“I’m not clever like you. I can’t make fancy rissoles of each word. Blue kingfishers won’t suddenly fly out of my mouth. If you want my story, you’ll have to put up with how I tell it.”

Such is the explanation given by a destitute, disabled Indian boy who calls himself Animal, the protagonist/narrator of Indra Sinha’s prizewinning novel Animal’s People. He’s cynical, funny, a little bitter (maybe a lot bitter), foul-mouthed, yet sympathetic and deeply likeable. You can pretty much get all of that from these mere couple of lines of text. How? Because Sinha is a master of voice and tone.

That’s nice, you might be thinking, but what’s that got to do with marketing and user experience? I’m not writing a novel, I’m trying to connect with potential customers. Maybe, but there’s actually a surprising amount of cross-over because, in both cases, you have to craft and communicate a personality through the words that you choose. The lines above are a great example of how that can work because Sinha manages to do it in such a short space. It shows how a writer’s particular choice of words communicates more than just the surface meaning of the text’s content.

Shall we look closer? Consider this: despite being a powerless, penniless orphan, Animal asserts that he’s in control of this story — that’s pretty confident. He makes some sarcastic remarks about his rough use of language (there’s plenty of swear words in the novel), yet he does it in an ironically poetic way. And he tells us he’s not clever — but he so very clearly is. Overall, it comes together to flesh out a character who has a strong, complex, and compelling personality that the reader will be interested in learning more about. In spelling all this out, I’ve used about three times as many words than Animal (and fairly dry, explanatory ones at that). I can describe the character, but when Animal speaks, you get to know him in a way that feels like an experience.

Are you starting to see what I mean about voice and tone and why it is important to marketing and the overall user experience? Each and every word you use in your communication strategies empowers you with a unique opportunity to connect with the user who is interacting with the words and design he or she sees on their screen. As your current or future customer reads from you, you have the opportunity to give them an experience by showcasing your brand personality. You can’t tell them “our brand is funny, trendy, and light-hearted,” or “authoritative, knowledgeable, and caring” for example, you have to show them that in the way that you communicate, both visually and textually. If you can successfully show it through your voice and tone it will be convincing. This is the central fact of UX Writing. It’s the secret sauce.

Voice and Tone in UX Writing

As we explained in our blog post “What the f*ck is UX Writing,” language is an integral part of the UX Design process. UX Writing, therefore, is all of the language that is crafted around User context and personal preferences, in order to consistently deliver a customized brand experience across all user-facing touchpoints, such as website wording, blog articles, onboarding emails, social media, push notifications, CTAs, microcopy, or even conversational spaces. UX Design, comprised of both visual elements and language, creates the personality of the brand in the mind of the User.

Quite a lot of User Research data goes into UX Writing, but the vital finishing touch is contextually personalized voice and tone. Think of voice as a representation of personality and tone as a mood the personality takes on in a particular context. Personality remains constant, but mood will fluctuate based on context. Voice and tone are important for two reasons. First, all communication with users and customers must come across as authentic, personalized, and from a human being — not a robot! — so a natural but consistent way of speaking is required. Second and most importantly, it’s through voice and tone that you can convey the personality of your brand. This is how your user gets to know you, so that you can develop a relationship that’s reciprocal. How you “speak” reveals everything about your brand DNA: corporate culture and philosophy, attitude, image, purpose, goals, you name it. It should all come together to present a coherent and relatable personality.

Voice: “Who am I?”

Every company needs to establish a very clear outline of the character attributes of their brand. Dzuy Linh, writing for Fast Company’s blog Co.Design, talks about how presenting a consistent brand persona can actually piggy-back on the psychological propensity to anthropomorphize (or see human characteristics in) everything. He explains that a User’s natural tendencies will meet the UX Writer in the middle in “fleshing out” the personality communicated through the various points of contact, as long as that persona adheres to a set of qualities presented in a context-appropriate, authentic way. He emphasizes consistency (“Like an actor playing a role, the persona must never break character”) and recommends “creat[ing] a persona style guide that starts with a backstory and factors in attributes like age, gender, and speaking style.” If your company hasn’t done it before, it can be a really good idea to sit down as a team to have a brainstorming session to help crystallize and clarify exactly who your brand is, as it’s really important that it remains stable and evident across all points of contact with the public.

