, it is enough to return to the container settings before the last script was deployed.