How to find
your tone of voice
We’ve helped many of the UK’s best-loved brands discover their tone of voice.
So what is it and why does it matter?
Over the years, we’ve found these are the three most important things
charities and organisations need to know about finding their tone of voice.
What is tone of voice?
Simply put, tone of voice (TOV) is not what you say but how you say it. It’s as much a part of who you are as your brand values.
TOV is your brand personality on a page and includes the words you use (and would never use), your style of language – are you formal, friendly, warm or clinical? – and should always sound like you.
Why does tone of voice matter?
An authentic TOV builds trust and credibility. It’s how you ‘talk’ to people across all your communications, from donors to team members, on anything from awareness campaigns to annual reports.
Your TOV must be consistent to help create an emotional connection – if something doesn’t sound like you, your audience can switch off. It means they’re less likely to make a donation or sign up to run a marathon for your charity.
Your tone of voice should be flexible
Your TOV should also be versatile, giving you the ability to dial certain elements up or down, depending
on who you’re talking to. So, you could dial up the energy for fundraising packs, or increase the sense of authority on health information pages.
Your TOV should also be practical and inspiring - if your audience doesn’t understand what you want
them to do, or they’re not motivated to do it, you could lose them and valuable support.
Don’t worry if all this sounds overwhelming. We can help unearth your authentic TOV and give your
teams what they need to put your TOV into practice.
Lark tip
In our Discovery workshops, we often ask, ‘If your organisation was a real person, who would they be? How do they talk?’. This helps define your unique style and distinctive TOV. It’s not an easy question - and we’ve had some amazing answers, from Albert Einstein to Bruce Springsteen - but it can help us find your voice.
Tone in action
From discovery to activation, explore the links below to see how we’ve approached different tone of voice projects, brands and audiences.
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Kew Gardens
We created a playful tone to surprise and delight visitors to this world-class wonder.
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Free Tibet
Finding a voice for the most oppressed people on earth – and putting it into action.
See full project -
Imperial College
ICL embodies excellence and expertise, but could we make them more accessible?
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Mint Velvet
We worked with the chic, distinctive fashion brand to create a stylish TOV to match.
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Sport England
Turning professionalism and passion into an inclusive voice that speaks to everyone.
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Oasis Project
Creating an uplifting TOV for a positive, optimistic organisation supporting families.
Creating your tone of voice
Looking for more tone of voice examples?
Find out how Lark created tone of voice guidelines for
organisations from Macmillan Cancer Support to The Body Shop.
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Guide Dogs
In-depth stakeholder interviews and workshops guided a new verbal (and visual) identity for the charity. We then immediately worked on a number of different creative and campaign projects for them, and continue to work regularly with Guide Dogs.
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Macmillan
Lark created tone of voice guidelines for Macmillan Cancer Support, specifically around engaging healthcare professionals and HNW donors. We led research, held workshops and wrote a new set of guidelines to help create their distinctive voice.
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The Body Shop
With more than 2,500 outlets in 80 countries, The Body Shop needed a consistent and unifying global voice. We carried out a content audit and discovery calls to create a new set of tone and messaging guidelines that every executive could follow.
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Thames Reach
Thames Reach supports people in London facing homelessness, but they were struggling against better-known charities. Following our Discovery, we created new brand messaging and TOV guidelines for them to talk with confidence and authority.
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Dementia UK
We held workshops, spoke to board members and volunteers, and involved beneficiaries to create new brand positioning, messaging and a compelling TOV to help the charity attract more supporters, and reach even more people in need.
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OnSide
National youth organisation OnSide came to Lark to help them create a new verbal and visual identity. When it came to tone of voice, we helped them find the principles to bring the energy of their brand to life, for all of their audiences across all channels.
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Crohn's and Colitis UK
We created extensive brand messaging and TOV guidelines for the UK’s leading bowel disease charity, then produced them as a series of playing cards, featuring key messages and tone principles. These enable everyone at Crohn’s and Colitis UK to understand and articulate the brand, at a glance.
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Drinkaware
Our challenge was to create a clear, powerful and flexible tone of voice, and an internal messaging framework. Following extensive research, the charity’s new guidelines included TOV, a ‘tone spectrum’ and a comprehensive style guide.
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Into Academic Partnerships
We invited everyone to contribute to our Discovery phase: staff, students and stakeholders around the world. We then created a complete TOV toolkit and global messaging framework, and led extensive training with future content creators.