Happy Friday…
This is the 14th email I’m writing this week. I know, right? Email marketing is part of what I do for my clients and it’s Black Friday week.
There’s a trick to being able to write email for someone else.
Know what it is?
It’s being able to write in the voice of whoever you’re writing for. Even if they don’t recognize that they have one. Because we all do.
Here’s what happens if you don’t get the voice right.
Customers read the email and get some idea of what the person/company behind the email is like. Then if they call, for customer service or whatever, and the tone and feel doesn’t match, bells go off.
Something feels off and they don’t even know what. They don’t have the words for it. It’s just something they feel.
The man who lost his mind and never found it….
I read about a man who woke up in a hospital and didn’t know his own name. He had no id and no memories. Was he mugged? They didn’t know. All they knew is that he had a blunt force injury on his head, and no idea who he was.
As he healed, it was the most peculiar thing. He remembered how to drive a car. He could read and do math and all the other stuff we learn along the way. The only problem was that he didn’t know who he was.
So they picked him a John Doe and got help from social programs to get him a job. And he lived that way for years. Never got his memories back. Had no idea what he was like before, what he liked to do or if he had friends, family or hobbies.
20 years later, his brother found him from one of those tv shows that run unsolved mysteries. Turned out he’d travelled clear across the country to attend some event and his family never knew what happened to him. He just disappeared.
His brother said it was eerie. The man he met wasn’t like the brother he remembered. He’d developed different interests, even different speaking patterns. He didn’t dress the same or look the same. Everything about him was different. And yet…
Something felt the same. Everything about him had changed, but there was still an essence about him that felt the same. His brother struggled to find words to explain it. He’s totally different. Looks different. Talks different. But he feels the same.
We think our habits define us, but they don’t. We can change all our habits, change everything about us, but some part of us remains the same. An essence of how we inhabit the world. I think voice is a lot like that.
Know why animals pace at the zoo?
The first time I took my daughter to see the big cats at the zoo, years ago, she stood there and stared for a while. Just a tiny poppet in pony tails and a romper. Then she looked up at me with tears in her eyes.
She said it’s sad they don’t have enough room to run. Animals need to run. That’s part of how she inhabits the world, if that makes sense.
That’s why animals pace at the zoo. They’re stressed and depressed. When you cage an animal, it develops psychological problems. And as Jiminy Cricket taught our little ones, we are all just human animals.
And there’s more than one kind of cage.
I feel I might piss off certain people…
After writing emails all week, I was feeling the pain of staring down the blank screen. What to write, what to write. A reader to the rescue.
Checked email and got a question from a reader. It said…
Sometimes I feel I might piss off certain people with my writing despite being as neutral as possible, how do I go about tackling this mindset?
Honestly? The first time you piss someone off is a clue that you’re probably on the right track, not the wrong one.
Which is not to say we should all strive to piss people off. That’s not the point.
The point is, there is an essence to you that no one else has. A way of being and inhabiting the world that is unique to you.
That essence is what will draw people to you.
If you try to water it down to mollify the people who wouldn’t like it, you alienate the people who would have resonated with who you really are.
And not only that? Every time you “tone it down” because of people who aren’t your people, that act of silencing yourself slowly crushes something inside you.
As a writer, your most important job is to hone your voice, not water it down. Your voice isn’t something you find. You already have it. It’s part of you, made of the way you see the world and how you express yourself.
No one likes to be criticized. We struggle with fear of being who we are, out loud and in public. And it’s paired with the human need for approval.
But we never get that approval by toning it down. It doesn’t work that way.
When you try to please everyone, you end up pleasing no one.
Open the cage and run with the wind.
“If you try to please all, you please none.”
—Aesop
Not new but maybe new to you…
I did not write on Medium this week. Too much writing off Medium and not enough hours to do more. Maybe one of these will be new to you?
If you’re in America, I hope you had a lovely Thanksgiving yesterday. I walked outside and fed the birds. Different than usual, but this whole year has been.
Comments are open if you have feedback, comments or questions about voice or writing. If you enjoyed this, I’d sure appreciate if you click the heart to let me know.
xo,
Linda
Love this! For awhile when I first started on Medium,I was afraid to piss people off. But as I went along, people were letting me know how much they could relate! Writing is my Happy Medium! :) Lol.
Another great read! I always knew I had a voice, I'm now learning how to accept and appreciate it!