Finding your brand voice is an essential step for growing your business. It can be difficult to know where to start. These 5 questions will guide you through the process of creating a voice that fits your brand and sticking to it.

Do you have a brand voice?

If you answered no or if you’re not quite sure what that is, it’s time to change that. 

Your brand voice is one of the most important aspects of your business. It helps you understand who you are, what you say (how you say it!), and what you don’t. Having a clear brand voice will help make your branding, content and copy just that much more cohesive to your target audience. 

Helping brands find their voice and share it through authentic storytelling is my specialty. From working with multi-billion dollar corporate brands like Nike to travel startups, health brands and more—my 10 years of experience as a journalist, hustling in the agency world and in-house has cemented the fact that knowing your voice and knowing how to use it MATTERS. 

After all, if you can’t describe and understand what your brand is and talk about it in a compelling way, how can you expect your audience to? 

Here are 5 simple steps to achieve the brand voice clarity you’ve been searching for:

1. What are 3 adjectives that describe your brand?

Yep, only 3. Brand voice is all about having a clear identity that doesn’t require a 30-minute explanation. Don’t overthink it, this is where gut reactions are a good thing, 

2. How do you want your clients or customers to feel when they interact with your brand?

What do you hope people take away from their experience? Think best case scenario, if this isn’t how they feel now that’s okay. Defining your brand voice is all about understanding where you fit into your audience’s life and how to improve when and where you fall short. 

3. How do you describe what you do to others?

What words do you use? Are their key phases that you always say about your brand? This will help you refine your messaging and make sure that what you say and your copy matches up. 

4. Who are you NOT? 

It’s just as important to know what you want to avoid in your messaging as it is to know what you want to include. Are there words that aren’t your style? Brands that you don’t like? This information will help tremendously, especially if you have a team helping you with copy. 

5. How can you differentiate yourself from competitors?

A lot of people will tell you to ignore the competition and just focus on yourself. I’m going to push back on that a bit. Being original is SO important, but how can you grow if you don’t know what’s going on in your space. I encourage my clients to check-in to see what competitors are saying so they can bring something new and fresh to the table. 

Understanding your brand voice (and writing it down) is one of the most impactful things you can do for your business. This will not only help you create a cohesive brand, but allow you to see the gaps in your brand, and make improvements as needed. 

Now that you have the steps, it’s time to take action. 

If you still don’t know where to start or need a little extra guidance, I got you covered. It’s got all the things to help you nail down that dang voice plus a word bank and a messaging guide to help you put everything together.