How to write emails in your own voice (so it sounds exactly like you!)

Write in your own voice… How many times have you heard that?

Probably hundreds of times, it is really common advice - mainly because it is really awesome advice.

Because of course you want to sound like you - you don’t want to sound like that crazy guy Jimmy next door, or your Great Aunt Jeanette with all her stories of “back in my day……..”

It sounds great in theory, but how do you ACTUALLY do it??

I’ll get to that in a sec, but first, this will absolutely help - some mighty fine examples from some of the world’s best copywriters and emailers.

Just a heads up

Blog Posts from at The Unicorn Advisory may contain affiliate links, but I’m a no bullshit affiliate kinda gal, as you can read about in my affiliate disclaimer.

I only share products and services we use and love and would recommend, if there was affiliate program or not.

The few $$ we make from affiliate income, costs you absolutely nothing and goes straight to our family holiday fund ✈️ so my kids and I thank you 💗

You may have got one of these emails recently…

If you are in any way part of the online business or marketing community, it is likely at some stage over the past few weeks you would have got one (or more) emails about Amy Porterfield’s What Kind of Course should I make quiz.

The first email I read, I though “oh that sounds like a cool quiz” especially as I am a course creator myself, but soon I had 4 then 5, then 6 emails all about the same thing and though ah-ha! There must be a big launch coming up soon.

It is pretty spectacular marketing from Amy Porterfield, which I won’t go into now – I’ll save that for another post once I see how her launch goes down.

So the emails… 

Noticing all these emails from different people really made it super SUPER clear how they all wrote in their own voice. These were email coming from some of the big names – Jenna Kutcher, Laura Belgray, Ash Ambirge and they were delightfully great examples of email copy writing that matches their own unique personalities.

I know lots of people (for a long time myself included) really struggle with writing in your own voice.

It can be really hard, but these are such great examples they are too good not to share. When you read them, notice how different they are (and how in some ways are similar). The language they use, the way they “speak” in their emails.

For many of them - at first I didn’t even know it was for the same promotion, which is really clever. Almost all the affiliate emails I saw for this quiz promotion give personal examples and stories that will no doubt resonate with their own audience (and probably not with someone else’s).

Have a read of them and you’ll see exactly what I mean.

First up Ash Ambirge from The Middle Finger Project

Ash actually turned her quiz affiliate emails into an entire series which was pretty cool. She set the scene first with a couple of emails. this is one of them…

This is the actual quiz email from Ash…

Next up we have copywriting legend Laura Belgray AKA miss Talking Shrimp

Then the internet darling, Jenna Kutcher - a few less swear words in her email you might notice ;)

Now Tarzan Kay who is a complete master at making a lot of dosh of a small email list - especially for affiliate launches, lets see what she has to say…

This one is really interesting - it is from Kajabi, the course software platform Amy partners with.

Funny it doesn’t mention Amy or the quiz at all, they just went straight to stage two - the course creators kit (which you sign up for on Amy’s website).

It is almost sounding like this is something Kajabi are offering to their own users. It has that kinda corporate tone to it.

This email from the delightful Amy Porterfield herself..

and last up - this one from JLD - John Lee Dumas of Entrepreneur on Fire.

Isn’t that fascinating?

Reading how different people write about what is essentially exactly the same thing but it all sounded SO different?

It was kinda funny getting that last one from John Lee Dumas, totally straight to the point, no fluff or story, just “go do this quiz”, but that shows what is most likely to resonate with his audience and how he is as a person.

Can you image what it would be like if say, Jenna Kutcher sent out Ash Ambirge’s email to her audience – full of orgasms and fuck you’s to her audience or vice versa? Jenna’s audience might wonder if her email had been hacked and Ash’s audience would scratch their heads over the lack of f-bombs and no talk of cocktails.

Each of these people has written emails for years, so they are very very good at it.

But mostly (and I think why they are so good), they write emails that sound just like it is them talking.

They write as if they are writing to a friend – not businessy or salesy, just like its them having a chat or sharing something cool.

