Welcome back to Sacking Girl Snacks. I'm Stephanie Ola and I'm here with Eric Zina, Senior Copywriter for Refine Labs, and we are talking about establishing a unique brand voice. Eric, what is your guilty pleasure snack? I think my guilty pleasure snack is probably touching on sweet rolls.
And as you tell on the 90s, maybe 90s kid, something about pizza rolls. Like I could just crush a ton of those on one plate, you know what I mean? Like pump them up and you're good to go. Alright, so diving into things today, we are building some procedures.
So Eric, what are some basic do's and don'ts to look out for? Or some common mistakes to avoid when building your voice? It's a really good question. This is a tough question, but I think you should again, make yourself in that way.
Use your why, use your, some people call it an L, some people call it a brand promise, brand truth, unique selling proposition, unique selling point, but use that why, whatever you call it, as sort of your anchor and use it to guide you. So that is number one. But I think don't, don't just rely on what other people are doing. Again, if you look into competitive research way too much, you're just going to sound like everyone else and you're not going to be the same, you're not going to stand out.
You're not going to have that unique voice. And so it's a matter of, alright, can you scout the landscape a little bit? Cool. You see how people are moving, how people are talking, but ultimately how can you use it when others are having this biggest part here?
Don't put so much structure into brand voice. And I think that is a good fault that a lot of people are in it too, especially in a B space where they're still beholden to a brand guide, for example, or even a style guide. Like when it comes to copywriting specifically, a lot of people think you have to be, I don't know, a noble laureate or something. You have to be this great author, this great literary mind.
And I don't think, I don't think it needs to be Shakespeare to write good copy. And frankly, I think it's better that you're just not tied to those norms. And for me, I mean, I used to be a big grammar junkie in college, I still am in some sense. But when it comes to writing copy and finding your voice, you kind of buff the rules a little bit.
You break senses up where it should be broken up. You use a lot of sentence fragments and things like that. But ultimately, I think it's just about writing true to how you are, writing true to who your audience is and going from there. Okay.
And in terms of resources, do you build an actual digital repository with style examples, words to say away from the note words or some that you want to use consistently to pepper into your writing? I'm glad you asked this because I actually have a thing. I don't know if I've had a line of them doing it, but probably at least five, six years now, I just document, I call a copy playground. And that's for every account I have.
I have one for every client. And it's really just a document I can bring inspiration to sort of turn my class down, write just the worst headlines on just to get my thoughts on paper. I would say not just notes, but my sixth space to think and really thrust me on the wall, pull the boards in or inspiration or whatever. But yeah, I use that for everything, whether it's kind of a work shopping line to copy or sometimes we put words in that we should stay away from.
I put that in my copy playground. I put some sort of like brand rules in there. So things have to look out for and things like that. But yeah, ultimately, my copy playground is like my Bible for the brands I work with.
And so I don't think it's necessary, but I think it's helpful. Eric, this has been incredibly valuable information. I am so excited and so grateful that you took the time to talk with us. Thank you so much for coming out and make sure y'all to check out his work in the vault.
If you're not already a vault customer, check it out refindlab.com slash the vault. And you can get more of Eric's amazing insight into copywriting. Thank you all so much for watching. We'll see you all next week.