How to find your outdoor brand's voice

In the outdoor industry, it’s not enough to have great gear, sustainable practices, or stunning product photos. If your brand sounds like every other adventure company out there, you're just another echo in the canyon. With more and more upcoming outdoor brands, especially in the apparel space, you need to give consumers a reason to choose your brand.

And the main reason people buy from brands again and again, and are proud to wear your gear at the crag or on the slopes, is often down to how your brand makes them feel. You need to create a connection with people through the words you use.

Why does brand voice matter in the outdoor industry?

Your brand voice is the expression of your brand’s personality through the words you use.

It’s that human connection that people feel when they think of your brand. It’s what makes you choosable. When buying something, we choose with our heart and then justify it with our reasoning. So if you ask people why they buy something, they will probably answer with the second part of that process (the price, the quality, the colour, the design, the reviews…). But it’s the emotional response to interacting with your brand that actually has the biggest effect on decision-making.

How do you find your brand voice?

Some brands seem to have a really clear and strong brand voice. I’m sure you can think of some. But I’m guessing you’re reading this because you need some help in understanding what your brand voice is?

The good news, you don’t have to choose a brand voice, or pick one out of a hat.

If you’re a small, upcoming business owner or team in the outdoor industry, you can work through this process yourselves. If you’ve got a bigger team, you’ll need a small group of stakeholders to work on this process. Think about who in your business really understands the values of the brand, who interacts most with customers, who are the key decision makers. This process works best with a small group of people.

Know yourself

Take time to think about your brand story, why you started, what’s happened along the way. Set the scene for getting under the skin of your brand. Get clear on your values and your mission. Think about how you want to make people feel. Think about your ‘enemy’, what are you fighting against? (This could be bland designs, expensive prices, think about what fires you up about the outdoor industry that you’d like to fix)

Know your competitors

See what other people are doing and explore what you like as well as how you'd like to be different. You can even look beyond your industry to completely different brands in other spaces.

Know your audience

Describe your audience. What's important to them? Why do they love the outdoors? What barriers are they overcoming? This isn’t just about demographics, but more about understanding what motivates your target customers.

Explore your personality

Dig deep into brand personality words. Don’t stop at ‘friendly’ or ‘happy’. Go deeper. Are you ‘approachable’, ‘compassionate’? ‘Assertive or defiant? Think and talk about why you are more drawn to one of two similar words. Bounce ideas around, talk about why you’ve chosen certain words.

How do you define your brand voice?

Once you’ve got all these starting points, it’s time to create some guidelines for your brand voice.

• Build a word bank - Collect words, phrases, and expressions that capture your tone. Find examples of both what to say, and what not to say.
• Think about cultural references - do you use metaphors about rock climbing? Do you make references to Daft Punk? Do you use any dialect in your copy? We all have those references we fall back on to illustrate things, think about which ones will work for your brand.
• Think about any no-go words or phrases.
• Look at examples from other brands, from other industries. See what resonates with your brand personality.
• Think about different channels - how will your voice be different on social media, in emails, on your website? Write examples of copy for different contexts.

Create a bank of examples to show how your personality comes to life through words.

And don’t forget, your voice can and should evolve over time. Let it. Come back to your brand voice, see what has changed.

Of course, if you want any help with this, get in touch

If you want to learn more about brand voice, check out this post about how I analyse copy to understand and define the brand voice