You must define your voice before you can scale.
Communicators need to stop thinking about brand voice in AI as an open, blank slate, said Susan Oguche, former EVP and chief communications officer for the Cavaliers Operating Company, during Ragan’s AI Horizons Conference.
“Please upload documents. Don’t just go in there and prompt blind,” Oguche said. “Use source data that will help you get the best results.”
There’s a structured way to accomplish this, regardless of what industry you’re in, she said. When done well, AI can scale messaging and still sound like your brand. Here’s how to get started.
- Data feeding: First, gather the full body of work that defines your brand or executive voice. That includes written articles, past media quotes and video interviews. “I can put in every single article that (the organization has) ever written, every quote that they’ve ever had,” Oguche said.
- Constrain the system: Then instead of letting AI pull right off the open web, feed it a “finite set of data” that reflects how the brand actually communicates, she said. This creates guardrails that keep outputs realistic. Once the guardrails are set, Oguche uses tools like NotebookLM to analyze patterns. There shouldn’t be content generation at this point. It’s more about looking for consistency and flagging any issues, she said. “I can actually start asking…what are the key messages? What is this person’s voice? What has consistently been pulled through in media interviews?” she said.
- Create a profile: Communicators can then build a profile that captures tone, phrasing and message consistency across channels using what they’ve identified as through the data. “I can start building a profile of an executive based on data we just collected,” she said. Once a profile is established, test it internally first. Bring in other team members to help review.
- Application: Once you have a great AI profile built, it’s still a communicator’s job to give the message final approval and check for accuracy, Oguche said. “We all probably see ourselves as brand guardians,” she said. “We feel very, very passionate about what it means to be authentic and what our brands really stand for. AI can really help in this space.”
Visit here to watch the full presentation and learn more about Ragan Training.
Courtney Blackann is a communications reporter. Connect with her on LinkedIn or email her at courtneyb@ragan.com.
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