Maintaining Brand Voice Consistency: Key Elements to Highlight When Briefing a Copywriter
Ensuring your brand voice stays consistent across all platforms is essential when briefing a copywriter. A cohesive brand voice builds trust, strengthens audience connection, and ensures your messaging resonates universally. To achieve this, your copywriter needs a clear, comprehensive brief highlighting the critical elements that define and preserve your brand’s unique voice. This guide outlines the key aspects to include in your briefing for maximum consistency and impact.
1. Define Your Brand Personality Clearly
Your brand personality is the foundation of your brand voice. It shapes tone, style, and word choice. Define it succinctly for your copywriter:
- Descriptive Adjectives: Use precise adjectives such as “professional,” “authentic,” “friendly,” “innovative,” or “empathetic” to convey your brand’s character.
- Brand Archetypes: If you employ brand archetypes like “The Hero,” “The Caregiver,” or “The Creator,” communicate these to align storytelling and values.
Example:
Our brand personality is confident yet approachable, blending expert advice with a warm, relatable tone.
2. Detail Your Target Audience for Relevance
A brand voice must connect with the intended audience. Provide your copywriter with exhaustive audience insights:
- Demographics: Age, gender, income, occupation.
- Psychographics: Interests, values, challenges, motivations.
- Audience Personas: Share developed personas for richer context.
Example:
Our content targets busy millennial parents seeking convenient, trustworthy, and supportive home solutions.
3. Establish Core Brand Messaging Pillars
These are the non-negotiable themes and promises underpinning your content:
- Value Propositions: What makes your brand stand out?
- Mission & Vision: Clarify your purpose and long-term ambitions.
- Key Promises: Define commitments made to customers.
Example:
We deliver eco-friendly, effective home cleaning products that protect families while enhancing living spaces.
4. Specify Tone and Style Guidelines
Tone and style indicate how your brand personality manifests in writing. Define these explicitly:
- Tone: Choose from options like conversational, formal, empathetic, playful, or authoritative.
- Sentence and Vocabulary Preferences: Should sentences be concise or descriptive? Use technical jargon or simple language?
- Do’s and Don’ts: Provide examples of preferred phrases versus banned words, clichés, or contradictory terms.
Example:
Our tone is casual yet expert—friendly, clear, and warm without slang or jargon.
5. Connect Visual and Media Guidelines to Voice
Voice aligns with visuals and formats. Include brand guidelines that inform the copy’s emotional tone:
- Brand Identity Elements: Links or summaries of brand colors, fonts, and imagery styles.
- Content Formats: Clarify expectations for social media posts, blogs, email newsletters, or video scripts.
Example:
Social media captions should be brief and witty, while blog articles are authoritative and insightful with a moderate formality level.
6. Provide Concrete Examples of On-Brand vs. Off-Brand Copy
Examples make the abstract tangible. Supply annotated samples illustrating your brand voice's “sweet spot” and pitfalls to avoid.
On-brand example:
“Our natural detergent leaves your kitchen sparkling clean while being safe for your family.”
Off-brand example:
“Our chemical formula aggressively attacks grime with high efficiency.”
7. Define Guidelines for Humor and Storytelling
Include expectations for narrative style and humor to enhance brand personality:
- Humor Style: Specify whether humor should be witty, lighthearted, or completely absent.
- Storytelling Techniques: Guide on using anecdotes, testimonials, or case studies.
Example:
Humor should be warm and relatable, never dismissive. Stories need to build trust by focusing on authentic customer experiences.
8. Share Templates and Voice Frameworks
Templates and frameworks streamline consistency across content types:
- Content Templates: Email greetings, calls to action, headline structures.
- Voice Adjustment Frameworks: Charts showing tone shifts based on platform or audience segment.
Example:
For newsletters, start with a friendly intro, highlight three key points concisely, and close with a motivational CTA.
9. Outline Competitor Analysis and Differentiators
Help your copywriter understand your competitive landscape and how your voice stands apart:
- Competitor Voice Profiles: Their tone, style, messaging approach.
- Differentiators: Your unique voice traits that set you apart.
Example:
Unlike the formal and technical tone of competitors, our voice is approachable, humorous, and highly accessible.
10. Clarify Review and Feedback Processes
Establish a clear workflow to refine and maintain brand voice consistency:
- Approval Hierarchy: Specify reviewers and decision-makers.
- Feedback Style: Encourage constructive, actionable, and precise feedback.
- Version References: Provide access to past content, glossaries, and style guides.
Example:
Submit drafts via shared platform to marketing leads; feedback will focus on tone harmony and brand voice fidelity.
11. Include Legal and Compliance Requirements
If applicable, detail mandatory language and prohibitions:
- Disclaimers: Required by law or policy.
- Forbidden Terms: Industry-specific banned words or phrases.
- Sensitive Topics: Guidance on addressing or avoiding.
Example:
For health-related content, include FDA-compliant disclaimers and avoid unverified claims.
12. Develop a Living Brand Voice Style Guide
Collaborate with your copywriter to create and maintain a comprehensive brand voice style guide:
- Centralized Resource: Consolidate all elements into one document.
- Regular Updates: Reflect evolving brand and audience needs.
- Collaboration Tools: Use platforms like Zigpoll to gather team feedback and track alignment.
13. Foster Ongoing Dialogue and Training
Maintaining voice consistency requires continuous collaboration:
- Open Communication: Encourage questions and clarifications.
- Workshops and Training: Regular sessions to onboard new copywriters and refine voice applications.
- Pilot Projects: Test voice in small campaigns before broader rollout.
Example:
Schedule monthly voice alignment meetings between copywriters and marketing teams.
14. Define Success Metrics for Brand Voice
Quantify and monitor how well your brand voice performs:
- Engagement Rates: Social shares, comments, email open rates.
- Sentiment Analysis: Tools measuring emotional resonance.
- Internal Feedback: Surveys from stakeholders and customer-facing teams.
Use tools like Zigpoll to efficiently collect and analyze content feedback across channels.
15. Adapt Voice for Multilingual and Multicultural Audiences
If targeting diverse markets, provide guidance on localization:
- Localization Rules: Maintain voice essence while tailoring tone.
- Cultural Sensitivities: Avoid phrases or terms inappropriate in target cultures.
- Translation Quality Control: Ensure consistent style across languages.
Example:
Our English content is casual and warm; German materials require a respectful yet friendly tone.
16. Include FAQs About Brand Voice
Preempt common copywriter questions with concise answers:
Q: How to keep technical content engaging yet accurate?
A: Use relatable analogies and simple language while preserving precision.Q: Are jokes appropriate?
A: Only if they reinforce warmth and do not alienate the audience.
Final Recommendations
To keep your brand voice consistent across blogs, social media, emails, websites, and more, your copywriter’s brief must comprehensively cover personality, audience, tone, core messaging, style, and feedback loops. Leveraging tools like Zigpoll helps teams gather real-time input and continuously refine voice alignment.
By emphasizing these key elements in your briefing, you empower copywriters to create authentic, unified content that unmistakably reflects your brand — everywhere your audience interacts.
Maintain clarity. Foster alignment. Elevate your brand voice consistently across all platforms.
