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Tone of voice (TOV) is crucial for brand success and this blog post explores why brands need to develop a kickass tone of voice.
However, before we begin, we will briefly look at what brand voice is.
What is brand voice?
Brand voice is the way a brand talks to their clients/customers and remains consistent. It reflects the brand’s values and persona e.g. playful, intellectual, sophisticated and so on.
So, what exactly is tone of voice?
Tone of voice is how you get your brand message across to your audience. It changes depending on the situation, subject matter, and who the brand is talking to. It’s the feeling behind the words. And it’s extremely valuable when developing the brand’s overall content strategy and communication plan. It will inform all the brand’s written copy including website and social media content, emails, newsletters, adverts and product packaging.
A brand’s tone of voice should be:
- Distinctive.
- Recognisable
- Unique
This may seem a bit daunting when you are trying to develop your own brand’s tone of voice until we consider the use of our own language in everyday life. We all employ language – both written and spoken – in our own way. Of course, culture and dialect are the most significant factors dictating our approach to words. But within these, we each have our own idiosyncrasies, favourite expressions, inflections, pace and so forth.
If you want to build a successful brand you need to understand voice and tone— and how to use them — as it can make all the difference between presenting a strong, unified brand or a shaky and inconsistent brand image
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A couple of brands that have nailed their tone of voice include mega-brand Coca-Cola and O2. The concepts of friendship, happiness and joy flow through Coca-Cola’s chatty brand language. And O2’s award-winning ‘Be More Dog’ campaign was a huge success. Talking of dogs, check out We Rate Dogs for inspiration because it’s here that tone of voice is truly being reshaped.
Other British brands who have an awesome tone of voice include Innocent Drinks with their humour and quirkiness and BrewDog with their kickass attitude! All these brands are clearly recognise the importance of having a distinctive tone of voice.
Why is TOV so important?
Branding is all about telling a story so it’s not just what you say (voice) that matters but how you say it (tone)! Remember when your Dad told you a bedtime story as a kid? His tone of voice and how he told the story would make a big difference. If he were animated and involved it would make the story sound much more exciting than if he were reading it in a dull, flat, monotone!
It’s the same with brand content – there’s no point having a cool, exciting, cutting edge brand if the content you deliver is bland and boring! Your brand tone of voice needs to capture the essence of your brand personality and reflect your values. It shows your target market who the people are behind the brand – the things that drive them, their likes and dislikes and what they want to share with the world. It’s that simple.
Here are some ways that your brand tone of voice can help make or break your brand:
- It helps you stand out from the crowd – having a warm, friendly and engaging tone of voice which makes you sound human and evokes emotion is more likely to attract your target market than having a cool, corporate and detached tone of voice (unless of course your target market fits these criteria!). If you sound approachable, it makes your brand more likeable. And people are more likely to buy from brands that they feel an emotional connection with.
- It helps bring your brand identity to life – your brand tone of voice helps bring your brand identity to life and convey your brand’s personality. For example, Chanel uses sophisticated, polished and professional language to appeal to their target market consisting of educated and affluent women who are interested in an exclusive, high- end lifestyle. So ultimately, the way a brand communicates with their audience will be a significant deciding factor in the impression they form of that brand.
- It helps build trust – the language you use should be consistent and authentic to build familiarity and trust amongst your target market. There’s no point making claims about your brand that aren’t true. Credibility increases trust and inconsistent branding breaks down customer trust. When a company’s branding is inconsistent across their communication methods, it breaks the link that the customer makes in their mind with the brand as they know it and the offer they are currently viewing
- It helps influence decisions – if people trust your brand, they are more likely to purchase your products or services so your brand tone of voice can ultimately drive sales or cause you to lose sales! A consumer survey conducted by online platform OnBuy.com shows the vast majority of buyers prefer to purchase products and services from brands they know and trust. In fact, 71 percent of consumers say it’s important they recognise a brand before they make a purchase.
Be mindful when you’re dealing with sensitive subjects. This includes things like health and medicine, religion, money and private information. These issues obviously need to be handled sensitively.
And there we have it! If you have a kickass tone of voice you will be able to more readily resonate and influence your audience. Also, it will be far easier to craft on-brand content like social media and blog posts. It really pays off when who know who you are (and how you sound!) as a company.
Grab a copy of my little brand voice toolkit here to nail your brand voice in 8 easy steps! https://bit.ly/3FW9KDk
