Brand voice plays a critical role in how a company views its marketing campaigns. It can be the difference between a company that stands out from the competition and one that hardly gets its message heard.
A consistent and well-defined brand voice will help you build trust with your customers. They’ll know what to expect from your company, and that consistency will make them want to partner with you.
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Key Takeaways
- Brand voice is necessary in distinguishing a company in the market, creating an emotional bond with customers, and building trust by consistently reflecting the company’s values and personality across all communications.
- A well-crafted brand voice not only humanizes a company, making it more relatable and approachable, but also conveys the company’s mission and values, reinforcing its identity and differentiating it from competitors.
- Establishing a brand voice involves understanding and articulating the company’s mission and values, adopting a conversational and authentic tone, maintaining consistency across all channels, and being open to evolving the voice based on feedback and changing audience needs.
What is Brand Voice?
A company’s brand voice is the overall tone, personality, and feel of your company’s communications. It includes the style, approach, and choice of words used in all forms of communication, from website copy to social media posts. It’s what makes your company recognizable and distinct.
Why is Brand Voice so Important?
Here are five big reasons why the right brand voice matters:
Emotional Connection
Brand voice connects you with customers on an emotional level.
When you think about your favorite brands, what comes to mind? Chances are, it’s not just the product or service they offer but also how they make you feel. Successful brands have a strong voice that creates an emotional connection with their customers.
One of the key ways that brand voice connects with customers on an emotional level is by evoking certain feelings and associations.
For example, a brand that uses humor in its messaging is likely to be seen as more approachable and friendly, while a luxury brand that uses language that is aspirational and highly polished will convey a sense of sophistication and exclusivity.
Distinctive Identity
Brand voice differentiates your company from your competitors.
Your competitors are likely saying very similar things to what you are saying. Their messaging might even be nearly identical. It is pretty typical in most industries. So, you need a unique way of communicating with your potential customers.
Your brand voice significantly impacts your brand identity and how your customers perceive your company. It’s how they would describe you to others.
As it reflects your brand’s peculiar attributes, you show your customers why it’s better to do business with you, not your competitor.
Trust
Brand voice builds trust.
Customers only do business with brands that they trust.
Your branding voice plays a role in building that trust by conveying your company’s values, beliefs, and brand personality.
If your brand voice is authentic to your values, consumers will know that you are not just trying to sell them something but that you genuinely care about providing a great product or service.
Human Touch
Brand voice humanizes your company.
One of the dangers of marketing is coming across as too impersonal or faceless. It is a particular risk for companies that are large or sell complex products and services.
A personalized brand voice helps to humanize your company by setting a more friendly, approachable, and relatable tone of voice.
What is your brand’s personality? Playful, casual, and down-to-earth are good choices to connect with your audience on a more personal level. If this is so, make it evident in your writing.
You may go for peppered with witty one-liners and amusing anecdotes.
Values Transmission
Brand voice imparts your company’s values and mission to customers.
To reiterate, your brand voice should reflect your company’s values and mission. Your customers need to know what you stand for and what you’re trying to achieve.
Do you focus on sustainable/ethical practices? Are you all about customer satisfaction? Do you prioritize innovation?
Your brand voice must accurately reflect your company’s culture, values, and mission. It should feel natural to your employees and customers and be an extension of the way you already do business.
We’ve just answered the question, “why does brand voice matter?” Knowing that it is one of your most valuable marketing assets, let’s look at some tips on how you can create or enhance yours.
How to Establish Your Brand’s Voice?
When crafting your brand voice, consider these eight points:
1. Establish Your Brand’s Mission and Values
When creating your brand’s voice, it is important to be clear about what you stand for. What are the company’s values and goals? What is the mission statement? If you’re unclear about your brand’s mission and values, your brand voice will be all over the place, and it will be difficult to establish a strong presence in the market.
2. Write As You Talk
If you want to connect with your audience, it’s important to write as if you’re having a conversation. That means using natural, conversational language that everyone can understand. It also means being honest and transparent.
What does that brand messaging look like in practice? It means:
- avoiding jargon and industry-specific terms
- using active rather than passive voice
- ensuring your sentences are relatively short and easy to read
- imbibing your brand – people appreciate your authenticity
3. Develop a Style Guide
A style guide delineates the house style for how a brand communicates. It includes details about the tone, vocabulary, and grammar that should be used when writing marketing materials, website content, and social media posts. A style guide can also guide how you should use images and videos.
