Why you need a content style guide and how to make a great one

What is a content style guide?

Content style guides are a source of truth for any and all content an organization makes. That includes web content, in-app copy, and marketing content. Sometimes, they are also called editorial style guides. 

They’re a bit more comprehensive than a brand voice guide, which only covers tone of voice. A content style guide is a larger, more comprehensive document that guides content for channel.

Why do I need one?

Content style guides make your content consistent and purposeful across any channel. More practically, they enable writers to deliver great content and save everyone time.

Here are scenarios I see too often: 

• A business hires a writer. The writer delivers a draft and it’s not quite right. Then, a bunch of stakeholders provide feedback and they all have different opinions. The second revision is still missing the mark, but it’s hard to define why. Everyone is frustrated.

• A startup DIY’s their website copy. Then they hire a freelance writer to create blogs. Eventually they hire a content marketer who starts posting on social media. The website, social, and blogs all sound like completely different brands.

A content style guide is a little bit of work up-front, but significantly improves your entire content production cycle for the long run. It will help you onboard new writers, ensure consistency across channels, and act as a source of truth when it comes to writing decisions.

What should I do first?

Start your efforts with a short discovery phrase to gather fact-driven evidence and build empathy with your users. Without research, your style guide would be based on assumptions that might be completely wrong — and steer your content off-course.

Here are a few research methods & activities to get you started.

• Stakeholder interviews: speak with key internal team members to define business goals and identify relevant constraints. Here’s a great blog post on stakeholder interviews for content.

• User interviews: speak with your users if you can. This can be done remotely or in person. This helps you understand your audience and how to serve them. Read my 6 tips for user interviews.

• Content compass workshop: this process, developed by content strategist and author Meghan Casey, identifies content goals and get stakeholders align. Read her article on A List Apart.

• Competitive analysis: look at what your competitors are doing. These could be direct competitors, or brands in other industries whose content is relevant to your target audience. For a template and detailed how-to, read my article on a content-focused competitive analysis.

• Data analysis: if you’ve got analytics that speak to user behavior, these are usually worth reviewing. Just remember that data only tells you what people do, not why they do it.

You may not need to do all of these, and you also might need research methods that are not listed. When choosing which research methods to do, think about what your knowledge gaps and goals are.

How to create a content style guide

I’ve made tons of these for enterprises and smaller organizations, and have tested the usefulness of different sections over time. The depth of your content style guide depends on your organization, but it should never be so lengthy that no one wants to read it. It should also be long enough that it will answer common questions for writers before they arise.

Here are the sections that were valuable every time.

Content style guide outline:

• Purpose: what is the overarching goal of our content?

• Personas: who is our content for?

• Content types: what type of content do we make? What do we not make?

• Voice & tone: what’s our personality? How might it change in different places?

• Grammar & punctuation: the nitty gritty, like, do we use oxford commas or not? 

Let’s dig in to each of these sections and how to make each of them useful.

1. Purpose 

Think of this section as a north star for all of your content. The first section of your style guide needs to introduce people at a high-level to how your organization approaches content and why.

If you have a mission or vision statement, you could include that here. Or, you could take the Mailchimp approach and think of this is a “goals and principles” section. 

You might also want to create a core content strategy statement, which is an output from the content compass workshop I mentioned. Think of it as a mission statement for your content.

The statement defines what your business goals are, the type of content you’ll create, how it will make your audience feel, and what it will help them do. It’s a great resource for writers, marketers, and anyone else making content.

2. Personas

Next, you need to tell a potential writer who they are writing for. This can be done with some content-focused personas.

For content style guides, personas based on a user’s mindset, needs, and emotions are far more valuable than demographic information. (Actually, I think basic demographic stats are generally useless. Anyway…)

Telling a writer their audience is a “35 year old male with an income oof 120K per year” is not helpful. Instead, dig deeper with your personas and tie it back to your business goals.

In your persona, describe your reader(s) . . .

• Mental model: What do they currently know or believe about your industry/topic/business?

• Feelings: How do they feel about the problem your business solves?

• Needs: What unmet needs do they have? Think of needs as a list of non-negotiables.

  Focusing on the thoughts, feelings, and needs of your core users will help writers start to empathize with their audience.

3. Content types

What type of content is approved? Making a decision about this can prevent tons of useless, unnecessary content from ever being drafted.

Depending on the size of your organization, this might be a very long or very short list. If it’s long, you could just give a quick overview in your content style guide and then link to a longer list or inventory. 

4. Voice and Tone

First, is there a difference between voice and tone? Some say yes. Some say no. Everyone is confused. That’s why I like to group them together. Since not everyone understand the difference between the two, separating them leaves room for confusion. 

There’s no real value in being picky about terminology — just focus on making a useful guide.

Voice and tone are like the personality of your brand. They answer the question, what do we sound like? 

Think about the top three adjectives that describe your brand. It’s also helpful to decide what your brand voice is not, and document why you made those decisions. 

Then, you can dig into each of those brand voice pillars a bit further. Explain exactly what you mean and provide an example. 

For example, if you decided that a pillar of your brand voice is to be friendly and warm, you could write some sample web copy that exemplifies those things — and some sample copy of what not to do. 

Adding examples into your content style guide makes it even easier for writers to understand what you want, which will help make your content better and faster to produce.

5. Grammar and punctuation

This is where you should get really specific about things like punctuation and capitalization. Start with a widely accepted style guide, such as the Chicago Manual of Style, then expand on any nuances or particularly important style rules. 

You may also want to document how to use your brand name (always capitalized? always lowercase?) and any other brand-specific language. You can also note how you’ll format times and dates, how you’ll approach pronouns, and whether or not it’s okay to use contractions. 

If you can’t tell, this section could get really long. Don’t get overwhelmed. Just try to think of the most common things your writers will need to know. 

Other possible sections

Every content style guide is a bit different. You should tailor yours to meet the unique needs or your business. Here are a few other sections to consider and why you might need them. 

1. Key messages per audience

If you have a few different personas, add key messages for each one. Key messages are the high-level takeaways you want those people to remember when consuming your content. This helps show a writer the nuances in tone or subject matter that might be needed when writing for each of the personas.

2. Copy pattern library

If your content style guide is for an app or other digital product, try a pattern library. Not the visual kind—the content kind. 

On mobile app projects, I create copy pattern libraries by finding words and phrases that will be repeated. This helps keep your microcopy extra consistent across tons of different screens. 

For example, all your load-states might say the same thing. Or, you always say “sign in” instead of “log in.” 

I format mine as a spreadsheet or a table within a document.

3. Accessibility guidelines

Accessibility is a design principle that ensures an experience is usable to all people, regardless of disabilities. Accessibility is just as important to content as it is to visual design or development. 

Add a section or checklist for writers to make sure content is accessible for all readers, not just some of them.

Final tips on content style guides

Remember that creating any strategic documentation is only worthwhile if you actually use it. If it’s a PDF deck that gets dumped into a restricted-access Google Drive folder, it was a waste of time.

A killer content style guide is living document that is easy to find, referenced often, and updated as needed. Incorporate it into your on-boarding materials for new hires or consultants, and revisit it as your content goals change over time. Good luck!

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