Tone: Or, “Know when to …”

Tone is use case specific and will change from point-of-contact to point-of-contact. In any medium, language is contextual, so a UX Writer is consistently asking herself, what is the desired outcome of this particular communication? A couple of goals remain constant: to communicate clearly and move the relationship with the User forward. Customer-Brand relationships are developed on the same principles as any other relationship: the primary currency is positive emotion and regular investment is required in order to establish trust over time. You don’t want your contact to be construed as an invasion or a waste of the recipient’s time, so you need to give them something in return, whether it’s as weighty as a sense of security or a solution, or as light (but powerful!) as a giggle, a smile, or even a guffaw.

What we’re saying is, brands have to meet the User where they’re at in terms of needs AND emotions.

Know when to be serious, authoritative, and instructive…

Service comes first. There are many situations in which clarity is the primary concern, such as when you are dealing with legal copy, requesting information, providing instructions, etc. As always, be mindful of the User’s emotional state. If your product or service is helping them at a moment when they are stressed, in a hurry, or under pressure, then they will be looking for fast and easy to understand solutions. Also consider situations that may involve User skepticism or caution, like with privacy issues, or other times when the User may feel annoyed or impatient. Generally, these are circumstances that require clear and reassuring language.

Take, for example, Canadian company Intact Insurance. Their customers’ sense of security is primary to their brand, so they have taken extra care with their instructions for redressing customer satisfaction: not only does their site include a detailed explanation of the steps, but they also offer a shortened visual version in a chart:

People who take solace in having all the details will find what they need as the expectations are clearly defined. Plus, people who are looking for answers FAST will appreciate the clarity.

Know when to have fun…

What’s trending more and more these days is a backing away from the formalism that brands used to use to convey their authority in an industry. Today, brands are more willing to dump this stuffy traditionalism and experiment with a variety other approaches, whether that’s to be surprising, subversive, funny, or downright silly. This is probably in response to the fact that today’s public is more skeptical and less trusting of authority, meaning that brands must seek a different strategy in order to catch a potential customer’s attention, build trust, sound relatable, and showcase the value in their service or product offering.

Any point of contact with the User is an opportunity to introduce an unexpected but welcome break from the mundane. This could be in newsletters, general contact emails, “thanks for waiting” microcopy, and even in error messages. We’ve combed the internet for some great examples where Brands have gone for a lighter, more playful tone. Let us know if you think they’re a home run!

Over’s changelogs are refreshingly casual and send the message that they refuse to take themselves too seriously.

In keeping with their funny and deliberately cheesy voice, JibJab’s push notifications like to crack some groaners.

Here, Canva’s message is clear and informative to prompt a User into action. Emojis are used to make the message more casual and friendly.

This permission screen takes a simple “Yes / No” option and infuses it with a big dose of character and raised stakes.

Dating site Kiss.com took particular effort to inject humour into their 404 page. We have a feeling this lack-luster dater is intended to embody the disappointment one feels in running into an internet dead-end (like a date dead-end … get it? 😉)

This coffee shop even saw an opportunity for humour on their cup sleeve — talk about not missing a single customer point of contact!

Know when to stand out…

Standing out for standing out’s sake is not a great idea on its own (ever hear about people who try to get the “wrong” kind of attention?) Any deviation from the kind of tone and language that is common and unsurprising (i.e. — boring) is going take on a certain amount of risk. For example, choosing one demographic in particular to appeal to usually means you’re guaranteed to appeal less to a different demographic. This is often a worthwhile risk, however, because it gives you a chance to build stronger relationships with the target. That said, it’s very important to have a clear vision of what your strategy is and why. Again, it’s about knowing how to strike the right tone and then committing to the personality you’re trying to create.

