If you’re building your brand, it’s important to find and establish a strong brand voice.

Just like creating a cohesive feed is important to establishing your brand’s authority, so is your voice. These elements should complement each other. 

Here are 5 steps you need to create a compelling and authentic brand voice. But before that, let’s define it.

What is a brand voice?

Your brand voice is how you share your brand’s personality and message. It includes the words you use, the type of content you choose to post, and your perspective. 

During a discussion on brand voice, Sina Port mentioned a story of someone asking her, “what’s the best way to catch butterflies?”

The answer: You don’t. You create a garden and let them come to you.

We discussed how your brand is the garden and you plant the flowers that attract the type of butterflies (i.e. people and opportunities) aligned with you. 

For example, my brand voice is friendly, warm, and joyful. This is why I include inspirational content throughout my business communications, and, though it may not be business standard, I call my Instagram audience friends. 

[Bonus Tip: I connect my content pillars through my core message of living a vivacious, freedom-filled life. Understanding your core message helps you in creating a brand strategy that keeps you focused as you develop your voice] 

At the same time, I know I want to attract people who understand that building a brand is a long game that requires self-awareness. This is why I also include introspective content. 

Voice vs Tone

It’s important to know that tone is part of your brand personality and voice, but they are different because your tone may change slightly based on the context. 

Say you have a warm personality and are invited to give a speech at an event. Your tone should still be warm and friendly, but it would be slightly different than when you talk to your business bestie. 

For example, I stay away from cliche corporate language to reflect my brand’s warm, friendly voice and my message about freeing yourself from social norms and the corporate world. 

At events I still avoid corporate words, but my tone may sound more formal because my talk would be structured unlike the free-flowing, personal tone I use in my brand development program. 

This is also true in your brand copy. 

While you may use a more free-flowing, conversational tone in your social media, brand copy like your mission statement would be more structured. But it always has to be true to your brand voice. 

[Suggested: use these customizable branded Canva templates to save time on creating content with your own brand voice!]

Why is your brand voice important?

Your unique voice affects how others connect with your business and your message.

You can have a great message and offer, but if your voice doesn’t match it, it will make it more difficult to connect with your ideal clients. 

This is why you need to take the steps necessary to discover and establish your voice. 

5 steps to define your brand voice 

Developing your voice requires deep work because part of creating your brand is personal development. So start journaling and exploring. 

1. Identify your core message. 

Your brand voice is driven by the core message that gives your brand purpose. For me, I want women to feel vivacious and see that a life of freedom is possible. 

This keeps my voice consistent because regardless of where I show up, this is a message I will always share passionately. 

2. Identify Your Brand Values

This is the first step to start building your personal brand as well. Your brand values help you define your voice because, even if you change niche, these are part of your perspective. 

You can have the same experience as another person, but if you have different values you will interpret the experience differently, and this will give you a different perspective. The Vision Book I created is a great tool to use in this process!

3. Choose the right words to describe your voice

Once you have your list of brand values, start taking notes of how these show up in your communication.

For example, if you value humor, you may use words like witty or sarcasm to define your brand’s specific type of humor. This way your team won’t make jokes that don’t accurately reflect your brand. 

This will help you create clear and specific brand voice guidelines. 

4. Try new trends and platforms YOUR way

As a Muslim woman, Sina shared how she grew her following for three years without showing her face using her podcast. She also used some noise effects but didn’t use music as it may be expected. 

Her work is a great example that you can do things differently and be successful on whichever platform you choose. You don’t need to show your face and dance if it doesn’t connect with your culture or personality. 

Explore different formats to best showcase your voice. The more comfortable you are with the platform and formats you use, the better your voice will come through. 

Showing up authentically becomes easy if you show up in ways that feel aligned and come with ease.  

5. Know your audience

Lastly, knowing your audience plays a role in your voice development. While your voice is unique to you, thinking of your audience will help you be more precise in your message.

As my business grew and I started my brand development program, I realized a lot of my clients were creative, multi-passionate women. 

This has now become part of my messaging’s language as I love helping multi-passionate entrepreneurs build their brand.

Once you’re ready to bring your big brand vision to life for the audience you want, the Social Media Branding Package may be just what you need. This is a one-stop shop service for building a cohesive, stand-out brand AND content strategy that work hand in hand. 

Keep Developing Your Voice

Remember to trust the process. The more you practice sharing your message, the more comfortable you will feel with your voice, and the better you will understand it. 

Keep sharing your message and your story because people connect to YOU.  

As a woman from the Middle East and North Africa region (MENA)woman, I am creating my own legacy despite what others told me and have connected with women of different cultures who also want to live a vivacious, freedom-filled life. 

If you are ready to build an online brand that allows you to live a freedom and joy filled life, check out my brand development coaching program. This program gives you hands-on experience creating your brand from scratch, including messaging and social media strategy.

If you want to find your authentic brand strategy, check out this brand strategy quiz I created to help you understand how to show up in your business in alignment with your unique energy, personality & Human Design.