In today’s digital landscape, social media streams overflow, email inboxes burst at the seams, and advertisements dominate every corner of our view. Your target audience battles constant distractions while their attention spans grow increasingly limited.
So how can you pierce through this overwhelming wall of digital noise to ensure your message reaches its intended recipients?
The answer lies in developing a tone of voice that’s authentically yours.
When you maintain a distinctive and steady tone of voice, you establish credibility, forge emotional connections, and make your brand immediately identifiable, regardless of where your audience encounters it. Without this crucial element, your communications risk appearing disjointed, inconsistent, or worse yet, unmemorable.
This comprehensive guide will explore the essence of tone of voice, methods to define it effectively, and examine how successful brands like Slack and Miro leverage it to forge meaningful connections with their audience.
What is the brand tone of voice?
Brand tone of voice represents how your brand communicates with its audience. It determines the way you convey ideas and engage with your audience while staying authentic to your brand’s character and principles. This helps your audience grasp your brand’s core values and shapes their perception of it.
Simply put, your tone of voice directs your communication strategy across every platform — from your website content to emails and social media posts.
Brand voice vs. Brand tone of voice
Your brand voice embodies your brand’s personality. It remains constant. Your tone of voice reflects your brand’s emotional state. It shifts according to different circumstances.
While these elements are intrinsically linked and form your brand identity, they serve distinct purposes in your communication approach.
Brand voice maintains consistency throughout all customer interactions. It mirrors your mission and fundamental values, regardless of the subject matter or theme. These overarching guidelines express your brand identity in all communications.
Conversely, tone of voice adapts your brand voice to suit specific contexts and situations. It determines how you express your personality in different scenarios.
Tone adjusts based on:
- Your audience type (new versus returning customers)
- The message content (product launch versus technical issue)
- Your audience’s emotional state (happy, puzzled, frustrated)
Here’s a simple comparison of brand voice versus brand tone of voice:
| Element | Brand Voice | Tone of Voice |
| Purpose | Expresses your values and core identity | Responds to the audience’s needs and context |
| Consistency | Uniform across all channels and teams | Tailored to specific formats, messages, or emotions |
| Driven by | Mission, values, audience, personality | Intent, audience mindset, and urgency |
| Example traits | Honest, bold, nurturing, witty | Friendly, serious, apologetic, enthusiastic |
Why tone of voice matters
Tone of voice forms an essential component of your brand identity.
Your tone breathes life into your brand and influences how people perceive it — whether you come across as humorous, lighthearted, professional, or something entirely different. It can:
Build trust and recognition: A well-crafted tone helps your audience instantly identify your brand across various platforms. When you maintain consistency in your communication style, customers naturally begin to associate specific voice characteristics with your brand, making you stand out effortlessly in a crowded marketplace.
Create a strong differentiator: Your distinctive tone of voice serves as a powerful tool to distinguish yourself from competitors. Take Ryanair, for instance – the airline has carved a unique position in social media through their distinctively bold and humorous communication style, setting them apart from traditional airline messaging.
Connect with customers: Your tone significantly influences how your audience perceives and relates to your brand. Whether you position yourself as an expert mentor, a friendly peer, or an insightful guide, your tone of voice helps forge meaningful emotional connections with your target audience.
Create clarity for internal teams: As your organization expands and more team members join to manage various communication channels, having well-defined tone of voice guidelines becomes crucial. These guidelines ensure consistency across all messaging and prevent any communication that might deviate from your brand’s established voice.
Consider your tone of voice as a natural extension of your brand’s personality. These guidelines help maintain consistent audience resonance while ensuring your communication remains relevant across all situations.
🪴 Tone of voice is crucial for localization
When expanding your business globally, a comprehensive tone of voice document becomes invaluable for brand localization. It streamlines collaboration with translation teams and content reviewers by providing clear guidelines that everyone can follow.
What shapes your brand’s tone of voice
Multiple interconnected factors influence how your brand communicates with the world. Let’s explore the key elements that contribute to developing your brand’s distinctive tone.
Audience expectations
Your tone fundamentally begins with understanding your target audience.
Whether you’re addressing adolescents, time-pressed parents, university students, corporate decision-makers, or any other demographic, thorough audience research is essential for developing an appropriate tone.
Look beyond basic demographics to understand what resonates with your audience. Are they receptive to humor, or do they prefer motivational content?
Consider TL;DV, a software company that creates concise, humorous social media videos addressing their target customers’ pain points. This approach has successfully increased audience engagement through relatable content.
Brand values and personality
Your tone should authentically reflect your brand’s fundamental values and character.
Align every aspect of your tone with your brand personality. For instance, if transparency is a core value, maintain clear and direct communication. If creativity defines your brand, incorporate playful and innovative elements in your copy.
Identify your essential personality traits and consider how to effectively convey them through your communication.
Content types and platforms
Different communication channels require varying tones. While your brand voice remains constant, your tone adapts based on the platform you’re using.
A social media post might embrace humor and relatability, while a blog post needs to prioritize information and reader engagement.
Therefore, develop specific guidelines for adjusting your tone across different channels and contexts, ensuring your message remains appropriate and effective for each platform.
Consider how Mailchimp expertly demonstrates this through their comprehensive style guide, which includes distinct sections for email communication, social media presence, legal documentation, and translated content.
