# **Canopy Voice Guidelines**  The Canopy voice is always two things: **positive** and **conversational**.   Even when discussing negative subjects, such as budget issues or troubling accounting trends, we maintain a positive voice. “Here’s how Canopy is addressing these obstacles.” “Here are some tools to help you solve this problem.” “Here’s the upside.” Positivity supports customer experience, ownership, integrity, and excellence. Keeping the Canopy voice conversational helps us remember and express that we’re not just a vendor to our clients, we’re a partner. Conversationality supports customer experience, openness, trust, and simplicity. It feels human, approachable, and helps us reiterate that we understand and speak our clients’ language. It also stands apart from our stiff-and-boring-as-hell competition.   Here are a few handy tips for conversational writing:   **Use contractions where you would in speech.**  When you are reading something that does not use contractions, it is like reading the writing of a robot, is it not?   **Exclamations, afterthoughts, parentheticals, and pop-culture references are great ways to humanize copy.**  (Just go easy with them—feel free to add that relevant Taylor Swift lyric, but don’t talk in memes or some code.)   **Don’t use overly complicated constructions**.  *Bad:* Developing a solid foundation of Canopy product knowledge better prepares attendees to maximize their experience during road show sessions.  *Better*: Developing a solid foundation of Canopy product knowledge helps attendees get the most out of road show sessions.   **Don’t use buzzwords where a clearer, more accessible word works just fine.** Business-speak sounds salesy, curbs emotional connection, and is often interpreted as compensation for a lack of real knowledge. It prevents us from ~~leveraging communication channels~~ getting to the point and ~~up-leveling knowledge transfer~~ passing knowledge to others. Don’t hide behind fluffy, stuffy language. (Exceptions can be made for SEO value, but should be the exception not the rule.)   ***TONE NOTES***  If “voice” is our overall personality, then “tone” is our mood. Our voice is always positive and conversational, but it might take on different tones depending on the context. Here’s a guide to tones we use (and just as importantly, tones we don’t):  Playful (but not childish)\*  Witty (but not snarky)\*\*  Direct (but not abrasive)  Persuasive (but not salesy)  Knowledgeable (but not know-it-all)  Informational (but not dull)  Inspirational (but not sappy)   \*Remember: A single well-placed line of witty copy is 10 times more effective than a handful of contrived jokes. If in doubt, leave it out—it’s better to be clear than to force a joke.  \*\*Inventive, perceptive, clever humor: Yes. Snide, critical observations: No. The spirit of it matters.   *A BRIEF GUIDE TO SOLID MARKETING WRITING:*   **Be Active**  Avoid using the passive voice whenever possible/prudent.  Bad: The accounting firm of your dreams is only made possible with Canopy. ☹  Better: Canopy helps you build the firm of your dreams. 😀   **Be Concise**  Rephrase rambling sentences to be shorter and tighter. (Using the active voice is a good start.) Specifically, beware of run-on sentences. Can your one-sentence paragraph be broken up into two or more shorter, clearer sentences?   **Be Confident**  Watch out for ambiguity, vagueness, or contradiction. Avoid wishy-washy, noncommittal phrases when making claims about Canopy. If you could say it about any company, maybe it's not the best way to describe Canopy. Dig deeper, my friend\!   **Be Credible**  On the other side of the “claims about Canopy” coin: Be careful with superlatives and over-the-top self-praise. Back up claims with data, testimonials, or conceivable hypothetical scenarios when possible. Honesty and openness earn trust. Exaggeration and hyperbole get us into trouble. Believe that Canopy is good enough (great, even\!) to not need stretchy embellishments.   **Stay on target**  In other words, stay on message. If your case study purports to be about easy implementation, then tell a focused story about implementation. It may be tempting to tangentially gush about all things Canopy, but you risk losing readers who have a particular interest in your stated topic. Unless it’s a general overview or a truly introductory piece, it doesn’t require the kitchen sink.   ***SOME STYLE GUIDE RULES***   **Serial Comma/Oxford Comma**  USE IT. Please, thank you, and goodnight.   **Ampersands (&)**  Use only in titles, headlines, subheadlines, and section headers.   **Bulleted Lists**  You may use complete sentences or sentence fragments in a bulleted list, but don’t use both in the same list. If you use complete sentences, punctuate them. If you use sentence fragments, make sure they have parallel structures, e.g. if some of them lead with action verbs, they should all lead with action verbs.   **Em Dashes** Use them to separate a thought from the rest of the sentence. No spaces—that’s right, zero spaces—on either side of the em dash. People who say that they're "an obvious show of AI usage" just never learned how to write. Also, AI tends to overspace on both sides of the em-dash, so, if you’ve used AI to write for you, the least you can do is double-check for its spacing.  **En Dashes**  Use them to express a range. For example, “3–10” expresses a range of employees at the firm or clients. “October 5–10” expresses a range of time.   **Content-Specific Guidelines**

> Use this to help you write, edit, or review any content—blog posts, social copy, etc—on behalf of Canopy 

## Brand Context

We’ve said it once but we’ll say it again: Every point of contact with Canopy— marketing, product, support, sales, social, internal docs—builds or erodes brand equity. There is no "off-brand" channel. Content and copy should reinforce a consistent personality across every surface.