Ash Ambirge actually went a whole step further and made her emails into a bit of a series, which is brilliantly clever as an affiliate promotion, but also a really cool experience as a reader. It was a bit like a soap opera where you would wonder what was going to happen the next day - so far we are up to day 15.

Talk about next level email awesomeness. I’ve added a couple of the emails below if you want to read them.

I love getting emails from the greats just to get inspired and see how they often they email, what they write, how they write it, what kind of detail they put in… If you want to sign up to any of these cool emails as well you can go to:

The Middle Finger Project

Talking Shrimp

Jenna Kutcher

Tarzan Kay

Amy Porterfield

The Unicorn Advisory is a particularly cool email list to be on as well 🤭

If you’ve got an email list – let me know in the comments so I can subscribe - I love emails so I’m happy to be on your list.

Now, to the how to write in your own voice bit (this is great for emails and blog posts)

My little secret trick to writing in your own voice is this.

Use your own voice.

Yep, literally your own voice.

Record your voice into the voice recorder app on your phone and READ your email and what you want to write into your phone.

Just try it, I reckon you’ll be SOOOOOO surprised at how differently it comes out to anything you try to write on paper (and it will save you SO much time!)

Pro tip - send the recordings you make to Rev.ai and get a computer transcription for just 3 CENTS a minute. Ie practically nothing! It won’t be perfect and you’ll have to fix the grammar and sentences etc, but it’s a SUPER quick way to do a first draft.

And because you’re speaking it not typing it, you won’t be changing things as you write, second guessing yourself or any of that.

Just read into your phone, as if you were ringing up a friend to tell them something cool.

Second part to the trick…

Once you’ve got your voice turned into a nice little text document, don’t go crazy with the editing. Don’t try to polish it and make it perfect and fix every tiny bit of grammar or poor sentence structure or any of that.

If you were going to text a friend, or write to a friend, you are pretty unlikely to make it perfect and fuss too much. Do the same with your emails. Obviously make sure they are interesting and get to the point and all that, but don’t stress about getting it just right.

Then, leave it for a day (maybe two).

Come back and have a look over it, make sure you’ve covered everything you want to cover, that it makes sense… and you’re happy with it at that point. Usually after a couple of days away, you’ll see things you missed earlier, perhaps you’ll fine tune it.

Then the last step.

READ IT ALOUD.

Not just reading it in your head, actually read it out loud.

When you read it out loud, not only will you hear to yourself if it sounds like something you’d say, you’ll pick up errors your eyes might not see and it will give you a chance to make sure it flows nicely, it helps you see if it has the “you” factor.

Practice Makes Perfect

It takes practice to find your voice, but if you get into the habit of emailing regularly (say once a week) not only will you get lots of practice (even more if you make it twice a week), you’ll start to find your groove and your audience will really get to know you.

Being YOU is a critical step in standing out and getting above the noise as there is only one you. Sending emails in your voice, that sound like you, are what connects you to your audience and helps them get to know you.

Email is SUCH a powerful tool when used well.

Most of the examples I’ve used today come from people who email regularly and write really personally, and I see their name in the inbox I can’t wait to open the email.

It’s cool as well, every time  I read an email from someone like Ash or Laura or Tarzan, I feel like I get to know them - which is weird, because in reality they are complete random internet strangers.

The personal connection formed though emails written in their “voice” , the emails that always sound like them, brings such familiarity and a sense of comfort.

That is because emails that are genuine and written in such a personal, you’re my friend way, help to form trust. And in the online business world – trust is everything.

So give it a go, use my method to see if that helps you write in your voice and one day, it could be YOUR email being featured on an email case study blog post like this! (and if you tell me your email list deets in the comments, I can get on it and get to know you in a totally non stalkery internet random stranger way).

Oh and one last thing, if you’re curious about this quiz everyone on the interwebs is talking about and don’t want to be that one person who hasn’t done it, like you’re that one person who hasn’t watched game of thrones (ahhh that would be me!), you can take Amy’s What Course Am I quiz here 😊 Alas, not an affiliate link haha.

Happy writing!

Sue x