Unlocking Tone of Voice: A Beginner's Handbook by The SEO Works - HTML preview

Introduction

Your brand has a voice. But is it saying the right things?

In today's crowded marketplace, a strong brand voice is a must. It's how you connect with your audience, build trust, and make a lasting impression. Not to mention standing out against your competitors.

This resource offers a clear and comprehensive guide on how to write in different tones of voice for your audience. It will help you understand what specific writing techniques can help you achieve the desired tone, not only so that your writing accurately reflects your brand’s tone, but also resonates with the target purpose and audience.

You might have encountered tone of voice books that provide vague instructions, such as "sound friendly" or "be professional," without providing much guidance on how to achieve these tones.

This isn’t that kind of guide. We’ve kept it practical and concise, packed with examples - a handbook you can refer to time and time again.

In the first section of this resource, you’ll find guidance to bridge that gap with tips for writing in different tones.

In the second section, you’ll find general guidance on content structure and flow. This will help you organise your content so that the reader finds it easy to follow the intended tone of voice, and the message does not become lost.

Section 1: Tone of voice

Tone of voice refers to the attitude or approach towards the subject matter and audience. It conveys the mood, feelings, and perspective, and shapes the way the reader perceives the message.

The tone might be formal, informal, serious, humorous, friendly, persuasive, or any other style that helps convey the intended message and engage the reader.

Even if this is not formalised by a brand, they often have a preferred tone of voice that they’d like their content to follow. This is usually to align with the brand's personality, target audience, and the purpose of the message.

The problem is, language is so intuitive to us that it can actually be really difficult to think more ‘mechanically’ about our tone of voice, and think “how exactly do I make my writing sound friendly, or professional, or persuasive?”. Your boss may not know exactly either.

The examples in this document intend to help bridge that gap, with features you can consider across different tones of voice. This is by no means a set of rules, but more so a set of guidelines to help you think carefully about your writing.

We’ll cover the following tones of voice:

 Friendly and down-to-earth

 Straightforward

 Professional

 Persuasive

 Personal and relatable

 Inclusive

 Empathetic