How to Audit Your Brand’s Language for Inclusivity

The words your brand uses in marketing and communication matter. They shape how people perceive your values and affect how customers connect with you. Inclusive language ensures that your brand respects and represents a wide range of people.

An audit of your brand’s language can help remove biased or exclusive terms and create messages that reach everyone. This guide provides a detailed approach to evaluating and improving your brand’s language.

How to Do an Audit of Your Brand’s Language: Step-By-Step Guide

Step 1: Build a Team for the Audit

Choose a group of people who bring different perspectives and experiences to the audit. This group should reflect the diversity of your audience as much as possible. Include individuals from different cultural backgrounds, genders, and abilities to ensure a wide range of views. A diverse team can help spot biases that others may overlook.

Additionally, include representatives from various roles within your organization, such as marketing, sales, customer service, and HR, to better understand how your brand communicates. If feasible, involve individuals from your target audience, as they can provide unique insights into how your messaging resonates. A well-rounded team forms the foundation of an effective audit, offering perspectives that lead to meaningful and inclusive changes.

Step 2: Set Goals for Inclusivity

Before you start the audit, define what inclusivity means for your brand. This step sets the direction for your efforts and ensures everyone on the team is aligned. Decide whether your focus is on eliminating gendered terms, ensuring cultural representation, or addressing accessibility in language. For example, you might prioritize using gender-neutral terms, avoiding stereotypes in visual content, or ensuring that your language is clear for people with different cognitive abilities. Write these goals down in a way that is easy to understand. Clear, documented objectives serve as a guide for the audit and help measure its success. By outlining your goals upfront, you create a roadmap that keeps the process focused and effective.

Step 3: Review All Content

Examine every piece of content your brand has produced. Start with your most public-facing materials, such as social media posts, website copy, and advertising campaigns. Then, extend the review to internal communications, such as employee handbooks and training materials. Pay attention to specific elements like word choice, tone, and imagery. Look for terms or phrases that might exclude or stereotype certain groups, and assess how various demographics are represented in both text and visuals. Create a checklist to help identify areas needing improvement. For instance, note whether your language assumes certain roles based on gender or overlooks people with disabilities. This comprehensive review ensures no content is left unchecked and helps uncover patterns that need addressing.

Step 4: Use Inclusive Language Standards

Adopt and implement inclusive language guidelines to make your communication clear and respectful. These standards should be straightforward and actionable for anyone in your organization. Replace outdated terms with modern, neutral alternatives. For example, switch “chairman” to “chairperson” or “salesman” to “salesperson.” Avoid expressions that may unintentionally exclude or offend, such as “falling on deaf ears” or “crippled by debt.” Ensure your language does not rely on cultural references that might be unfamiliar to some audiences. Inclusive language guidelines help create consistency in your brand’s voice and make your messaging more accessible to all readers. Share these standards with your team and provide examples to illustrate best practices.

Step 5: Collect Feedback

Feedback is a crucial part of the auditing process. It helps identify blind spots that might not be apparent during the initial review. Create multiple channels for gathering feedback, such as anonymous surveys, focus groups, or direct conversations. Include input from employees across departments, customers, and external stakeholders. Be clear about your goals when asking for feedback to ensure participants understand what you are trying to achieve. Encourage honesty and provide examples to guide the discussion. Use the feedback to refine your audit and make changes that reflect your audience’s perspectives. Regularly updating your content based on this feedback ensures your language stays relevant and respectful.

Step 6: Continue to Improve

Inclusivity is an ongoing effort. Language and societal norms change over time, so your brand’s communication must adapt. Set a schedule for regular audits, such as every six months or annually, to review your progress and make necessary adjustments. Monitor feedback from your audience and stay informed about new trends in inclusive language. Encourage your team to bring up concerns or suggestions as they arise. Provide ongoing training and resources to ensure everyone understands and uses inclusive language effectively. By making continuous improvement a part of your strategy, you can keep your brand’s messaging current and ensure it remains respectful and welcoming to all audiences.

Tools to Use for a Comprehensive Audit

To perform an an audit of your brand’s language for inclusivity you need to use a combination of tools to evaluate different elements of your communication.

