Business, healthcare and government leaders are realizing the value of identifying and interpreting your message. By clarifying your message, everyone in your company or organization can clearly and succinctly articulate what your company does and the value that it brings its customers, employees, and partners. There’s also a “self-realization” aspect to defining your message. By understanding your position and benefits, you can reflect, as a group, on where you are as a business, and be inspired to make some long overdue changes along the way.
So how do you define your message?
Depending on the size, competition, and complexity of your organization, you may benefit from actually hiring an expert to help you determine your messages, even developing a message matrix to address each of your audiences with targeted communications for each.
One of the most important steps in the process is to get consensus within your core group of decision makers and those who touch your customer. There are a few ways to go about this, but we’ve found that, by hosting a facilitated meeting, we’re able not only to build consensus among the group, but also to tap into the collective brain trust of those who know the business — and perhaps their industry – best.
Regardless of how you decide to proceed, a solid messaging platform will be the foundation of your brand. Here are six things you may want to consider, or need to learn and do in order to develop effective messages.
- Know your business. Get honest about what is unique and nets the biggest ROI while building on your plans for growth.
- Know their business. Find out what is most important to your audience(s).
- Communicate your business. Define your mission, vision and values.
- State your position. Create a solid value proposition that shows what differentiates you in the marketplace.
- Speak directly to your audience. Develop core messages that speak directly to your audience segments.
- Remember your message! Print it on your walls if you have to. Because your message is who you are – and you want to make sure, as a whole, to stay true to yourself.