6 Simple Steps to Define Your Brand Tone of Voice
Your brand’s tone of voice is one of the most important things to consider when creating or revamping your company’s brand identity. It’s the foundation for everything else — from your logo to your website to the way you answer customer service calls.
Think about it this way: You know branding is essential, and the tone of voice is the core of your brand identity. It is how your brand speaks; just like any person, your brand has its own personality, values, and attitude. So when crafting your tone of voice, you need to make sure it aligns with who you are as a company.
What is a brand tone of voice?
Your brand’s tone of voice is an essential part of brand identity. It’s the personality that you project to your audience through your words. It’s how you say what you say instead of what you actually say. Your brand tone of voice should be consistent across all channels and align with your brand’s values and mission.
Why is a tone of voice important?
Because it is a pillar of brand identity and helps you connect with your audience on a deeper level, it humanizes your brand and makes it more relatable. And it can help you stand out from the competition.
Is it hard to create?
Not at all; creating your tone of voice should be the easy part. The hard part is maintaining consistency over the hours, days, and years. It should be unique to your brand and always be consistent and synced with your brand identity.
Here is the exact copy with a different tone of voice for a brand selling umbrellas.
Funny: “You paid for your gorgeous haircut, get an umbrella, and save the day 😉”
Serious: “Rain season is starting. Choose an umbrella from our vast collection, available now!”
Here are a few tips to help you get started with developing your brand's tone of voice:
1. Define your audience
The first step is to define the audience you want to reach with your content. Who are they, and what do they care about? When you know who you're talking to, it will be easier to develop a tone of voice that resonates with them.
2. List your objective
What are you trying to achieve with your content? Use the 2-year-old approach of questioning their environment. They ask,” Why?” When you answer, they say, “Why?” and keep saying this until they get a satisfying answer. So whether your content objective is raising awareness, generating leads, or making a sale, ensure that you keep your aim in mind when developing your tone of voice.
3. Define your values
Your values will guide the way you speak to your audience. If honesty is your core value, your communication should always revolve around trust, transparency, and giving facts to your audience even if they did not ask for it. Believe your values and don’t treat them as mere words.
4. Keep it simple
When you’re just starting, it’s best to keep your brand’s tone of voice simple. You can add nuance and complexity later on. To start, you want to ensure everyone on your team is on the same page about how your brand speaks. It's like a building with child cubes, one simple cube and the other.
5. Write down what you want your tone of voice to be
This may seem like a no-brainer, but it’s important to write down (or type out) what you want your tone of voice to be. Write in a very casual manner. Don’t care about grammar and professional writing; just write what's on your mind. You can even record it. It’s important because it communicates what your tone of voice core is really about. Then later, you can fine-tune and write it professionally. This step will help you and your team members reference back to it later when you start creating content.
6. Keep it consistent across all channels
There is no way we can say how important this point is. Your tone of voice should be consistent across all channels where your customers or prospects might interact with your brand. This includes social media, your website, blog posts, email marketing campaigns, etc. Take care that consistency does not mean copying and pasting your content across channels. Every platform has different audiences and dynamics, so you need to be adaptive. For example, Tik Tok is more visual than a text type of channel, so you can't write on Tik Tok what you write on LinkedIn. Change your style but don’t change your identity.
The final tip is that you can always look up different brands and analyze how they speak and produce content, and you will notice amazing patterns that will inspire you to create your own tone of voice. We recommend starting with the top players in your industry.