Harry’s, a company that manufactures razors and men’s grooming accessories, is one of my favourite examples of brand-character done right. They target younger, professional men with a trendy, urban aesthetic and, every point of contact with the public adheres flawlessly to their brand personality. They make excellent use of infusing voice and tone into their content strategy. They’ve even created their own lifestyle magazine, Five O’Clock, which, in addition to giving advice on shaving, features interesting interviews, thought-pieces, and even streamable music.

Vice Mag is an example of a brand with a very strong voice, perspective, and distinct sense of humour. Originating in Montreal and proudly representing street culture, Vice has never been afraid of: A) swearing in print B) ruffling feathers or, C) covering everything from serious politics and public issues to pondering the absurd. Consider: “What It’s Like to Have a Pathological Fear of Vomiting” right next to “Meet the Young European Activists Fighting Against the EU’s Housing Crisis”). Through their range of content, however, the publication maintains a consistent writing style and a devoted readership.

Another honourable mention is FreakerUSA, a company that makes knit drink-cosies and (matching) socks, in a nutshell. But one could argue that what they really sell is personality. Making the perfect accessories for a college frat party, they proudly explain how they “quickly grew to be the global leader of preventing moist handshakes and sweaty beverages” — crisis averted! World peace is surely next.

You see, voice and tone can totally transform the user experience. It helps brands communicate trust and build lasting relationships in meaningful context. It’s important to have UX Writers at kickoff meetings so that they can help lay the groundwork with the design and product teams. With a clear brand personality and a solid content strategy that’s steeped in communicative competence and unselfish anticipatory design, you can craft a personalized experience that really speaks to the user.

That’s all for today! Thanks a lot for reading our latest UX Writing article. Please feel free to give it a share, leave a comment below, or tell us about your favourite example of stand-out brand personalities. We’d love to read them! You can also send us your questions or comments via Twitter, or shoot us an email at info@flipscriptmedia.com. Stay tuned for more UX Writing and Content Strategy articles. Thanks again! Have a great day! ☺️

Carrie Lynn Evans, Staff Writer at Flip Script Media

UX Writing: How Voice and Tone Can Transform the User Experience was originally published in Prototypr on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

You’ve probably heard of UX Designers, Product Managers, User Researchers, Marketing Directors, Creatives, and plenty more I’m sure… but have you ever heard of a UX Writer? Google sure has, but I’m going to guess that you haven’t. And that’s a shame considering its fundamental contribution to all those talented people listed above. Lucky for you, there’s no need to wallow in sorrow. In this post, the Flip Script Media team is excited to share some insight about this little-known field that is highly involved in much of the UX design process. You might say UX Writing is a lot like the body’s central nervous system: when it’s doing its job well, everything else runs smoothly, everything feels right, and everyone looks good; but if it’s neglected, it can painfully weigh the entire team down. And, when things go awry, you’ll become numb and blinded by the actual (ugly) truth. While we’re on the subject, let me dish it out to you: language is an integral part of the UX design process. All but too often, businesses consider language as an afterthought, and it’s high time we do something about it as it affects product design, communications, marketing strategies, branding and image, community building, even social media, chatbots, and conversational spaces! For such a little-known field, that’s a BIG list.

In our mobile-first, soon to be a conversational-first reality, language is the ultimate game changer. With Facebook’s latest AI announcement, and Elon’s latest business venture, Neuralink, big and small companies are scrambling frantically to keep up with a landscape that is undergoing some of the most radical changes the marketplace has ever seen. This is a challenge for everyone: bigger companies often have large departments that are entrenched in their old ways and are slow to change; smaller companies can be more nimble, but they may be hesitant to gamble their more limited budgets on untested strategies. But this situation also creates some fantastic opportunities — and here’s where UX Writing comes in.

