Brand voice: what goes into tone of voice guidelines?

The business case for brand voice guidelines.

A clear brand voice makes your brand more distinctive.

Think about some of the great singers you know. Johnny Farnham. Stevie Nicks. Axel Rose (yes, I have a penchant for 80s rock, in case you didn’t know). They all have a super-distinctive sound. As soon as they start to sing, you know exactly who is singing. The same applies to a brand. As soon as you read, watch or hear something from your favourite brand, you’ll know exactly who is speaking.

A clear brand voice makes you better able to connect with your customers.

You know the saying, listen then speak. If you get to know your customer and how they like to be spoken to, you’re better able to make sure you’re speaking the same language. That builds connection and trust. And when it comes to connection, consistency is important too. If you’re always chopping and changing the way you speak to them, it undermines their trust. 

A clear brand voice saves time and money.

If you’re reading this, you probably know the frustration of having created a piece of content that takes 11 rounds to get approved. Whether you’re writing the content yourself or managing a team of frustrated content producers, you know how much time gets wasted back-and-forthing because a stakeholder doesn’t feel like it’s quite right. If everyone is aligned on tone of voice, then the rounds of revisions reduce. It takes time for the tone of voice guidelines to take effect, but it really is that simple.

Brand voice guidelines: the 7 things you should include

What makes up a brand voice guideline deck varies slightly from brand to brand (after all, a tone of voice is unique, and so too are the guidelines). I’ve seen (and created) massive, in-depth guidelines that service organisations where hundreds of people are writing for the brand across different departments and different countries. I’ve also crafted shorter, snappier versions that help smaller teams get stuck in and nail their brand voice. 

Here are some of the things to think about including, when building a brand voice.

1.     Brand voice principles

These are overarching principles that guide the way we look, sound and read. It’s where we break tone of voice down really simply to define the words that we should use, the tone we should use them in, and the rhythm (also known as cadence) of our words.

Usually guidelines will have three or four principles. Any more than that, and it’s too difficult to remember what they are. Here are some examples:

Refined

Stylish

Warm

Down-to-earth

Knowledgeable

Transparent

Curious

Considered

Playful

Now it’s all good and well to have some guiding words, but to make these really practical, we need to dig a little deeper than that. I recommend each tone of voice principle have:

–       An explanation as to what exactly we mean by each principle

–       Do’s and don’ts – tips and tricks about how to express that brand tone, and importantly, what not to do

–       Short, snappy examples of how this will be expressed in the written word

2.     Brand values and key messages

Tone of voice isn’t just how you say something; it’s what you say. If your business doesn’t already have brand values and key messages nailed and expressed in the tone of voice, often a tone of voice guideline will include these. These are the messages that will be woven in through your content time after time to ensure that you’re consistently expressing everything the brand is about. 

3.     Examples of brand voice – per content format

Guidelines are all very good and well, but there’s nothing like best-practise examples to set the benchmark for on-brand tone. Your writers will come back to these examples time and time again.

I like to provide best practise examples for every format, e.g.

–       Web page

–       Blog

–       eDM

–       Social posts

–       Advertising

–       Any other content that is going to be helpful for your brand 

It’s a really handy way of seeing the brand tone at work. It also puts the principles to the test – it’s a way of ironing out any kinks before the brand tone gets put out into the big wide world.

4.     Technical guidelines for brand voice

Take a big breath, because this is where we get into the detail. 

This is where you dig really deep and create what’s known in editing circles as a style sheet. This will include things like:

–       Narrative – do we talk in first person, ‘I’, ‘We’, second person, ‘you’, or third person ‘Hudson Properties delivers…’

–       Language – Australian English, UK English, US English etc

–       Lexicon – all the specific words, vernacular and peccadillos specific to your business. For example, if you have a fashion brand, you might need to clarify the difference between a ponte pant and a capri pant (in case you’re wondering, there is a difference, and it matters if you’re in the ponte pant business)

–       Tense – future, present, past

–       Guidelines around inclusive language and diversity 

–       Formatting – like abbreviations, capitalisations, use of bold and italics

–       Punctuation – clarifying use of things like ampersands (&), dashes and commas, quotations 

–       The list goes on.

Let’s face it, this isn’t the most exciting bit of your guidelines. In fact, it’s about this part where many eyes start to glaze over. But for a writer, this is the mortar between the bricks. It’s something you refer to time and time again. If these things are written incorrectly at the draft stage, it can add to the internal rounds of revisions – and if these inconsistencies get published they can subtly undermine the trust you’re building with your customers.

5.     Brand voice content templates

Good writing is made easier with templates. Whether it’s an email, web page, blog or social post, a framework gives prompts and cues to the writer to nail the style every time.

6.     Process guidelines

I love a good content creation and approval process. When everyone’s clear on what they should be doing and the role they have to play, the things get done. The deadlines get hit. The rounds of revisions reduce. It’s freedom on a page. Sigh.

7.     Checklists and scorecards

Yep, brand voice is something that can actually be measured. After you’ve written a piece of content, you can use a checklist to tick off what you’ve covered and identify what you’ve missed. A scorecard goes one step further, and you – or your manager or another team member – can score how well the content hits the tone of voice.

The thing to remember with brand voice is it’s only ever as good as how well it lives and breathes within your business. So stakeholder engagement when the brand voice is being build, and upfront and ongoing training for writers, are really important considerations. And once brand voice is a living, breathing organism within your organisation, there’s no doubt that your brand will be more potent. Because when you’re connecting with your customers better, standing apart from your competitors – and saving time, money (and frustration) in the process – you’re always going to come out on top.

Need help building your brand voice, or training to embed existing tone of voice guidelines into your organisation? Get in touch here.