Why you need a text style guide

​A style guide is the home for your brand and keeps your brand identity consistent and recognisable. At I Heart Farming we’re big believers that style guides, which often only focus on logos and colours, should also include the written word. Natasha Lobban explores her top four reasons why style guides that cover tone, spelling and conformity in text are so valuable.

Style makes everything prettier
The beauty of the style guide is that it creates consistency. It is the keeper of beauty. Your annual report, website and social content will be polished and professional.
For example if you sell fertiliser and your website spells fertiliser with an s in some instances and a z in others, it creates confusion and leaves a reader uneasy, without even knowing why. It can in some instances erode brand trust, it certainly makes your business look unprofessional.

Style guides capture knowledge
A style guide also harvests knowledge and stores it for future employees. You don’t want staff wasting time remaking decisions that were made the month before, or worse still flip flopping when new marketing staff come in, only for the next one to change it back. 
This does not create consistency, it just creates work and hassle.
When used correctly, a style guide is a great way to transfer non-negotiable knowledge between staff. 
Style guides work exceptionally well for content contractors as well.

A place to record jargon 
At I Heart Farming we often say, “we talk farmer”. It’s a big selling point of what we do. It basically means that we understand the language that farmers use and how to communicate with them.
A style guide is the perfect place to record jargon specific to your industry or workplace. 
A lot of farming terms can be found in the dictionary but many can’t. 
It can be as simple as a seed business listing all the correct spelling of its grains, so there’s a quick way to make sure spelling is correct in content.

Style guides create efficiencies
The number one reason I love style guides is that it creates a lot less work. There’s no need to waste time arguing, there’s no need to waste time looking up what you did last time, there’s no need to sit and think and think about what to do. The answer is already there in black and white.
For managers this is also good because it means you don’t have to keep answering staff questions and if you edit/approve content it should be coming to you a lot cleaner.

If your business needs to set up a style guide for the written word, book a 15-minute discovery call via the link below.

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