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A good charity Tone of Voice guide helps everyone write consistently, whether they are creating website content, newsletters, funding bids, social media posts or emails. Moreover, charities are increasingly struggling to cut through all the slop and online misinformation to be heard. Trust and authenticity have always been very important but we believe that they will now be even more critical. Before creating your tone of voice, you may wish to read our guide to trust and authenticity and include those elements you think are most important to your charity. You do not need to use AI to use this brand guide but it does allow you to tweak and test your work very quickly.
Often charities choose too many words when describing their tone of voice. If you select everything, the result will be generic and inconsistent. Don't try to be everything. As a guide, choose:
If you struggle doing this, ask yourself - if a reader remembered only three things about us after reading our content, what would they be? A tone of voice based on 3–5 clear priorities is usually much stronger than one based on lots of different ones.
Find examples that best represent your charity, such as:
Aim for at least 5 to 10 examples.
Tell the AI who you are speaking to. For example:
Choose words such as:
For example:
Accessibility. Depending on your audience, you may wish to consider avoiding language some may find difficult to understand, such as young people, people with certain disabilities, poor educational attainment or for whom English is a 2nd language.
Reaction. You might also wish it to be either sensitive to a particular culture/faith or to avoid language that some might find distressing. Or provocative - we will achieve far more by trying to persuade people, than we ever will by provoking them.
Terminology. Note specific terminology you use, such as service user, beneficiary, client, grantee or customer.
Politics. Campaigning is an important part of many charities' work. However, charities must not reasonably be seen to be promoting political parties, politicians or candidates.
For example:
Copy and paste the following into your AI tool:
The quality of the Tone of Voice guide depends on the quality of the examples you provide. Use examples that genuinely represent your organisation at its best, not content written by external consultants or AI.
A simple rule is: Show the AI your best writing, tell it who you help, how you want people to feel, and what you dislike.
That is usually enough to create an excellent Tone of Voice guide.
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Ethics note: I used AI to create our own tone of voice then used what I learned from this to create this guide. It drafted by AI and reviewed and rewritten by a human (me).
A charity tone of voice is the consistent way your organisation communicates through its website, emails, funding bids, newsletters and social media. It reflects your values, personality and approach. A clear tone of voice helps people recognise your charity, trust what you say and understand why your work matters.
A tone of voice guide helps staff, trustees, volunteers and AI tools write consistently. It reduces mixed messaging, strengthens your brand and helps build trust with funders, beneficiaries, supporters and partners.
Start by collecting examples of your best writing. Decide who you are speaking to, how you want readers to feel, what language you want to avoid and where the content will be used. You can then use this to create a tailored tone of voice guide.
Yes. AI tools such as Copilot, ChatGPT, Gemini and Claude can analyse your existing content and identify patterns in language, style and structure. The quality of the result depends largely on the quality of the examples you provide.
Less is usually better. Most charities should focus on three to five core characteristics. Choosing too many often produces a generic tone that is difficult to apply consistently across different types of content.
There is no single correct approach, but trust, authenticity, clarity and usefulness are usually important. Most charities benefit from sounding knowledgeable, human, approachable and evidence-based rather than corporate or overly promotional.
Many charities choose to avoid jargon, buzzwords, corporate language, political messaging, marketing hype, patronising explanations and unnecessarily complex language. The aim is usually to be clear, inclusive and easy to understand.
A strong tone of voice helps build credibility and trust. Funders, donors and supporters are more likely to engage with organisations that communicate clearly, consistently and authentically. It can also make funding applications, appeals and campaigns more persuasive.
The core tone should stay consistent, but the style may vary slightly. A funding application, social media post and annual report all have different audiences and purposes, but they should still sound recognisably like the same organisation.
People are increasingly exposed to misinformation, AI-generated content and marketing messages. Trust and authenticity help charities stand out, strengthen relationships and demonstrate credibility. Organisations that communicate honestly and consistently are more likely to gain support and engagement.