Whether it’s brand storytelling, ASO, push notifications, CTAs, in-app copy, website wording, blog articles, onboarding emails, social media, or even conversational spaces, UX Writing is used to connect with users, at every stage of the user experience via user-facing touchpoints. With clear, consistent, personalized, and contextual messaging, language can be used to strategically enrich user experiences in a way that transforms brands, helps businesses grow, inspires change, and makes the world a better place.

Let’s face it… Traditional marketing just doesn’t work. The days of making a TV commercial to tell your audience that “Super-White Brand Laundry Detergent” is the brand ALL YOGA MOMS TRUST are long gone. Your audience is bombarded with pushy, meaningless, marketing messages all day from all sides, which is why they’ve gotten so good at ignoring them. Today, brands have to focus on engagement and building quality relationships with each customer in a way that’s both meaningful and valuable. That’s right, each customer. Sounds hard, right? It is — it takes a lot of careful thought, planning, and attention — but it’s certainly possible, and it IS hugely rewarding. Trust us, that’s the core of our business! How do we do it?

One deceptively simple answer: UX Writing.

To build lasting relationships with users, businesses must communicate trust and anticipate customer needs, as well as utilize Smart Messaging in contexts that are meaningful, and they absolutely must personalize the experience with communicative competence. This breaks down to analyzing users’ emotional and rational behavior across different contexts and understanding the effects of various communications on the overall user experience. As these patterns evolve and change over time, businesses must continue to learn from their customers through their continued interactions. When customers consistently engage in clear, relevant, and communicatively competent interactions with a business or brand, they develop trust, and an invaluable, long-lasting brand loyalty can grow. In a nutshell:

• Communication is the medium
• Copywriting is the material
• UX Writing is the vision

See what we mean about UX Writing being at the heart of all of your marketing strategies, customer relationships, and branding efforts? Now let’s get started. Here’s how to do it:

Searching, Researching, and Positioning

Chances are you already have a pretty good idea of how you fit into your marketplace, such as how your product or services are differentiated and what unique value you offer your customers. But as important as that entrepreneur’s gut-instinct is, it’s not enough — research is essential. Creating a well thought-through strategy for market research may make you consider aspects of your positioning that hadn’t occurred to you before, and it’s likely to produce results that you don’t expect. Each stage of your research — from planning to data collection and analysis, to interpretation — will result in valuable information that will help you fine-tune your marketing strategy and begin to develop meaningful interactions with your customer base.

We’ve created a checklist of the areas you may want to consider in your research:

• Who are your competitors? How are you different? How do they differentiate themselves from each other?
• What marketing strategies are your competitors using? What avenues are they not exploring? Are they using brand-specific terminology? If so, how does the market react to this?
• Who are your competitors’ customers? How are they different from your target demographic?
• How do your competitors’ customers perceive them? Is that different from how you want your customers to perceive you? What type of language is being used to convey this?
• Do your competitors position themselves as “experts” in a particular area? What don’t they know? What type of wording are they using to communicate this?
• What are your goals? What are your competitors’ goals?
• What are your competitors’ pain points? What could be yours?
• What are you trying to achieve with this product or service? How do you bring value to your customers?
• How should you use language in this particular context? What language “fits” in this context and what doesn’t?
• What words are your customers using in association with your product or a similar one?

Understanding Context & Understanding Your Users in Context

Next, you need to research your target audience. User research is critical because you communicate best with someone you know well. Remember, language is contextual. Your goal is not only to understand the movements and motivations of different types of users generally, but to know their patterns through different use cases as well. For example, every time I use my IGA grocery store app, I’m the same person with the same tastes and budget. However, on weekends when I’m planning a dinner party, I will use my app differently than when I’m trying to find a quick dinner solution by combing through the sales flyer tab on a random Tuesday night. These different scenarios (“Dinner Party Planning” and “Last-Minute Tuesday”) are examples of what are known as use cases. Each kind of user will interact with your service, app, or website through a handful of distinct use cases, and you need to know what those are and how users behave in such circumstances. With this knowledge, you’ll be in a position to anticipate responses and use contextual triggers and cues to bring contextually personalized value with Smart Messaging.
​
In addition to knowing your user and defining their use cases, you need to know how to “talk their language.” And no, we don’t just mean English! We mean you have to know how to match the way you use words to create a flow that comes across as natural and local. Your message should always reflect communicative competence if you’re looking to connect with users in a nuanced, precise, and authentic way. It’s about understanding the semantics and pragmatics of contextualized language. To start, you will need to establish user personas based on your research and contextual cues. This information will allow your team to create personalized experiences that take into consideration socio-cultural and demographic factors, as well as how tech and products like yours are used in region-specific markets. Armed with all this interconnected information, you’ll be able to consider language in its full context and produce copy that is personalized, localized and appropriate to each situation.

