As a freelance translator and self-confessed grammar geek, I have to say that Holly’s blog series on style guides has been right up my street. What an honour it is, then, to be invited to share my thoughts on defining your brand’s voice this month. Thank you for having me here, Holly!
Last month’s post covered those all-important preferences at the micro level. You know the ones – hyphenation, numbers, capitalization and so on. Lovely stuff. But there’s no use knowing that you need to insert a hard space between a number and a unit if you’ve not got a clue about the tone of voice. It’s not what you say, it’s the way you say it.
When it comes to branding, consistency is key. After all, you want your brand to be recognised and remembered. You want to build up a level of familiarity and trust. You may immediately think of your brand’s visual identity here – the logo, fonts and colours. That’s a good starting point, but how are you going to make sure that your brand’s personality, vision and values really shine through consistently across all your written content? You’re going to need to clearly define your brand’s voice. And a style guide is the perfect place to do just that.
I recently had to get to grips with my own tone of voice in a big way when rewriting my website. I knew that I wanted to start from scratch and think outside the box. My original website was seriously lacking in personality, which didn’t make any sense given that I run my own freelance translation business. I am my brand, so what excuse could I possibly have for such generic copy that didn’t reflect my passion for what I do? Time for a change indeed.
A perfectionist at heart, I struggled to move past that blinking cursor at the top of the blank page. A year later and I turned to good friend and exceptional freelance copywriter Ed Callow. We met up for a two-hour consultation session (remember the good old days of 2019?) and went through my answers to the questionnaire Ed had sent me in advance. The idea was to get a clear idea of my USP (unique selling point) and paint a picture of my ideal clients. Who did my website copy need to target and what did I need to convey to them? Ed also hit me with an unexpected round of quickfire questions to help me really get to the heart of my brand’s personality.
By the end of the session, I had a one-page tone of voice summary that I could refer to when writing my website copy and any other content I would be working on going forward. Having the purpose and target audience in black and white kept me focused and on track, whilst the list of attributes helped me refine the personality that needed to shine through in my writing. One major breakthrough was the decision to switch to first person singular pronouns. This seemed like such a natural move once I was confident about who exactly my target audience was and how I wanted my brand to come across to them. And there’s no denying that defining my brand’s tone of voice so precisely proved to be a successful strategy. I finally launched my new website this January after almost three years of drafts, designs and deliberation. The feedback has been amazing and I couldn’t be happier with the way I have expressed myself to potential clients online. Why not check it out here and let me know your thoughts?
The next stage of my website project was, of course, to have my carefully created copy translated into German, my source language. After all, that specific target audience of mine was based in Germany, Austria and Switzerland. I was able to simply share my tone of voice summary with my translator so that she could refer to it just as I had done. Since the copy was quite creative and packed with idiomatic expressions and chatty lines, we also discussed the overall translation strategy on the phone. We quickly decided together that the informal pronoun ‘du’ would be the best way to address the German-speaking audience rather than the more formal ‘Sie’. The translator flagged up specific style points along the way too. For example, I had to decide to let the alliteration go in my list of specialisms (no matter how tempted I was to go with the version that listed slightly different fields of expertise in order to keep the rhythmic sounds).
As a translator myself, I am all too aware of just how important it is to have any available information about a client’s preferred tone and style before making a start on a translation. Just last week I had to wearily explain (not for the first time) that having to alter the tone of a text after the fact is less than ideal. As for how it should be done? My all-time favourite direct client outlined their tone of voice in the second email I ever received from them. Attached was an invaluable 40-page brand document. From the very first project I translated for them, I have been able to channel their personality and values in the style and tone. Whenever I work on their texts, I am confident and consistent. We often have discussions about specific sentences, phrases and even words fitting in with their brand image. I’m a valuable part of the team and they know they can trust me to stay on brand every single time.
Now that I’ve got my brand’s voice covered, I reckon it’s time for me to put Holly’s previous blog posts into action and create a full-on style guide. Perhaps you’re in the same position? Or perhaps you need to strip your brand right back and identify the personality, vision and values at its heart? Either way, I’d love to hear from you if you have any comments, tips or recommendations!
About Fiona (f.gray@grayscaletranslations.co.uk)
Fiona Gray, Director of Grayscale Translations Limited, translates marketing content from German into English to help companies shout about their brand in a way that really speaks to their international target audience. A passionate qualified member of the Institute of Translation and Interpreting (ITI), Fiona is the Coordinator of the ITI East Anglia Network and the Marketing Tutor on the ITI’s Setting Up as a Freelance Translator Course. Why not follow her on Twitter (@GrayscaleTR)?
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