Why Your Brand Needs to Find Its Voice

October 25, 2021 Freya Whiteside Branding, Small business  

The importance of speaking your audience’s language 

You never really know someone until you get talking to them, and the same goes for brands and businesses. When your brand looks the part, you want it to sound the part too. But how do you start creating a voice that communicates who you are and what you stand for that really resonates with your audience? 

In this blog, we’re deep diving into why your brand tone of voice is an essential part of helping your customers get to know you.

 

What is a brand tone of voice? 

Your brand’s tone of voice is all about the way your brand talks to your audience. It’s a distinct personality that captures who you are and includes things like the words you use, the way you talk and the tone or emotion behind the messages you’re putting out.

The way you talk tells your audience a little more about what you’re about and helps them get a feeling of the kind of company you are. Think of your brand’s voice as an initial impression, like striking up a chat with someone new: what kind of conversation would get them to stick around?

 

Why is a brand tone of voice so important?

A well defined tone of voice will be used everywhere. From your website to your socials to emails and advertisements, your tone of voice should be front and centre, and is as essential to your branding as a logo or colour palette. 

More than just telling the world about who you are, a tone of voice can also help to build community, especially on social media channels where consumers can opt-in to following your brand. Smart brand positioning, articulated through your brand’s voice, can foster a real connection between your brand, individual customers and a wider community, creating loyalty that goes beyond the quality of your offering.

It’s therefore vital that your tone of voice is right for your audience. You wouldn’t want to buy baby products from a brand that sounded harsh or cold, for example, or alcohol from a brand that reminded you of your old headteacher. But how to get started?

 

How can I define my brand tone of voice?

Your brand’s tone of voice is all about you – your company, your values, your mission and your purpose – so thinking about how to get those on paper is a valuable place to start. Defining your business in a few key words, or thinking about the sort of language your brand brings to mind, can help you start thinking about what your voice could become.

Your voice will be a key touchpoint for your audience, and this is particularly true online. As you start thinking about your tone of voice, consider the purpose your voice will serve as you create an online presence. Will your brand make your audience laugh? Empower your customers to be their best selves? Whatever your message, it’s up to your brand voice to get it across – so you want to get it right!

 

 

Thinking about how to find the right words for your brand? Reach out to me at [email protected] to chat more about copywriting and your brand’s tone of voice.

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The Facebook Ad Funnel: What Is It and How to Make It Work for You

October 18, 2021 Paff Evara Facebook, Paid Media, Small business  

The Facebook Ads Funnel is one of the most powerful tools in helping you generate leads, sales, increase ROI and ultimately grow your business. We want to help you get the most out of the funnel by breaking down what it is and how you can make it work for your business. 

 

Are you ready to start advertising your business on social media? You’ve established your brand identity and your core offering, but now you’re ready to really drive up those conversions. Before you dive into the world of Facebook ads, it’s important to understand how the conversion funnel works and how you can use it to get your message in front of the right people to reach your goals. 

 

 

The Facebook ads funnel is split into three key stages in the buyer journey (Awareness, Consideration, Conversion) and is designed to pull qualified users down the funnel to convert. A conversion is when the recipient of a marketing message performs a desired action, which might look like purchasing a product, booking an appointment or filling out a contact form.  

 

Top of Funnel (TOF) – Awareness

At the top of the funnel is the awareness stage. This is where you target cold audiences, people who are not yet aware of your brand’s products or services, as your ideal customer persona. At this stage, your key focus is to introduce your brand and clearly communicate your brand purpose and offering. The ads you push at this stage should spark curiosity with potential prospects and educate them on your brand through an authoritative tone of voice. 

 

Middle of Funnel (MOF) – Consideration

Moving into the middle of the funnel, you are targeting a warm audience as prospects: people who are aware of your brand and have previously shown some interest but who haven’t taken it further. For example, these prospects may have visited your website previously, engaged with your social media channels or engaged with the ads you are pushing at TOF. 

 

At this stage, you want to push ads that communicate not only the key features of your offering, but also its benefits and how it can help users overcome their pain points. Here, you want to focus on clear and concise ad creative that communicates your core USPs in the first 3 seconds of a user seeing the ad. 

 

Bottom of Funnel (BOF) – Conversion

At the bottom of the funnel is the conversion stage, where your prospects are now a hot audience of users you are retargeting. These users have come close to converting but have pulled back to consider further (e.g., adding product(s) to cart but abandoning before completing their purchase). Therefore, at this stage you want to push strong ad creatives that answer the ‘Why us?’ question and work to push users over the conversion line. You might use techniques such as highlighting social proof, featuring customer testimonials or using an offer (e.g., 10% off code) here.

 

The successful implementation of the full funnel Facebook ads structure works to nurture users and pushes those qualified users down the funnel to convert. It’s important to remember that most users are not going to convert on your core offer at the first touchpoint (particularly with high value conversions) as it’s likely they won’t know or trust you yet. Therefore, users need to interact with your brand over multiple touch points before converting – as the Facebook ads funnel is set up to facilitate.  

 

To maximise the success of your new Facebook ads funnel, it’s important to implement an omnichannel marketing approach that uses various touch points including organic social media, paid social media, email marketing, SEO etc., ensuring an integrated and seamless experience for customers across each. At Pilot Fish Media, we can help you build a successful Facebook ads strategy as well as help you implement a full digital omnichannel marketing strategy to maximise its success.

 

Get in touch at [email protected] to find out about how our creative and strategy teams can help you reach your goals.

