Visual Personae help to focus the personality, tone, and visual direction of a site or application. They also provide visual inspiration throughout the design process.

Because communicating visual concepts and brand attributes verbally can be difficult, it is important to begin a project with a shared vision of the qualities the design must convey. Do this exercise as the very first step in the visual design process, long before you put down that first pixel.

1. Begin with as many source materials as possible. Gather magazines, packaging, collateral materials, and found objects and put them in a central location.
2. Gather your project and client team together and have them spend about a half hour pulling images that they feel represent the visual direction the design should take.
3. Have each person share their images and the reasons they selected each one. Use sticky notes on the images to record key words.
4. Organize all the images into categories that represent tone/personality, audience, and visual language.
5. Tape or pin the groupings to the walls, or lay them out on a large table
6. Edit the images down until you have group consensus
7. Record the final images with scans or color copies so that the team can refer back to the Visual Personae throughout the design process