**Canopy's personality:** fresh, confident, perceptive and always positive and conversational.

**Purpose of this guide:** Canopy wants to be seen as a refreshing, human beacon of clarity in a complicated industry (cloud-based accounting). Consistency in voice and message is what makes that recognizable over time.

## Content Goals

All content should serve at least one of these three goals:

1. **Establish thought leadership**    
   Provide insights, best practices, tips, and updates in the cloud-based accounting industry.  
2. **Educate**    
   Help customers and prospects understand the Canopy platform and capabilities in a way that's masterful but digestible.  
3. **Position expertise**  
   Make Canopy the go-to source for specialized knowledge for its key buying personas.

## Voice vs. Tone

- **Voice** is constant. It does not change based on audience or channel.  
- **Tone** flexes based on who's being addressed—their priorities, role, and responsibilities.  
- Write to an *individual*, not to "businesses" as an abstraction.  
- Write the way people actually speak. This doesn’t necessarily mean informal. It means following natural speech patterns rather than stiff, corporate phrasing.

### The Confident Guide

Canopy's audience knows their industry, but knows how convoluted it can be. They trust Canopy to field questions, lead the way, and confidently navigate them to solutions. Write as that guide:

- Use technical detail moderately. Too light? You’ll undermine credibility. Too heavy? You’ll overwhelm or, worse, bore the reader.  
- New content should deliver on at least one (not necessarily all) of the following:  
  - Bring a new angle or perspective to a trend  
  - Give access to Canopy's thought leaders and trusted partners  
  - Showcase outside expertise from recognized thought leaders  
  - Present data or research with a clear takeaway  
  - Teach a new or improved way to do something  
  - Share best practices that improve practice management  
  - Offer insights or tools that help readers do their jobs better or more efficiently

## **Do / Don't**

**Do:**

- Streamline every sentence to offer a clear takeaway. What's the one thing the reader should learn or do?  
- Use short, direct sentences. Add just enough color for context and personality—don't over-explain.  
- For long-form content, open with a strong intro that sets up the story in 3–6 *sentences*, not 3–6 paragraphs.  
- Use plain words people already understand. 


**Don't:**

- Use jargon or "word speed bumps" that slow the reader down. Wanna show how intelligent you are? Go to Pub Trivia. In content, clarity wins all day, every day.  
- Bury the point. Get to it quickly.  
- Force keywords into copy just to hit an SEO target.  
- Refer to the company as "Canopy Tax" or imply Canopy only serves tax firms. Canopy started in tax but now serves all kinds of accounting firms—CAS, bookkeeping, tax, audit, and multi-location firms.

## **Content Creation Process**

Content is grounded in SEO-informed strategy, not written in a vacuum:

1. **Identify demand**   
   Work from data-driven keyword research to determine which topics to cover, from broad to niche.  
2. **Interpret intent**  
   Analyze the questions and related keywords behind the research to understand what readers actually want to learn.  
3. **Determine perspective**  
   Use engagement data and seasonal patterns to shape angle and timing.

Every content brief includes target SEO keywords, but keywords should never feel shoehorned into the copy. Insights from published content (analytics, engagement data) should inform future briefs.

## **Sourcing & Citations**

- Cite facts, stats, tips, or data to an authoritative, reputable third-party source using inline hyperlinks. This boosts credibility.  
- Vetted internal sources may be quoted directly.  
- No citation needed for facts that are common knowledge or appear consistently across multiple agreeing sources.  
- If a linked article is written in first person, name the author.  
- Name a study or publication only if it's well-known enough to add credibility. If it's obscure, refer to it generally (e.g., "a 2017 survey") instead of naming it.  
- Use sources published within the last three years to keep information current.

## **Quick Reference Pre-Publish Checklist**

Before publishing, confirm the content:

- [ ] Delivers a clear, single takeaway  
- [ ] Sounds like a confident guide — neither too technical nor oversimplified  
- [ ] Opens with a tight, direct intro (long-form content)  
- [ ] Contains no forced keywords  
- [ ] Cites third-party facts/stats with inline links  
- [ ] Uses sources published within the last 3 years  
- [ ] Does not say "Canopy Tax" anywhere or imply tax-only focus  
- [ ] Serves at least one of the three content goals (thought leadership, education, expertise positioning)