Context and intent
Building on our previous discussion, your tone should adapt to different situations. Ask yourself: What emotional response do I want to evoke in my readers?
For instance, when introducing a new product launch, your tone should radiate enthusiasm and excitement. However, when communicating a price adjustment, maintain transparency and show respect for your customers’ perspectives.
Simply put: Your communication tone varies depending on the situation’s importance, emotional impact, and intended purpose.
Take Duolingo as an excellent case study.
Their meticulously crafted tone of voice guidelines outline how to modify communication style based on various user experiences within the application, encompassing both positive and challenging scenarios.
How to define your brand’s tone of voice in 6 steps
You’ve got your whiteboard marker ready and a clean slate waiting for your tone of voice guidelines. What comes next?
Should you simply list out your desired tone characteristics? Or should you conduct thorough research to inform your tone development?
I understand the challenge of starting from scratch – it can feel daunting. That’s why I’ve created a structured six-step approach to help you systematically develop your brand tone.
1. Audit your current communication
Begin by evaluating your brand’s current voice.
Gather diverse examples of your brand communications and content (including emails, articles, social media posts, etc.) to evaluate your existing tone.
Identify instances where the tone succeeds and where it falls short. Look for consistent patterns in your message delivery and communication style. Try to identify any gaps between your intended tone and its actual reception.
Beyond analyzing content and presentation, consider audience response.
Did your social media presence generate meaningful discussions? Were your email campaigns memorable for customers? Did your blog content achieve significant share rates? These metrics reveal your tone’s real-world impact.
For deeper insights, consider:
- Consulting with customer-facing teams to understand trigger points for positive and negative reactions
- Examining tone consistency across different touchpoints to identify inconsistencies and areas needing improvement
This foundational research ensures you’re working with concrete data rather than assumptions, providing a practical foundation for development.
2. Identify your brand personality traits
Your tone emerges naturally from your brand’s personality.
Start defining your tone by considering: If your brand were human, which three or four words would best describe its character?
These descriptors become the personality traits you want your brand to embody. For instance, a sustainable fashion brand might choose traits like “environmentally conscious,” “sustainability expert,” and “eco-passionate” to define its brand personality.
Choose specific descriptors rather than generic terms. Skip words like “authentic” and “creative” in favor of more precise characteristics such as playful, geeky, witty, humorous, rebellious, or similar distinctive traits.
💡 Exercise for defining your brand personality traits
Picture your brand personified as a guest at a dinner gathering. Consider their behavioral patterns and social interactions.
Would they be the life of the party, generating laughter with their energetic presence? Perhaps they’d engage others in meaningful discussions, sharing profound observations? Or would they maintain a more serious demeanor, posing thought-provoking questions?
Select three defining characteristics for this personified brand at the dinner party. Then, elaborate on how each trait manifests in your brand identity.
For each characteristic you identify, consider:
- What situations call for amplifying or subduing this trait?
- How does this trait influence our written communication style?
- Could this trait potentially compromise clarity, emotional sensitivity, or trustworthiness?
Develop a reference triangle outlining your desired voice, message content, and elements to avoid.
For instance, if “Bold” is one of your chosen traits, your reference triangle might appear as:
We say: “Let’s shake things up.”
We avoid: “Consider doing things differently.”
We sound like: A confident and helpful friend.
3. Define tone dimensions with examples
Brand tone exists along a continuum — “playful” doesn’t necessarily mean “chaotic.” This is where subtle distinctions become crucial.
The NN/g identifies four fundamental tone-of-voice dimensions, each spanning between two extremes:
- Formal ↔ Casual
- Warm ↔ Neutral
- Bold ↔ Careful
- Enthusiastic ↔ Matter-of-fact
Determine your position along each dimension’s spectrum. Are you more casual than formal? Warmer than neutral? Bolder than careful? Carefully evaluate your brand’s positioning and incorporate these dimensions into your voice guidelines.
If you lean toward “Casual,” specify exactly how casual your tone should be. Provide concrete examples and guidelines to illustrate your desired level of casualness.
Consider this example for an abandoned cart reminder: Psst… your cart is missing some things you liked. Let’s fix that.
4. Write nuanced dos and don’ts
The most effective tone guidelines provide contextual understanding and clear reasoning for achieving appropriate tone in various situations.
Create actionable, easily understood guidelines for your entire team. Here’s the approach.
Instead of using abstract concepts like “We’re dynamic,” explain how dynamism manifests in your tone. Develop comprehensive dos and don’ts lists to help your team implement your tone consistently across all communication channels.
For instance, Shopify’s voice guidelines provide detailed instructions for various writing elements. Consider their comprehensive dos and don’ts framework for crafting bulleted lists in communications:
Develop specific dos and don’ts for each personality attribute, and include relevant examples to illustrate your guidelines. Consider adding specific scenarios where flexibility is appropriate, allowing for adaptable tone application within your established framework.
5. Adapt tone based on context, not just platform
Brand voice isn’t uniform across all situations. The same tone won’t resonate equally across different channels or audience segments.
While social media might call for a casual, clever approach, blog content might demand an inspirational, educational tone. These variations should be strategic and deliberate rather than arbitrary adjustments.
Design a comprehensive tone matrix to guide your team in adapting voice across different platforms:
