If Your Brand Were an Animal, What Would It Be?
Discover your brand's true essence by asking the one question that reveals everything.
If Your Brand Were an Animal, What Would It Be?
It sounds like a strange question, but stay with me.
If your brand were an animal, what would it be?
Maybe a hummingbird, a golden retriever, a black panther, or a flamingo. Maybe it's a very expensive-looking horse with better hair than most humans. Whatever came to mind, don't overthink it. Pick one, and then ask yourself why.
If you chose a golden retriever, maybe your brand is warm, welcoming, and easy to trust. A panther might feel confident, instinctive, and quietly powerful. A hummingbird could represent curiosity, energy, and a constant pull toward beautiful things.
Already, you've told me far more about your brand than you would have by saying you want it to feel "professional, modern, and elevated."
And that is where branding starts to get interesting.
After nearly 20 years of creating brands, I've learned that the most important part of the process often happens long before we choose a logo, color palette, or font.
We're trying to find the soul of the brand—the thing underneath the business that makes it feel alive and distinctly yours.
Sometimes, that soul begins with why you started.
Maybe you wanted women to feel more confident. Maybe you have a gift for making something complicated feel easier. Maybe you looked at your industry and knew there had to be a better way. Maybe you simply believe the world could use more beauty.
Those things matter because your brand should be an expression of what you believe, how you see the world, and how you want people to feel when they encounter your business.
The trouble is, we tend to lose those wonderfully specific things when we start trying to sound like a business. We reach for words like authentic, elevated, innovative, and luxury. There's nothing inherently wrong with those words, but they rarely help us uncover what makes one business feel different from another.
That's why I love questions that take you somewhere unexpected.
Tell me your brand is a hummingbird, and then tell me why.
Maybe you love that something so tiny can be impossible to ignore. Maybe hummingbirds remind you of someone you love. Maybe it's the color and movement that draws you in. Maybe you can't explain it at all, except that something about it just feels right.
That little moment of recognition is worth paying attention to.
It's also part of why I created SEEN. I wanted women to experience branding as a process of discovery, rather than sitting in front of Canva wondering which shade of green makes them look more professional.
Your brand has a personality before it has a palette. It has values before it has a logo. There is already a story, a point of view, and a feeling underneath the thing you're building.
The creative work is finding it, naming it, and eventually giving it a visual language so other people can feel it, too.
So before you ask what your brand should look like, try asking something a little stranger:
If your brand were an animal, what would it be?
Your answer might lead you straight to its soul.
Alanna Frattaroli is a Creative Director and brand strategist with nearly 20 years of experience creating brands and creative experiences. She is the creator of SEEN: Build Your Brand in Canva, a self-guided branding experience designed to help women uncover what makes their businesses distinctive and turn it into a brand they can actually use.
