The sound of your brand

OnBrand Audio work with organisations to ensure that their telephony is on brand and easy to navigate, so that every call strengthens the relationship with their customers.

Adam Clarke works with new customers to help them get this right, and here are a few of his thoughts on why and how to do it.

When people think of a brand, they don’t necessarily think about how they should sound.  When customers or clients ring, the pre-agent voice is the first thing they hear, so the way you sound is a lot more important than you think.

When we talk to people face-to-face, we tend to analyse how we might sound or come across, and choose to construct sentences in a certain way to fit the environment we are in. This is exactly how we should look at how our company sounds too. It could also be that person’s first encounter with you, and first impressions really do count.

Tone of voice is more than just a voice. It’s rhythm, intonation, pace and the language used. Companies often have this in place for other channels of contact (postal marketing, websites, social media, etc) and it is just as important (if not more so) on the phone, because sound is all you have. The sound of your brand is your customer experience!

Your tone of voice should set you apart from others and make you stand out. Drilling down on the brand, the personality and how you see yourselves is what ultimately will determine this.

Look at your products, the market you’re in, your competition and the demographic of people looking to communicate with you.

You also need to be clear about what types of calls you receive on each phone line and make sure that your tone is appropriate to that department. For example; you wouldn’t want to sound too upbeat or humorous to someone who is making a serious complaint as it may infuriate them further. You may still choose to use the same voice as the other lines, but slow the pace slightly, adapt the tone and remove any marketing content to keep it appropriate.

Writing for the telephone is also an art and sentences are often written in a different way so callers understand what they are being asked to do in that context.  If the instruction is ambiguous, people will mis-interpret them and may often press the wrong option.  This could lead them to the wrong place, causing caller frustration and higher costs for the business.

When writing for the phone, it’s important to think carefully about every connotation it could have before signing off the script.

There’s a lot more to consider, but if you follow the above, you will start to find your writing will change and your tone of voice will become more engaging and effective for customers, strengthening your relationship with them on every call.

To learn more or give us your thoughts please get in touch at [email protected] or call 03333 220022

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