The Attractive Character is a technique used by many businessmen and entrepreneurs wherein they become the personality behind their brand. We see it in many online marketers such as Russell Brunson and Neil Patel and we have seen it many times in advertisements such as GoCompare with Wynne Evans and Halifax with Howard Brown. These people are all the faces of the companies that they own and have become synonymous with their respective brands. We can also see the Attractive Character in acting. How many times have we gone to see a movie just because it features a specific actor?
The Attractive Character is a persona which you wear when you are communicating with your audience. It will help you put your brand forwards and sell your product from a more personal standpoint than being just a faceless business entity.
So How Is The Attractive Character Formed?
The Attractive Character is made up of several components which come together to create a person that the audience can relate to.
- Story
- Message
- Values
- Brand Identity
These features when combined make up the Attractive Character. If you want to make a connection to your audience and allow them to get to know you better, you will benefit from using these components and bringing them together within yourself whenever you present yourself to your audience.
First of all you will have to decide an identity which fits you:
The Leader
The Leader is a power player, someone bursting with charisma, who has the capacity to move others and get them to follow based upon their successes. You are at the forefront of your business, you call the shots and people follow you because of your success. In order to fully realise the Leader identity, you need to already have attained some level of success. This is an identity that is very hard to fake, and faking a persona isn’t good because there will always be holes and flaws in your disguise. To be a convincing Leader, you have to be a Leader in real life as well, the forefront of your brand and the powerhouse behind it. A good example of a leader would be Russell Brunson, the founder of Clickfunnels*.
*Reflink https://clickfunnels.com/?cf_affiliate_id=452584&affiliate_id=452584&aff_sub=dashboard&aff_sub2=trial
The Adventurer
The Adventurer is an innovator, driven by their endless search for answers. The Adventurer shares their knowledge with a hungry audience! Adventurers are adventurous! Sometimes they go out and they travel the world and show you their experiences and what they learn along the way. The Adventurer takes the audience with them on their journey and people enjoy the journey of learning. The Adventurer will bring you along and share the knowledge they’ve found with you! A great example of an Adventurer is Matt Plapp the founder of the R.O.I. Engine!
The Reporter
The Reporter gains their power through reporting on events and advances, they interview professionals in the field and share secrets with their audience. The Reporter isn’t always the most experienced, but they make up for their lack of experience in certain areas by interviewing the best of the best and sharing their tips. Reporters have an advantage in that they can show the work of professionals from many different fields. This means that the information they give will not only be specialist but they can head into areas which are more varied than the other identities, which can lead to a powerful audience. The most well known Reporter personality is probably Oprah Winfrey.
The Reluctant Hero
The Reluctant Hero is the bearer of a burden not meant for them. They have had to overcome their reluctance to stand in the spotlight. The Reluctant Hero has made discoveries and whilst they would rather avoid the hype, they have overcome their feelings to share their secrets with the world. The Reluctant hero makes you relatable because you’re vulnerable, you’re capable of making mistakes, you keep going. My favourite example of the Reluctant Hero is Neil Patel.
So Which Of These Traits Fits You?
You might feel that none of these traits fits you at first, or maybe there is a hybrid in there somewhere. My favourite Attractive Character of all time is Neil Patel. He embodies the Reluctant Hero perfectly. He is a curious innovator always looking to advance and share his knowledge with others, yet he remains vulnerable and is prone to making mistakes, but they only show him as one of the most human marketers I’ve ever listened to. Think about who you are and how you feel most comfortable coming across to your audience.
Building Your Attractive Character
There are several different elements that make up the Attractive Character!
Backstory
Who are you and where did you come from? You have seen the backstory many times and the best representation is probably that of Comic Book Superheroes. Batman’s backstory where he lost his parents, and his evolution into a hero is loved worldwide. Every Superhero has a backstory, think of your favorite heroes and think about your past. How do you want to present yourself to people?
My backstory is: “I was bitten by a radioactive sales assistant and now I have magnificent marketing powers.” You can probably tell already that I’ve thrown a comic element into the way I try and present myself to others. On a more serious note, I was struggling to find employment and was terrible at selling myself to people.
I begged on my hands and knees for the manager of a care home to hire me, where I worked for four years. I experienced some of the most heartbreaking moments of my life and met some amazing people but working there was taking a severe toll on my sanity. I met my current boss who offered me a job after I did some camerawork for him. I had all the equipment needed to film in this way because I have aspirations of being an independent filmmaker.
So who am I? I’ve worked on well over 100 films and short films. Most of my work has actually been music, though I love being both behind the camera and in front of it. I’m a father to one son. These small points are only vaguely touching on who I am.
Think about your backstory, your roots, where you came from and what made you the person you are today. What are the good points and the bad points you are comfortable sharing with others? How can you bring these across to people?
Parables
This is where you use the experiences you’ve had in your life to teach others. Small stories where you explain some of the things you have done in the past to deal with problems and issues. These teach people not only how to overcome certain issues, but about you and your mindset. The audience becomes closer to you because the stories are personalised.
