Content style guide for The Replay Button

The Challenge — Finding The Replay Button for my own brand

Where It Started — A Love for Music That Never Left

Music has always been more than background noise for me. It has been a language. Growing up, friends relied on me to decode lyrics, name artists they couldn't place, and send them the newest songs before anyone else had heard them. It never felt like a task; it felt like breathing.

So when I created The Replay Button, it was simply an extension of something I’ve done my whole life: sharing good music in a warm, nostalgic way.

But as the page grew, I noticed something:the vibe was strong… the system wasn’t.

Captions sounded good, but not always consistent. Ideas flowed, but turning them into polished posts took longer than they needed to.

I wanted to fix that not just for efficiency, but because I wanted The Replay Button to feel like a real brand.

That’s how the style guide began.

The Challenge — Turning a Vibe into a System

The real problem wasn’t creativity. It was consistency.

I needed a way to:

• A clear brand identity

• Reusable structures

• A consistent voice

• Faster content creation

• A professional framework I could scale

Discovery — Studying How the Best Do It

Before writing anything, I researched how established brands build systems.

I studied:

• The Intuit Content Style Guide

• The Conscious Style Guide

• Monzo’s tone of voice guidelines

• Top-performing captions from The Replay Button itself

• Music-driven pages with strong identities

Three insights shaped everything:

1. Pages with consistent voice grow faster

2. Clarity feels like personality when done right

3. Reusable patterns fight creative fatigue

This research gave me the foundation to build a guide that wasn’t just pretty —it was purposeful.

Crafting the Identity — Defining the Brand’s Heart

I distilled The Replay Button’s essence into four personality pillars:

Warm: Like a friend excited to put you onto a new song.

Nostalgic: Music that pulls you back to a moment you didn’t realize you missed.

Human: No performative hype — just honesty, memory, and vibe.

Taste-Driven: Curated with intention, not trends.

These pillars helped me write voice and tone principles that could work across different types of content while still feeling like me.

The goal wasn’t to sound like a brand. The goal was to sound like a person consistently.

System Building — Where Vibe Meets Structure

This was the most transformative part, turning a fluid, emotional brand into something repeatable, reusable, and scalable.

I built:

• Writing principles to guide every caption

• Grammar and style rules (emojis, punctuation, sentence structure, tone)

• Content patterns for playlists, artist spotlights, song recommendations

• Brand emoji system: 🤎 🎶 ✨

• Governance rules (posting frequency, self-review checklist, editing process)

These frameworks turned a personal passion into an operational content system.

Testing the System — Bringing It to Life

To validate the patterns, I tested them on real upcoming posts:

• An Oladapo spotlight using the “sound-as-feeling” pattern

• A Gabzy recommendation using the emotional-line template

• A nostalgia post using the reflective-tone framework

Each test worked smoothly, and for the first time, creating content felt effortless.

The style guide wasn’t just theory —it translated directly into stronger, consistent posts.

One personal win: my summer playlist post, the first created using my new framework received warm feedback and felt “exactly like the brand in my head.”

The Outcome — A Scalable Content Identity

This project resulted in:

• A fully documented content style guide

• A repeatable system for captions

• A distinct brand identity

• Faster content creation

• A clear, consistent vibe across posts

• A proof point of my systems thinking as a content designer

The Replay Button now has a foundation strong enough to grow from a passion page into a recognizable music brand.

The Impact — Why This Project Matters

Brand Impact

• Clearer identity

• Stronger emotional connection

• Consistent tone

Content Creation Impact

• Faster process

• No more caption hesitation

• Reusable structures that make posting easier

Click button below to see style guide