How Do I Find My Brand Voice
Wise Words From A Copywriter
By Dani KREEFT
If you’re just starting a business or setting up your new website, then you know what you say is SUPER important! Maybe you heard the term, “brand voice” and you have no idea where to start? Meet Dani Kreeft, a copywriter extraordinaire and a good pal of mine!
I had the pleasure of designing her website, so go check it out!
I asked Dani, “How do you help someone craft their brand voice and what are some common struggles that your clients have?”
Here is what she said:
The toughest thing about being a copywriter isn’t so much the copy, but what I need to pull out of my clients to get to the copy. All too often, their perception is that hiring a magical pen to build their brand voice is the fix, and that I’m the answer for what they want to say.
The truth is, they are.
They already have the magic.
But when clients don’t recognize this yet, they hand me their brand homework, tell me who or what they want to sound like and then often go park themselves on the sidelines. Their idea of our collaboration is that they’re paying me to give them their brand voice, but don’t realize I’m there to dig it out of them.
When that transaction lives in theory, clients nod and agree and are just so excited to unload the work of their words onto someone else, so, “Yes! Go ahead! Dig it out of me!” Yet, when I actually start drilling into who they are, what their why is and what purpose-filled call they’re answering, the understanding of our collaboration can often flip. When a client doesn’t have clear answers, they can often get super busy, get frustrated that copy takes time or get annoyed that they’re being asked to collaborate more than they thought. I pick up on an internal and existential agitation because they just want to hurry up and launch or rebrand their business and don’t want to go where they actually need to go in order to come up with the thing they want to show the world.
I have to show them that the truest brand voices come from the inside, and remind them that they already know this. They’ve already read copy that resonates, that hits, that sinks into their skin and beckons them towards something bigger, and they only felt that way because it came from a brand’s guts, from out of their spirit - that is the only place a true voice can come from.
It’s the same for you.
Your brand voice isn’t some collection of carefully-selected words and lines. It’s you.
And if it’s going to drive home who you really are, you aren’t going to find that voice out here. It’s not in a business course or an Instagram tutorial or an 8-week whatever.
The voice you are looking for, you already have.
You just have to go in to get it.
To start bringing out your brand voice, start by asking yourself:
What brand qualities am I trying to project, and are they true to who I actually am?
Is my effort to emulate the brand voice of someone I admire replacing, in whole or in part, the internal work of finding my own voice for myself?
What labels am I afraid of if my truest brand voice doesn’t sound like everyone else’s in my industry?