A long time ago I put a message into a bottle and threw it into the ocean. I never knew if anyone ever found it. Recently however I heard a story about someone finding a message in a bottle which they found on the beach. Despite the fact that I don’t know whether my bottle was ever found, the fact that someone else had found a bottle was exciting to me. I hadn’t thought about the bottle for many many years, I did it over 22 years ago, but it showed me that sometimes, the effects of an action can be felt years later.
Whilst what happened to my bottle remains a mystery, someone did the same sort of thing I did and their bottle was found showing me that maybe, if it’s not been found already, in the future my bottle might end up being found by someone. It was a pretty inspiring moment for me. Did I learn anything from it? Not really, but the ripple from that event galvanised me into working harder for a few weeks which resulted in a higher overall quality of my work.
Character Flaws
The hardest part of becoming an attractive character is revealing your personal character flaws. You might not want to reveal everything but everyone has to have a vulnerability to them to appear to be a real person.
So what are my flaws? I have a highly addictive personality, which has been a bane on my existence. A few years back I managed to overcome my addiction to Coke… I was on the strong stuff, the Cherry and the Vanilla. Of course I mean the drink, don’t get me wrong! I was drinking up to 18 litres of the stuff a day. It used to come in packs of 4 two litre bottles for £4.00 at our local shop. I used to drink an entire pack per day and get another coke with the delivery of Dominos pizza. I was 19.5 stone. As of writing this blog. I’ve not drank coke in over a year. I managed to stop for almost a year the time I tried before that. One moment of weakness and one can of cheap diet cola later and I was back on it before. Whilst I believe I’ve beaten Coke, I’m still addicted to Chocolate and Computer Games, though I’m working on it. I’ve learned that I can overcome addiction if I work hard at it.
So what’s happened here? I’ve revealed a massive Character Flaw within myself, not something I’m proud of but I’ve told it as a parable. Revealing this kind of thing is deep and personal and it generally helps to connect with the audience. Everything I’ve told you about myself is true apart from being bitten by the radioactive sales assistant. (She wasn’t radioactive.) These flaws are part of your backstory and they not only humanise you but they can become a valuable teaching tool.
Polarity
This is our most dangerous element because it feels counter intuitive. We want the biggest possible audience as marketers, and it seems to be the sensible thing to remain neutral when it comes to the big conflicts of the internet. Having a strong opinion one way or the other with make one group of people like you and one group will dislike you, and this can be hard for a lot of people. Most people generally won’t want to be disliked but it’s important that you develop a polarity because it will help you when it comes to coming across.
If you have a political affiliation for example, left or right wing, coming across from that perspective will result in one of the sides liking you and the other possibly even hating you. I think a good example of this is Paul Joseph Watson, a right wing commentator. He has garnered massive support from the right because of his political leaning, and has many die hard followers. He’s also had to deal with a huge amount of trolling and attacks from people who consider themselves left wing.
How does this benefit him? Paul Joseph Watson is clearly a smart individual and he’s fantastic at engaging with his audience. The people who follow him and watch his videos almost religiously are an amazing audience. These are dedicated to him because he’s a man dedicated to fighting for his beliefs. Despite the fact he has made many enemies, he continues to grow his YouTube channel and gain zealous support from people. If he was neutral, people wouldn’t follow him so religiously. It’s by standing for a firm set of beliefs that are not always the most popular ones that one can get a strong following and Paul Joseph Watson does it incredibly. Even whilst I don’t agree with some of his content. I still tune in and watch him, I think a part of his magnetism comes from the risk of his work, and that is true for many Attractive Characters.
Political affiliations can be dangerous when it comes to marketing. When it comes to politics or religion, moving against certain groups can be regarded as a hate crime, and we’d rather avoid that! You must always be careful when interacting with these things! It can be much better to have an enemy or a rival company that you can compete with. Maybe one which has different services that rivals you! Look at the amount of frenzy the Console Wars sparked up with certain Consoles only being able to play some games. The rifts between people became so great that South Park even parodied it in their episode: Black Friday.
By having a strong polarised opinion or affiliation, you will gain a stronger level of die hard followers who will be more likely to have an interest in you as a person, and this will allow you to sell to them more easily.
Building Your Backstory
Now you’ve had a chance to think about who you are and how you want to appear to others, it’s time to craft your back story. There are six different parts to this backstory that you will want to focus on. It’s always best to be completely honest about all the factors you bring up in your backstory as you never want to have to lose face in front of your audience if different facts surface in the future.
- Loss and Redemption
- Us Vs Them
- Before and After
- Amazing Discoveries
- Revealing Secrets
- Testimonials
Loss and Redemption
I was a good for nothing teenager addicted to computer games and coca cola. I had anger management problems and major issues with trust and getting along with people. I was a loner and wrestling with heavy depression. Despite hating myself, my father believed in me and always supported me. I used to rant and rage and he would calmly deal with my problems and help me through.
