How to set your tone of voice

You will learn

How to set Customer Agent’s tone of voice using a preset or a custom description, and how tone fits with the rest of your Guidance.

Before you begin

You’ll need:

• An Owner, Admin, or Manager role
• A brand summary in place (recommended — tone builds on it)

What tone is

Tone of voice is Customer Agent’s overall personality and voice. It shapes how every response feels — warm or formal, playful or buttoned-up — across every procedure and every channel.

Tone is one of four Guidance levers, alongside brand summary, communication style rules, and escalation rules. Tone sets the vibe. Communication style rules handle the mechanics (sentence length, emoji use, specific word choices).

Set it up

1. Navigate to Customer Agent > Guidance > Tone of voice.
2. Choose a preset, or select Custom to write your own.
3. If you chose Custom, write your tone description and click Save. The change takes effect immediately.

Use Preview to see how a sample response sounds with the tone applied.

Tone presets

Pick a preset if one of these matches your brand. Most brands start here.

• Neutral — Direct and informational. Default option. Works well for most brands and gets out of the way.
• Professional — Formal and courteous. Suited for B2B, financial services, and brands with a measured voice.
• Friendly — Warm and approachable. Good for lifestyle, wellness, and consumer brands that want to feel personable.
• Playful — Casual and enthusiastic. Right for brands with a fun, energetic identity.

What each preset sounds like

A shopper asks: “Where can I find your shipping policy?”

• Neutral: “You can find our shipping policy at example.com/shipping.”
• Professional: “Our shipping policy is available at example.com/shipping. Please let me know if you have questions.”
• Friendly: “Happy to help! You’ll find our shipping info at example.com/shipping.”
• Playful: “Got you! Shipping deets right here: example.com/shipping.”

Custom tone

Pick Custom when none of the presets fit your brand — for example, if your voice is highly distinctive or built around a specific persona.

A good custom tone is:

• A single paragraph, 40-80 words
• Specific — concrete adjectives and analogies, not generic words like “friendly” or “professional”
• Clear about what your brand IS and IS NOT — call out the personality, and note what to avoid

Examples of custom tones

Good:

Speak like a knowledgeable friend who’s been working in beauty for 15 years. Confident but never condescending. Use plain language; explain ingredient names when they come up. Never sound like a chemistry textbook. Skip exclamation points unless they’re earned. We don’t oversell; we help.

Too vague (avoid):

Be friendly and helpful but also professional. Make customers feel good.

The vague version doesn’t give Customer Agent anything specific to work with. The good version gives it a persona, voice patterns to match, and what to avoid.

How tone interacts with other Guidance

• Brand summary gives context (what the brand is). Tone gives voice (how it speaks).
• Communication style rules are specific writing guidelines layered on top of tone. Use rules for things like “keep responses under three sentences” or “use bullet lists when comparing products” — things tone alone can’t enforce.
• Escalation rules override tone when they fire. Hand-offs follow your handoff configuration regardless of tone.

Next steps

• Add communication style rules to lock in the writing mechanics tone alone can’t enforce
• Configure escalation rules for situations that should hand off to a human
• Test in the playground to see how your tone sounds in real conversations

Additional resources