Finding Your Social Media Voice

When it comes to social media there are so many ideas and techniques out there to help your brand perform better. From post formatting to frequency and timing, there seems to be a lot of technicalities to social media marketing today.

Amongst all of these techniques it is important not to forget the main purpose of social media; to connect and engage with your customers. This is what makes your social media voice so important. In this post, we will explore how to establish an effective voice for your brand, and how you can use this to improve your social media strategy and increase engagement.

Think of your brand as if it were a person:

Don’t you hate it when you phone a call centre and you’re greeted by a lengthy automated voice message? Or those irritating automated marketing calls? People like talking to other people, not computers or robots, and this rule also applies when it comes to social media. Giving your brand an identity will make your audience feel more comfortable, meaning they are more likely to interact.

In order to humanise your brand, you can begin by asking yourself some questions about the kind of person it would be. The more detailed your brand persona is the better, but below are some questions to get you started:

  • What kind of personality would they have? (Try choosing your 3 most important personality traits)
  • What tone of voice would they use? (E.g. Friendly, authoritative, funny, casual, serious etc.)
  • What kind of relationship would they have with your audience? (E.g. Friend, coach, an inspiration/someone to aspire to, colleague etc.)
  • Who would be your brand’s celebrity mascot/s? (This is a good way of further visualising the persona of your brand and how you would like to be perceived)

Once you have developed a clear persona for your brand you should visualise this character in all of your social media posts. If it doesn’t fit the character, then don’t make the post!

Give people a reason to follow your brand:

People are constantly being marketed to, but they certainly don’t use social media just to look at ads. Competition is fierce, so you need to give consumers a reason to follow or like your page. Many businesses make the mistake of being overly promotional on social media, with profiles that look something like this:

 

Looking from an audience member’s perspective, would you really be interested in following a brand that constantly made posts like this? Probably not, right?  Of course, it is fine to post some promotional content; just make sure it is relevant, not too sales-heavy, and most importantly is of interest to your audience.  One brand that does this particularly well is Innocent. Their light-hearted and humorous tone is projected in all of their posts, even promotional:

 

In a case study interview with The Drum, Innocent Drinks social media team broke down how they promote their brand on social media:

Our team is split between ‘One To Many’, and ‘One To One’. ‘One To Many’ is our content creation – they’re the ones who get all the glory. ‘One To One’ covers our responses across social – both solving customer service queries and having a fun chat with the people who buy our stuff. 

We actually have a very in-depth strategy: chat nonsense all day. (…) it’s our day-to-day stuff – making consistently great posts that our core audience love. We don’t crowbar sales messages into every tweet. (…) We constantly reply to people. We try to have one-to-one interactions so good that they become one-to-many by writing replies that people want to share.

Your audience wants to feel like they matter, so be polite and make sure you respond to any interactions. Competitions are another great way of giving value to your audience whilst boosting engagement and expanding your social media presence.

Put yourself in your audience’s shoes:

You should already be aware of your business’s target audience and their interests, so the next step is to cater your social media content towards these interests. Make the most of analytics tools to see which posts your audience responds best to and tailor your future posts around this data.

Remember that social media is all about conversation, so give your audience something to talk about. Ask questions and encourage interactions – just one person talking positively about your brand can reach a multitude of potential new customers.

When posting content on social media your brand identity and consumer profiles should always be at the forefront of your mind.

Concluding thoughts:

Your social media voice may seem trivial at first, but getting it right truly can make such a difference for your brand.  Having a consistent and authentic voice allows your audience to really connect with your brand; they should almost feel like they know your brand as a person and will, therefore, be able to interact with you in that way. Engagement is key when it comes to social media success, so having an audience base that is willing to interact with your brand is invaluable.

Remember that building a recognisable social media presence will take time; so be patient, keep things consistent, let your personality shine through, and you’ll soon start seeing the rewards.

If you would like any further advice around finding your social media voice, or anything else related to social media management then please get in touch and we’d be happy to help.

22nd January 2020 Case Studies

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