In my early 20s, my father passed away. Up until that point, I was a total slacker. I was doing my degree at the Colchester Institute, and I couldn’t be bothered with it most of the time. When my dad died though, I buckled down in a way I’d never thought possible. I worked like a demon and I wanted to be the person that he had always seen in me. I began writing scores for independent horror films, making a name for myself under the alias of Chan Walrus. I began to fight back and realised that despite my feelings about myself, I had a worth and a value, and I was more capable than I’d ever known…
This is a story of loss and redemption, things which have really happened within my life and my experiences. By sharing these moments with you despite my past being a thing I don’t really like talking about, I hope you will be able to relate to me a little more as the writer of this blog.
Us Vs Them
I grew up a loner, as I’ve mentioned. One of my major problems was fitting in with different groups of people. A lot of the time when talking to others I felt like I was on a different plane of existence. When I was starting college and working on my diploma in performing arts, I worked with two amazing actresses, Rosie and Jamie. We were the odd ones out but we synchronised so well with each other. The other people in the group I felt didn’t take drama seriously, and at the time I didn’t realise that I wasn’t taking it seriously myself. I didn’t get on particularly well with the other people in the group, and we came to some very savage disagreements at times. Working with Rosie and Jamie was brilliant however, the fact I had such animosity towards the other people galvanised me into working harder at my performance and craft, and together we had some beautiful performances which I remember fondly.
This experience of my college life goes into a serious conflict I had with other people I was often forced into working with at the time. Working with Rosie and Jamie was a very real version of the Us Vs Them scenario and I feel that the competition really helped us improve at our craft!
Before and After
When I had finished off my drama degree, I was hired by the Colchester Institute as a teacher doing one to one with a student who had special needs and had autism. He had several really bad experiences with teachers there which he told me about, and the teaching staff didn’t hold out much hope for him. Due to some unfortunate circumstances, this student became very alienated from his coursemates due to a breakdown instigated by one of the teachers. I took on the role of teaching him and working through the degree course with him. He became one of the best friends I have, completed his degree and does a lot of acting work in independent short films.
This experience changed both of our lives and I honestly believe that I managed to help him a lot! In this part of the back story, you show others how your teachings have helped other people giving examples. These parables help show your audience that you are a helpful person and you can support and assist other people.
Amazing Discovery
At the advent of 2017, I made a mind blowing discovery. I developed an astounding SEO tool which required a little minor programming and occasional maintenance it worked from the concept that people and companies working in cooperation with each other were generally more successful. We are at heart a social species and the majority of our advancements have come from working together. I developed an off site SEO system that used video to help boost people’s web rankings and I’ve used it successfully for many businesses since then! This tool is Business Clips, and it’s something I am really proud of. By keeping the process completely secret, I am the only person who can achieve results using this system so it makes me a useful employee to have.
I am sure that you’ve made an amazing and unique discovery of your own which can help people! It’s by sharing these discoveries that we inspire others to follow in our lead and learn from what we have created. We are all capable of discovering things and we all know something that we can use to benefit others.
Revealing Secrets
I have talked a little about Business Clips here, and whilst I’m not going to explain how the Helix Networking software that supports it works, I can explain one of the techniques that can work to increase your website’s presence which Helix helps to build. Any video uploaded to YouTube with your website’s URL in it counts as a backlink. YouTube videos can be edited for SEO just like any web address, meaning that if you put information about your company on the YouTube video, tag it with competitive keywords and watch it help your website rank. This should take a few months and probably around 10-20 videos at least! This is one little step you can take to improving your presence. You can also add these videos to a playlist on YouTube, which will also count as an extra backlink to support the site.
Now you’re probably wondering: How and Why does this work! Basically because the YouTube videos contain information that is similar to that which is on your website, and they are tagged competitively for competitive keywords, they start to rank high on Google’s video search tab, and as they are ranking high, they have a lot of value when competing with other local companies which most likely won’t have video support. There are also other ways that I can teach you to rank your website which go far beyond this.
Now I’ve revealed a part of my big secret to you and maybe I have helped your company by giving you new ideas to promote your website and video! If so, I have become more useful to you than someone who speaks of ideas and grand plans, but never really gives away anything. In order to gain something, you have to put something in.
Testimonials
What other people have to say about you can really matter. On my personal business website I have some fantastic testimonials from some amazing people who have been absolutely lovely when it comes to talking about the services I have provided for them. If you have worked with people and helped them, it’s always good to have a testimonial from them, and video testimonials speak much louder than words. If you are the owner of a restaurant or pub, the reviews people may leave on your Facebook page are great because they show that your service is high quality.
Redefining You!
Taking on the role of the attractive character is hard. It’s a complicated process and you have to have a good idea of who you are as a person. I would recommend writing a short abridged biography about yourself containing about a paragraph of information for each of the significant points. Are you a Leader, an Adventurer, a Reporter or the Reluctant Hero? This will become apparent to you as you’re writing. Think seriously about who you are and how you want to come across. I’m a fallible person, I have a few issues and I like to joke around a little. Everything you’ve read about me here is true. Have I said everything about my life? No. Only what I’m comfortable sharing with a stranger. This is how you should build your attractive character, and hopefully you’re more successful, better looking and less balding than me!
I’m a social media marketing specialist based in Wivenhoe, the CEO of Fantasoft and wannabe space adventurer.