Three myths about tone of voice

It comes up on almost every project, usually later than it should. A few things about tone of voice that get repeated more often than they get checked.

Content is the part of a project most likely to be underestimated and most likely to delay a launch. Write the reasoning down alongside the decision, because the reasoning is what changes first.

“It only matters for big sites”

Write like a knowledgeable person talking, not a brochure. Where this goes wrong is almost never a lack of knowledge. Check it against what you would want a competitor's site to get wrong.

“We can deal with it after launch”

Sometimes true, usually expensive. The teams that handle this well are rarely the ones with the biggest budgets.

“Our platform handles it”

Jargon signals insecurity more often than expertise. Where this goes wrong is almost never a lack of knowledge. The teams that stay on top of it are the ones who put it on a calendar rather than a wish list.

In practice

Writing for the web is largely an editing job: the first draft is always longer than it needs to be. Three things worth confirming about tone of voice before you move on:

• Someone can say what the current setup is without going to look
• Write like a knowledgeable person talking, not a brochure — and you know whether that is true here
• There is a way to tell whether the last change to this helped

None of this needs a rewrite. Most of it is a morning's work once someone decides to do it.