Persuasion by character — from Aristotle.
In his classic book Rhetoric, Aristotle identified three forms of persuasion: logos (logic), pathos (emotion), and ethos (character). He called character “the most effective type of proof.”
Two thousand years later, he’s still right.
Ethos is the reason you trust a recommendation from someone you respect more than a rational argument from someone you don’t. It’s the reason credentials matter, reputation matters, story matters. Not because they prove anything logically — but because they change how the audience feels about the person speaking.
This is the force behind the origin story. When I tell you that I built an agency with clients around the world, then walked away from it to write a novel — I’m not making a logical argument. I’m building character. I’m showing you something about my values, my willingness to take risks, my ability to finish things.
And you’re drawing your own conclusions.
That last part is critical. Ethos works through inference, not assertion. Every business wants to say “we’re professional, we’re effective, we’re the best at what we do” — but the moment you have to say it, you’ve weakened it.
Character is what you do, not what you claim. Trust is earned, not announced.
This is why testimonials work. Why client logos on a website work. Why case studies and awards and a track record of showing up consistently all work. They’re forms of stand-back storytelling — you don’t have to tell the audience you’re good at what you do if fifty other people are already telling them.
You step back from the claim and let the proof create the story in the audience’s mind, without ever having to say the words out loud.
Aristotle understood something else, too — something most people miss. Ethos isn’t just about the speaker. It’s about the relationship between speaker and audience.
It’s not enough to be credible. You have to be credible to that specific audience. A founder talking to founders builds ethos differently than a founder talking to investors. The proof changes. The vulnerability changes. The resonance changes.
I built an agency with no ads and no cold calls — just stories. Ethos was the force behind everything, though I didn’t have a word for it until much later.
It can magnify the value of everything you say and do … or it can tear it down.
Either way, it’s working. Whether you’re building it intentionally or not.