Brand archetypes are supposed to help you figure out your brand personality. But if you’ve ever looked at the standard 12 and thought, “Yeah…none of these are really us,” you’re not the only one.
Most modern brands are way too layered to fit into those old-school categories.Your brand shows up in a lot of places now, and it doesn’t always behave the same in each one.
We kept seeing the same issue with clients. The classic archetypes felt either too vague, too limiting, or just…weirdly off. So, we expanded the framework and added 23 new archetypes that make a lot more sense for how brands communicate today.
And now, we’re breaking down all 35 brand archetypes, how to figure out which one fits your business best, and how to use it in your branding.
Why the old brand archetypes don’t really work anymore
The original 12 brand archetypes had a good run. Back in the day, they probably made a lot of sense. But branding has changed quite a bit since then.
Modern brands are more nuanced than The Hero or The Sage. Some brands are witty but still professional. Some are chaotic online but polished everywhere else. Others switch tone depending on the platform they’re on.
The problem with the old framework is that it forces brands into these super neat little boxes that don’t leave much room for personality. You end up reading through them thinking, “Well…we’re kinda this one? But also not really?”.
We kept seeing it happen with clients. A brand would pick an archetype that technically fit, but their content still felt awkward and forced because it wasn’t capturing the full picture.
It was at this point we realised modern brands need modern archetypes. With so many different tones, personalities, audiences, and ways of showing up online, the original 12 just weren’t cutting it anymore.
How we developed 23 new brand archetypes
At first, we thought we could just make the original 12 work harder. Maybe brands only needed slight tweaks or a stronger tone of voice.
Turns out…not really.
The more client work we did, the more obvious the gaps became. We’d have brands landing somewhere under The Jester, for example, but they all had completely different energies.
One felt nostalgic and nerdy. Another leaned heavily into self-deprecating humour. Another
had a darker, more nihilistic vibe that definitely wasn’t giving “playful court jester.”
Same with The Explorer. Some brands felt adventurous and outdoorsy, while others were more culture-focused, boundary-pushing, or creatively experimental.
So instead of scrapping the original archetypes completely, we expanded them. We treated the main 12 as umbrella personalities, then built more specific archetypes underneath them based on the tones, behaviours, and brand styles we kept seeing over and over again in real projects.
That’s how things like:
- The New Age Wellness Guru
- The Too-Cool-For-You Trendsetter
- The Treat Yo’self Queen
- The Boundary-Pushing Innovator
started taking shape.
Basically, the original archetypes became the starting point, not the final answer. Because most modern brands don’t fit into one clean personality type anymore – they sit somewhere in the overlap.
A few of our favourite new archetypes
The original archetypes still work, but modern brands have a lot more personality than they used to. So we expanded the framework to make room for the more specific versions we kept seeing in real life.
The Sage
The classic Sage is about knowledge, clarity, and depth. It’s the brand that has answers – or at least knows how to find them properly.
Its brand voice is calm, measured, and designed to help people understand things more clearly. It trusts its audience to think and go a bit deeper instead of taking everything at face value.
But wisdom shows up in different ways depending on the brand. That’s why we expanded the Sage into more specific expressions:
The Caring Grandpa in the Shed: Warm, practical, and quietly wise. The kind of brand that feels like a kettle is always on and you’re welcome to stay a while.
The New Age Wellness Guru: Intuitive, reflective, and focused on alignment, balance, and deeper personal transformation. Less “here are the facts,” more “let’s explore what this means for you.”
The Explorer
The classic Explorer is still very much part of the framework – that core idea of freedom, adventure, and pushing beyond limits hasn’t gone anywhere.
But we expanded the category to capture more of the different sides of exploration that modern brands tend to lean into
The Free-Spirited Wanderer: Restless, curious, and always chasing the next horizon.
The Boundary-Pushing Innovator: Driven by possibility, constantly testing what’s possible (and what’s just a rule someone made up).
The Culture Lover: Deeply curious, experience-led, and drawn to people, places, and stories from every corner of the world.
The Outlaw
The classic Outlaw has that instinct to challenge the norm, question authority, and do things differently has never really gone away.
But some outlaws are loud about it. Others are far more subtle. That’s why we added:
The Rule-Breaking Realist: Doesn’t rebel for the sake of it – just refuses to accept “that’s how it’s always been done” as a good enough answer.
The Quiet Dissenter: Subtle, sharp, and not interested in attention. They don’t shout about breaking rules – they just quietly ignore them.
The Anti-Establishment Builder: Focused on creating something better, not just criticising what already exists. Less chaos, more deliberate disruption.
How to choose an archetype that fits who you are
Choosing a brand archetype is really about noticing what’s already there, then shaping it into something clearer and more consistent so it holds up in the real world.
Here’s what to do:
Step 1: Understand your brand
Before you pick an archetype, you need a clear read on what the brand is like underneath everything else.
What’s the vibe? Playful, edgy, calm, chaotic? What do they stand for, and what do customers actually come to them for (beyond the obvious stuff like price or service)?
Then zoom out a bit: if this brand was a person at a party, what would they be doing? Making friends with everyone? Hiding in the kitchen? Quietly judging the wine selection?
And finally, the TCL classic – what animal are they? It sounds random, but it usually gets you to the truth faster than anything else.
Step 2: Do your research
A brand archetype has to connect with the audience as much as the business itself.
Think about how the audience talks online, what brands they already love, and what kind of content they respond to. Someone manifesting their dream life with crystals probably needs a very different vibe from someone arguing in Reddit threads about tech launches.
Then look at competitors. What are they doing well? What’s painfully boring? Where are the gaps?
Step 3: Match the company’s energy to an archetype
This is the fun bit.
Sometimes the archetype jumps out straight away. Other times it’s more of a mix. Most brands end up with a primary and secondary archetype instead of fitting neatly into one box.
And honestly? The more specific and human it feels, the better.
Step 4: Gut-check it
Before you commit, make sure it works in the real world.
Does it suit the company’s values? Will the audience get it? Can the brand consistently sound like this across socials, websites, campaigns, and emails without everyone internally cringing?
If it feels forced, it probably is.
Step 5: Commit to it
The goal is consistency, not turning the brand into a full-time theatre kid performing a personality trait.
The best archetypes feel natural because they’re built around something that was already there to begin with.
Mistakes brands make when using archetypes
Archetypes are meant to make brand building easier, but a lot of brands manage to overcomplicate them anyway.
Here’s where things usually go wrong:
- Trying to force a perfect fit: Most brands aren’t just one thing. Squeezing them into a single box usually flattens the personality.
- Choosing what sounds good instead of what feels right: It’s easy to pick an archetype because it sounds “cool”, even if it doesn’t actually match how the brand behaves.
- Copying competitors: Just because a competitor is pulling off a certain archetype doesn’t mean it will work for you too.
- Ignoring the audience: If it doesn’t land with the people you’re trying to attract, it doesn’t matter how accurate it feels internally.
- Switching tone all the time: One day bold and edgy, the next day overly corporate – consistency is what makes archetypes work.
- Turning it into a performance: The best archetypes feel natural. The worst ones feel like someone trying very hard to act like a personality they’re not.
Meet all 35 new brand archetypes
When you find the right archetype, your brand strategy finally clicks. It brings clarity to your voice, your content, and the way your audience connects with your mission.
Ready to see how all 35 archetypes work in the real world? Download the full guide here.