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How to Design your Black Friday and Cyber Monday Offer

October 11, 2021 Maya Benabdelhadi Black Friday and Cyber Monday, Business, Paid Media, Sales  

It’s this time of year again. Black Friday and Cyber Monday are approaching fast and 2021 looks like they will be even more hectic than 2020… But fear not, your trusty Pilot Fish Media team is here to guide you through the madness and help you plan (and execute) for BFCM success!

 

Step 1: Define your BFCM goal

Where should you start? First things first, begin by thinking about what you want to achieve this Black Friday and Cyber Monday. There are three big categories of BFCM goals:

Profit (short-term benefits)

And yes, it is profit, not revenue. The danger of focusing on revenue is that you try so hard to create an attractive offer that you could end up selling your products, services, or experiences at an unsustainable price where your profit margin is low to non-existent.

Tip: don’t forget to set yourself a best and worst case scenario measurable and time-specific profit objectives!

Growing your customer base (medium-term benefits)

With this goal, you are not so interested in a short-burst influx of cash as you are building your brand awareness in the market. You’re looking to the future with the goal of bringing in customers who will stay with you.

Tip: here also, you’ll want to define an ideal and break-even number of new customers from the BFCM sales to measure success!

Learning (long-term benefits)

Here, you take a longer-term approach and seek to know more about how your customers behave, to what techniques they respond best, their purchasing process… With this goal, you are using the BFCM sales as a research project to feed into future strategies.

Tip: Identify what you are analysing and how you will do so.

 

Step 2: Choose your type of offer

Now that you know your brand’s purpose in joining the BFCM sales, it is time to look at the different types of offers and deals available to your brand. You can then pick the one most aligned with your BFCM goal and most beneficial to your profit margins.

Percentage discount offer

This deal is one of the most widely used one and consists of offering a set discount to either selected items or to the customer’s full basket. Unsurprisingly, this is one of the most used offers and fits particularly well with profit-oriented BFCM goals.

E.g. 10% off selected items/your basket

Tip: make sure that your discount does not go beyond what your gross profit margin can sustain

Tip: display the original price AND the discounted price to show customers how much they are saving

Pounds-off discount offer

Here, you would offer a set amount of money off a product, selection of products, or even on customers’ total basket. This deal is also very popular and works well with profit goals.

E.g. £10 off selected items/your basket

Tip: consider bundling complementary products and offering your percentage discount off said bundle to increase your average order value.

Tiered discount offer

This offer is designed to increase savings based on levels of spending as set discounts are applied to specific levels of spending. This deal is designed to increase your average order value by giving customers an incentive to spend more. As such, it fits the profit goal best and the learning goals, too. It is also a great way to gently nudge your customers into trying more than just your hero product.

E.g. £30 off when you spend £80

£40 off when you spend £110

£50 off when you spend £140

Mystery box offer

This is a slightly trickier one but that can yield great results. The customers roughly know the type of product, service, or experience they are purchasing but not the specifics. As such, it is an opportunity for you to bundle complementary products and to surprise customers. The key is to manage expectations (so be very careful with your product name and description) so as to meet, or even better, exceed customers’ expectations.

This deal works best with experiences and when your product/service portfolio has a homogeneous high quality level. We would recommend this for learning-focused BFCM goals.

E.g. Wellness basket for £50 (but not mention of specific contents) OR one-night stay in our hotel (without specifying the room category or inclusions such as breakfast, bottles of wine, flowers…)

Tip: copy is critical, here. Make sure your offer descriptions generate excitement and play up the mystery for an enhanced unboxing experience.

Free gift offer

Always a good option when your gross margins are too slim to justify any discount, the free gift deal enables to increase overall value without decreasing gross profits. It is also a good tactic to use at key points throughout the year, especially when trying to extend your customer base!

E.g. Free mirror with every makeup purchase

Tip: make sure the gift is relevant and complementary to the product purchased, otherwise customers will have a lower incentive to pick this deal.

Extra donation offer

This offer consists of pledging a caritative action for every purchase, which can be monetary or not. It is an excellent way to create an emotional bond with your customer base and to enlarge it. It can also be a good learning opportunity for the brand to understand your customers better.

E.g. For each purchase, a tree will be planted in Kenya

Tip: for this to succeed, you must pick a cause about which your customer base feels strongly.

 

Step 3: Consider the customer experience

Once you have identified your goal and selected your offer, your work is not quite done. You should also consider the overall customer experience. First, look at your offer. The easier to understand it is, the better it will do. So make sure your deal makes sense to your target customers. In the eternal words of Michael Scott, “make it simple, stupid”. This is also why we would recommend only using one type of offer at a time! With customers having easy access to many sales from many different brands at the same time, any confusion will quickly cause them to go to a competitor.

Now that your offer is profitable, attractive, and simple to understand, examine the customer journey in detail to make it as smooth as possible. Don’t forget the check out process. As the last step in the purchase process prior to receiving the product, the check out is your last chance to make a positive impression. As the last link of the chain, the ease of checking out will leave a lasting impact on the customer and will likely colour their perception of the entire purchase process. As such, you will want to make this step, fuss-free, fast, and easy, without forgetting to thank customers once completed.

Your confirmation email is also an extension on your customers’ purchase experience and should reflect your brand. It is also a chance for you to subtly push one-time customers into becoming repeat or even loyal customers. To do so, make sure the email is visually appealing (in a way that highlights and supports your brand’s aesthetics), clear, concise, and highlights the next steps (i.e. delivery process and timing). Thank the customers for choosing your products and you, and add a little fluffy message to leave them with a fuzzy warm feeling about having supported your brand.

Need some expert help to make a splash this Black Friday and Cyber Monday? Get in touch with us now at [email protected] for a strategy consultation…

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