Creating a life coach’s verbal identity - portfolio

In 2023 Radici Flessibili, aka Francesca Laidlaw, was taking her first steps into the internet as an online life coach. She needed a website and a verbal identity she could easily apply to all her assets to be always consistent and professional.

As I wrote her website, I’ve been working on her tone of voice and copy guidelines. Here is how I’ve proceeded, and what are the takeouts Francesca is still using for her communications across different media.

6 steps for a verbal identity system

Francesca has a strong yet kind personality, and all I had to do was observe and codify her way of communicating, creating a relationship between her speaking choices and her business, target, and industry. It was key to start from herself, and to insist she just had to be herself - nothing would have turned more consistent than that.

A screenshot from Radici Flessibili's website

Here are the steps I followed to elaborate a verbal identity system for Radici Flessibili:

1. Francesca was already communicating through her Instagram account and was already working on a podcast series. I’ve started from these materials to study her natural tone of voice, lexicon, wording choices and vibe, to draft my first ideas on the system.

2. I met her in person, and we shared a delicious lunch and talked about our lives, families and jobs. We met via video calls where I could get to know her better - and her way of communicating her passion for her job while filling up my notebooks about words, expressions, and feelings that came up by spending time with her.

3. I’ve asked Francesca to share materials from her competitors asking her what she did and didn’t like about them, and how she wanted to make a difference in the industry.

4. I’ve encouraged Francesca to share the most relevant conversations with her clients and target audience to understand how they speak, the wordings they use for their problems and needs, and the lexicon she uses when offering solutions.

5. Collecting all these notes, words, impressions, and unspoken rules, I gathered them into clusters and I verified their frequency with the SEO analysis tool I am most familiar with. The numbers I got helped me understand what words were most searched so those would have been keys to Francesca’s communication.

6. However, while she wanted to be relevant SEO-wise and found on Google, Francesca was more interested in communicating the right vibes and atmosphere so, having pointed out our main keywords, we came out with a compromise between an SEO-performing and inspiring verbal identity.

A peek from the guidelines doc.

What did the final verbal identity system document include?

Having gathered all this material, suggestions and information, I wrote the guidelines document structuring it practically, so that Francesca could go to it any time. It includes:

1. An initial motto, summarizing her approach.

2. The Way We Are: a 6-point manifesto about Francesca’s main topics, what she talks about and what she believes in. This part is a little poetic and describes with evocative words the inner world through which Francesca’s message comes (i.e.: We are welcoming, kind, inclusive. We feel close to whoever listens. We are never judgemental…).

3. The Way We Speak: through adjectives and "dos and don'ts" I've pointed out our general tone of voice (i.e.: Our language is warm, close, and harmonic. It's friendly, yet never unkempt…).

4. Glossary: ​​a mood board of words. A list of the most important, used, evocative and inspiring words Francesca will use. All the words that represent Francesca's world as a life coach (i.e.: path, feelings, emotions, listening, evolution, open, respect, protection, steps, dreams, life, discovery...).

5. Grammar and Forms: this includes Radici Flessibili’s way of addressing her audience and her way of handling foreign words within her copy assets. Plus rules about capital letters and punctuation for copywriting consistency.

6. Long Content Guidelines: best practices, use of boldings, avoidance of repetitions and content redundancy, preference for paratactic rather than hypotactic periods (+ showing examples).

7. Short Content Guidelines: a recap on how to make short, captivating and SEO-relevant headlines aligned with her values and tone.

Francesca’s feedback was crucial so, after sharing the document, we had a Q&A section to make sure she was 100% confident with the content of the guideline document.

If you need to define your verbal identity system, why not consider working with me? Drop me an email at hello@luciaceccolini.com and let’s discuss your business.