Mascot: what it is and when brand needs it

Brand awareness can be raised by various means. One of them is to create a brand character, or a mascot. The CEO of the branding agency Logomachine Roman Gorbachev tells when the company needs a mascot and how to create it.

What is a mascot and what companies use it

Nesquik Bunny, M&M’s Spokescandies and Mr. Proper are mascots — graphical characters, which “humanize” the company and its communication. As a rule, mascots represent a collective image of the company’s target audience.

Not only companies have mascots: many sports teams — hockey and basketball ones — have their own characters. The Olympic Games have it as well, where for each Olympiad its own mascot is worked out. Quite seldom a mascot is used by IT and digital projects.

In some cases companies use a mascot in the logo, where they simplify and standardize it. Michelin chose to do it this way: their mascot became a 3D visualization of the character from the logo. Actually, while a real person or an animal can be a mascot, so can a fictional character be it. For example, McDonald’s mascot is a clown and KFC is represented by Colonel Sanders.

When the company needs a mascot

In 2018 a British company System1 Group conducted a research which showed that advertising with mascots is 30% more profitable. The main purpose of a mascot is to make the company’s communication with its audience more “human”, to transmit emotions from the face of the brand.

Mascots are widely used by brands, whose communication is aimed at attracting children’s and their parents’ attention. For example, Quiky, the Nesquik Bunny appears before the audience as an energetic, positive and brave character, who doesn’t like to stay still. It impersonates the brand’s qualities, which are impossible to show in the product. In addition, one can find similarities between Rabbit Quiky’s and children’s behavior — he’s energetic and always up for an adventure.

Any company can work out a mascot and use it in communication with its audience. A mascot is especially good at attracting young audience and increasing loyalty. Even “serious” brands can use a graphical character, — his jokes and informal communication won’t interfere with the company’s specialization.

Initially under the brand name Mr.Proper there were offered products for professional cleaning. In order to make the brand more popular, the company created a character — a bold man with an earring, who resembled a genie — a magic helper able to cope with any dirt. The character momentarily gained loyalty among the product’s audience — housewives who need a hand with house chores.

Summing up

A mascot can help a company:

— to “humanize” communication;
— to attract children’s and parents’ attention;
— to make the audience more loyal.

How to choose and create a mascot

The working out of a mascot can become one of the branding stages. So that the character resonates with the consumers one needs to conduct a target audience analysis: identify the needs, values, wants and expectations from the product.

Based on the target audience analysis there will be designed a mascot. Children like animals and fictional characters, — one can remember popular animated films — and adults wish to communicate with the character, which is as close to a real person as possible.

The next stage of creating a mascot is writing down all the associations connected with the brand. It can be done as a mind map or just in the text document. Then one needs to analyze competitors and highlight the values which their characters transmit.

This knowledge helps to decide whether your mascot will transmit the same values or set apart from the competitors. Internal and external character traits are worked out, as well as the tone and channels of communication with the audience.

Michelin’s character reminds of a yeti, — a creature which lives in the woods and mountains. It helps to associate the company’s products — car tyres — with high quality, which lets an automobile drive on rough road conditions.

Another example is a mascot of language learning platform Duolingo. An owl, whose image is used in the project’s logo as well — is a symbol of wisdom, confidence and determination, which fully embodies the service’s values. Owl as a mascot is widely used among educational institutions — schools and universities.

After the conducted research of target audience, competitors, brand associations, one can start graphical creation of the mascot. Corporate colors can help to connect the character with the certain company in consumer’s perception.

Review

Mascot is a company’s character, which can help to make the communication simple and catchy both with adults and children.

The working out of a mascot requires not only creativity, but serious analytical work as well: target audience research, competitors’ and brand associations analysis can help to choose the right character, which will correspond with the positioning of the company and its products.

One can use a mascot both in all communication channels at once, and separately — for example, only in social media or email-marketing. The channel depends on the audience, which the brand wants to attract with the help of the mascot.