Here are a few factors to consider that may help you learn more about your users:

• Demographics: sex, age, location, employment, relationship status… Who are your users?
• Interests: habits, activities, hobbies, sports… What do they like?
• Socio-cultural dynamic: social, geographic, economic, political, historical… What’s their day-to-day like?
• Behavior: device type, technology choices, app usage, social media channels, locational usage… How do they use technology or your product? When do they use it? Where are they and what are they doing when they use it? How do they use it?
• Contextualized demographic behavior: local trends, local technology choices, engagement levels, usage trends… What local trends might influence the way your product is consumed or used? How are users in context “X” using your product? How do they engage with technology, and why?
• Linguistic: verbal expressions, wording, emoji usage, language in context… What terminology is being used by your users in context in relation to your product? Is it similar across to other contexts? What stands out? Are you engaging with them in a meaningful way?

​These examples represent a basic level from which you can start. Any one of these categories can become increasingly specific, as is required for your particular demographic niche. This is vital research that will help you scale personalization and ultimately leverage responsible anticipatory design practices: the unicorn of user interaction.

Voice, Tone, and Contextual Personalization

The vital finishing touch of UX Writing is contextually personalized voice and tone. Think of voice as a representation of personality and tone as a mood the personality takes on in a particular context. Personality remains constant, but mood will fluctuate based on context. Voice and tone are important for two reasons. First, all communication with users and customers must come across as authentic, personalized, and from a human being — not a robot! — so a natural but consistent way of speaking is required. Second and most importantly, it’s through voice and tone that you can convey the personality of your brand. This is how your user gets to know you, so that you can develop a relationship that’s reciprocal. How you “speak” reveals everything about your brand DNA: corporate culture and philosophy, attitude, image, purpose, goals, you name it. It should all come together to present a coherent and relatable personality.

Tony Haile, writing in recode.net, explains it like this:

“The value of a media company will be predominantly tied up in its brand; the amount of incremental revenue or reach that content can derive from being associated with that company. This will not depend upon another layout redesign or logo refresh. When content is atomized and accessed far from the publisher’s site, the content itself must act as an expression of brand. Its style must be a fingerprint, an instantly recognizable promise of quality that can inform, inspire or engage.”

You may find that your brand’s voice takes on a more defined character over time — this is great! In fact, novelists will tell you that when they are creating a character in a fiction it takes time, imagination, and dedication for that personality to fully emerge and take on depth. Once it does, however, characters have a way of taking on a life of their own, which is where you must draw the line to make sure you’re not taking it too far. For example, Slack has mastered voice and tone and they use it to engage in a clear, consistent, and cohesive way that reflects their unique brand personality. (And, they do it perfectly, from end to end.)

Because consistency and coherence are essential to sustaining the projection of your brand personality, voice must remain consistent across all mediums: ASO, push notifications, onboarding emails, website copy, blog content, social media, conversational spaces… everything! Tone, on the other hand, will adapt to context and use case. (Getting confused? Don’t sweat it! Read more about voice and tone in MailChimp’s Style Guide or try the exercises laid out in their Voice & Tone Guide). If it sounds like a lot to keep in mind, it is! The words you CHOOSE to use when engaging with your users are a critical part of your overall business strategy and they deserve your every attention, at every level. Be sure to incorporate UX Writing to your overall UX Design strategy and allow UX Writers to work with the Design team and Product Owners at the very beginning of your creative process! (I swear… it makes all the difference in the world!)