Developing a style guide is important to ensure that everyone who is creating content for your brand is doing so in a consistent way across all touchpoints.
4. Make a Mood Board
A mood board (sometimes called a concept board) is a collection of images, colors, textures, and materials used to communicate the company brand’s tone and feel.
The goal of creating a mood board is to provide a visual reference for the copywriter, art director, or designer when developing marketing materials.
Mood boards are designed for various purposes, such as enhancing the overall brand identity, exploring specific color palette options, or refining the style and voice of a company’s website.
Here’s how to create a mood board for your brand voice:
- Gather images that reflect the overall tone and feel you want to convey. These could be photos, illustrations, or screenshots from websites or social media posts.
- Group the images into categories based on a theme. For example, you might have a category for “Serious and Professional” and another for “Fun and Playful.”
- Once you have your categories, start sorting the images within each category by tone. For example, within the “Serious and Professional” category, you might have subcategories for “Authoritative,” “Compassionate,” and “Intelligent.”
- Finally, narrow your selections to the best representations of each category and tone. These will be the images you use to create your mood board.
5. Be Mindful of Your Audience
Your audience should always be at the forefront of your mind when crafting your brand’s voice. After all, your efforts are primarily for them.
As you deal with businesses, you must project a professional image and use language suitable for a corporate marketing setting. Be respectful and straightforward.
Of course, you want to appear as an authority figure in your industry, someone who knows what they’re talking about and is trusted by their peers.
It doesn’t mean that you can’t be playful or friendly. A touch of personality can go a long way in making your brand more engaging. However, you must strike the right balance so that you maintain a level of professionalism.
6. Train Your Employees
Your employees are the face of your company, and they play a vital role in establishing your brand voice.
It’s important that they be able to represent your brand in a positive light and that they have a good understanding of your company’s values and mission. When customers interact with your employees, they should instantly identify your distinct personality.
To ensure that your employees do this:
- Provide them with training and resources.
- Coach them in your style guide and set standard operating procedures for customer interactions.
- Encourage them to be themselves and let their personalities shine through.
- Give them the freedom to be creative – after all, creativity is what helps to set your brand apart from the competition.
7. Be Consistent
Inconsistent brand voices will make your company seem confusing and untrustworthy. As previously mentioned, your company’s core values should guide all of your marketing and communications.
For example, if one of your company’s core values is “innovation,” you should make it a point that all your marketing materials are creative and forward-thinking.
Your customers should be able to recognize your brand no matter where they encounter it. Whether they see an ad, read a blog post, or interact with customer service, they should always have the same experience.
8. Take Feedback on Board and Make Changes
As you gain more customers and learn more about your target audience, you may find that your current brand voice isn’t resonating as well as it used to. In this case, it’s important to take feedback on board and make changes where necessary.
Your style guide must be a living document that evolves. as your brand grows and changes.
Of course, you don’t want to make changes for the sake of change. But if you find that your voice is no longer in line with your company’s values or that it’s not resonating with your target audience, don’t be afraid to make a change.
Conclusion
Establishing a brand voice ensures that all your communications are cohesive and on-brand. It makes your marketing more consistent with your brand guidelines and helps you better connect with your customer base. As it reflects your business principles, you are building customer loyalty. Paying attention to the importance of brand voice goes a long way in your business growth.
FAQs
Here are other questions about a company brand voice that we have not covered in the article.
A brand voice strategy is a plan for how you will communicate with customers through all channels. It should include your company’s core values, the tone you want to use, and the tone you think is appropriate for your target audience. It should also outline how you will be consistent with your branding across all channels.
There are many benefits to having a strong and consistent brand voice:
1. Builds trust with your audience
2. Makes your brand more distinguishable and memorable
3. Differentiates your brand from your competitors
4. Builds an emotional connection with your customers
5. Creates a more positive brand image.
Steps to creating a unique brand voice:
1. Understand your company’s core values and what makes your brand memorable.
2. Understand your target audience and what they want to hear from you.
3. Find the right tone that is appropriate for your brand and resonates with your target audience.
4. Maintain consistency across all channels.
