Why tone of voice matters and how to nail it

You know that feeling when someone replies 'OK'? It's cold. It's blunt. It's blah.

But when someone replies with 'OK x', it softens up a little. It's warmer, friendlier.

The same word has been completely reshaped. It has a different tone and evokes different feelings.

This is a very simple example, but you get the jist. Essentially, it's not always what you say, but how you say it. And that, is tone of voice, also known as TOV.

As a brand, when someone heads to your website or your social media sites, you need to consider your TOV. Are you warm and chatty? Straightforward and serious? Funny and bold?

Your TOV can dictate how people feel about the words you're saying, and in turn, how they feel about your brand. TOV helps you to speak to the right crowd (how you speak to Gen Z is likely going to be very different to how you speak to corporates for example) and it can help to build trust. As we all know, trusting a brand is everything.

Nailing your TOV....

1. Ask yourself... if your brand was a human, how would it talk? What are your personality traits? How do you want your audience to feel when they heard from you? Jot down some traits and work with these.

   
   

2. Build a TOV cheatsheet. When I work with brands, I often get sent one of these. It reiterates the list of tone 'traits' and sample phrases that work well and others that go against the TOV. Sometimes, I set a brand's TOV...in which case, I may be asked to create one of these cheatsheets which is then accessible to all staff and any other freelancers.

3. Adapt to the platform. You can still maintain your familiar TOV across the board, but naturally, if you're replying to a customer complaint, you might speak a little differently than if you're replying to a customer's Instagram DM where they're bigging up your brand. On your cheatsheet, it's a good idea to have some examples of the different types of replies you might offer up.

   
   

4. Get help. Stuck? Drop me a message and let's audit your site/social media/blogs/newsletters and create a consistent TOV.

   
   
   
   

If Wilson was a brand, his TOV would be...energetic, playful, a man of few words, cute.