It doesn’t end there… Although you may have done your fair share of research prior to writing, you have to test it out in context. (Unless you’re a mindreader, in which case, just do that! And, can we borrow you?) For us non-telepathic mortals, we don’t want to just throw our content into the universe and pray it works. At the end of the day, we have to validate whether it’s working or not. How to do it? Engage with your community and ask your power users for input. Another idea is to run a push notification campaign with some A/B testing to validate linguistic/contextual responsiveness. For example, do users react more positively when there is an emoji in the push notification, as opposed to when there isn’t? Do users prefer an email headline that is personalized and includes their name? Look at the data, crunch the numbers, and find patterns! Compare which ones generate more leads, or which ones increase open and click-through rates to validate your choices. A lot can be learned from trial and error, but if you don’t try anything you’ll never know.

Unselfish Anticipatory Design

All good, lasting relationships are based in mutual respect and reciprocity. Today’s savvy shopper knows that companies collect data, usually using it to help them “sell” more products. So what value are your customers getting back from you? According to a wise old Canadian aphorism, “even babies raised by wolves, they know exactly when they’ve been used”* — and no one likes it.

Enter: Unselfish Anticipatory Design! This approach provides no-strings-attached benefits for the sake of building trust and brand value with customers. Consider a telecom company that texts a customer with a friendly suggestion to suspend their international add-on package while they’re not using it, thereby saving them money that they otherwise would have wasted on a product they don’t currently need. This is altruistic take that builds trust and brand loyalty. It’s also a great example of how a brand can create empathy, one customer at a time with user-specific interactions. Consider Bumble’s strategic voice and tone, and notice how they’ve implemented it into their overall UX design strategy. Given their primarily female user base, they’ve incorporated a fun, playful, friendly, flirtatious and feminine voice to their branding. Their word choice reflects this in ALL of their communications and it works. The reason it does, is because they understand who they’re talking to, the context in which they’re engaging in, and they use language in a way that’s relatable and fun. They know just what to say to pull at those heart strings, and embody female empowerment at their core. They’ve done a remarkable job!

So, can you think of any ways that your business can anticipate its customers needs and provide a welcome yet unexpected value? If you can, you’ll more than likely set yourself apart from the crowd, as Bernardo Rodriguez explains:

“Understanding individual users through data is the jumping-off point to successful anticipatory design. While most companies recognize this need, few have adopted anticipatory tactics into their experiences.”

Big or little, your words always matter! Words are an opportunity to connect. Whether you’re writing a fun CTA or crafting copy for your app’s changelog, make sure that you use every opportunity to its fullest. Each and every little word choice reveals your personality and sets the tone for the relationship to follow. Weigh each word/emoji with care to leave a lasting impression and memorable experience.

At the end of the day, UX Writers are a lot like user representatives and brand ambassadors, all at once. It’s our job to have in mind the bigger picture while being able to divvy it up into small portions, so that each team can understand the part they play in contributing to their company’s broader goals and message. This requires an interdisciplinary approach to understanding the cross-organizational roles and how each applies to the user in context. As a UX Writer, I take pride in my work knowing that my wording has a positive impact on the overall user experience. Above all, I do what I do because I love it. (And, I love knowing that my work makes people smile!)

Well, that’s all for today, folks! Thanks for reading my first UX Writing article. I sincerely hope that you’ve enjoyed it and that it has brought value to your work, or changed your perception of UX Writing. Feel free to give it a share and stay tuned for more UX Writing articles in the coming weeks! If you have any questions, please don’t be shy. Hit me up in the comment section below, send me a tweet, or shoot me an email at samantha@flipscriptmedia.com! Thanks again! Have a wonderful day! 😀

Samantha Bilodeau — UX Writing & Conversational Optimization

What the f*ck is UX Writing? was originally published in Prototypr on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.