096: How to identify your brand voice – with Amber Williams

Are you aware of how your clients perceive and identify you, your brand voice… your persona? I mean, when they hear your name, what’s the first thing that comes to mind for them? What role do you play in their lives?  

My special guest today is master brand strategist Amber Williams and she’s simplifying how to identify your brand voice. Ultimately, this is so you can better connect with your clients and prospects and grow your business. Utilizing principles of storytelling in marketing, we go deep so you can clarify who you are as a brand, how your clients relate to you, and what sets you apart in the marketplace.

Here’s how.

Amber Williams simplifies how to identify your brand voice.

In this episode, you will learn:

• • How she defines what a “brand voice” is and how to use the “hero’s journey” framework when cultivating yours
  • What “characterization work” is and how to identify your persona and role in your customer’s story
  • Are you the…
    • assurer
    • motivator
    • clarifier
    • cultivator
    • encourager
    • enlightener
• Does your role stay the same throughout the customer’s buying journey or evolve over time?
• How to craft language to attract your target audience
• What to do when you DON’T want to show up on camera or be visible as the face of your brand

When you understand the role you play in your customer’s minds, you begin to understand how to show up on social media, in your marketing materials and how you deliver your products and services. 

As it relates to your brand voice, one person might need Yoda, another might need a drill sergeant or a best friend. 

Match that with what sits right in your heart for the kind of work you love to provide, that’s where the magic happens. You aren’t showing up as someone you simply aren’t. Your authenticity shines through. I hope you enjoy this deep dive conversation and I know it’ll unlock a new idea inside you as you continue to simplify your sales and marketing efforts in the year ahead.

#DoTheThing!

Book: Atomic Habits: An Easy & Proven Way to Build Good Habits & Break Bad Ones – James Clear 

Book: The Hero’s Journey: Joseph Campbell on His Life and Work (The Collected Works of Joseph Campbell) – Joseph Campbell

Resource: Marie TV: Create a business and life you love – Marie Forleo

Resource: Write the Word Bible Journal: Scripture Faith Journal by Lara Casey (Yellow) – Cultivate What Matters

Blog: Who is my Ultimate Ideal Client? – The Simplifiers

Freebie: Find Your Brand Voice Quiz – Amber Williams

Podcast: How to tell your brand story, featuring India Jackson – The Simplifiers Podcast

Favorite quotes from this episode:

[04:37] “A brand voice is simply how you sound, how your brand talks.”

– Amber

[07:28] “When you personalize and humanize your business, that’s when you’re able to connect with more people.“

– Amber

[13:35] “When you think about marketing or a business, your ultimate success state is the solution that you’re providing or offering. And more importantly, how that solution is going to make your customer feel.” 

– Amber

[28:18] “I always argue that nobody has a target customer A, B, and C. Everyone has one customer who’s at journey point A, B, and C, but it’s typically the same (type of) person, right? But your role… can intensify throughout your customer’s journey. So it doesn’t necessarily shift… it intensifies.”

– Amber

About Amber

Amber Williams is a master brand strategist, copywriter, and founder of Punkyflair, a boutique branding agency in Washington, D.C. Through her work, Amber helps CEOs and course creators get their message out of their head and onto the page.

Amber’s boutique shop takes a new, narrative approach to marketing driven by her belief in the fact that “people don’t buy products; they buy stories.” 

Her clients have won valuable wholesale contracts with retailers like Target, Walmart and Sally’s Beauty, press coverage in publications like Essence, Inc., Elle, and Vogue, and more thanks to her approach.