1. Inclusiviteasy (Language Analysis)
   Our tool focuses on identifying biased or non-inclusive language. It scans text to flag (among many other issues) gendered terms, ableist expressions, and cultural stereotypes while providing alternative suggestions to make your messaging more neutral and respectful. Inclusiviteasy is perfect for written communication, from marketing copy to internal policies.

1. Canva Pro (Visual Representation)
   Canva Pro allows you to create and evaluate visual content. Its extensive library includes diverse stock photos, illustrations, and templates that can help ensure your brand’s visuals represent different genders, ethnicities, ages, and abilities. Use it to check whether your imagery aligns with your inclusivity goals.
2. Color Contrast Analyzer (Accessibility)
   This tool is essential for assessing the accessibility of your visual content. It evaluates color contrast to ensure your designs are readable for individuals with visual impairments, such as color blindness. Accessibility is a crucial aspect of inclusivity, and this tool ensures your materials are easy to consume for all audiences.
3. UserTesting (Audience Perception)
   UserTesting allows you to gather real-time feedback on how your content and visuals resonate with your audience. You can select participants from diverse backgrounds to provide insights into whether your messaging feels inclusive and representative.

By combining these tools, you can perform a comprehensive audit that goes beyond language, ensuring that every aspect of your brand’s communication is inclusive and accessible.

Best Practices for Creating Inclusive Language

Train Your Team

Educating your employees about the importance of inclusive language is essential for building a consistent brand voice. Start by explaining why inclusive communication matters. Share real-life examples of how inclusive language fosters trust and strengthens relationships with diverse audiences. Conduct workshops to help employees recognize and eliminate bias in their communication. Use practical exercises where participants review biased and inclusive language examples to build awareness. Distribute written guides with clear instructions and examples for reference. These resources ensure that everyone in your organization understands and adopts inclusive language in their daily work.

Simplify Your Message

Clear, plain language is a cornerstone of effective communication. Avoid jargon, idioms, and complex sentence structures that might confuse or exclude certain audiences. For example, instead of saying “utilize,” use “use.” By simplifying your message, you make it easier for a wider range of people to understand, including individuals who speak different primary languages and those with cognitive disabilities. Provide guidelines for plain language use and review content regularly to ensure clarity. Simplified messaging increases the accessibility of your brand’s content, allowing it to reach and resonate with more people.

Focus on Representation

Representation in your brand’s communication should reflect the diversity of your audience. This applies to both language and visuals. In your writing, acknowledge a range of experiences and perspectives without relying on stereotypes. For instance, avoid phrases that assume traditional family roles or binary gender identities. In your visuals, use images and graphics that depict people of different ethnicities, ages, genders, and abilities. Regularly evaluate your content to confirm it mirrors the audience you want to reach, showing that your brand values inclusion.

Be Open to Learning

Inclusivity is an ongoing process that requires openness to feedback and willingness to improve. Mistakes are inevitable, but how you respond to them matters. Create systems for collecting feedback from employees, customers, and partners about your brand’s language and representation. Listen carefully to critiques and use them as opportunities to grow. Based on this input, update your guidelines and practices to ensure your communication stays respectful and relevant. This approach helps prevent repeated errors and demonstrates your commitment to inclusivity in a transparent and authentic way.

Auditing Your Brand’s Language for Inclusivity

Auditing your brand’s language for inclusivity is extremely important to create meaningful and respectful connections with your audience. Language shapes perception and plays a significant role in understanding your brand. Ensuring inclusivity in your communication demonstrates that you value diversity and are committed to representing a broad range of experiences. This approach helps foster trust and loyalty, making your brand more relatable to a wider audience.

By evaluating its language and refining its messaging, your brand can create communication that aligns with its values and resonates with more people. Follow the outlined steps to identify and remove bias, embrace inclusive practices, and build a stronger connection with your audience. These efforts go beyond mere compliance—they make your brand’s values clear and authentic.

Start your audit today to uncover opportunities for improvement and address them effectively. Commit to regular reviews to ensure your content stays inclusive and relevant as language and societal norms evolve. By doing so, you can maintain a consistent, inclusive voice that speaks to everyone and supports lasting relationships with your audience.