The art of creating an effective message

Good research merits good communication

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Quality of communication

Communicating Food Policy Research, IFPRI (March 2005)

Developing effective messagesWhen communicating your research, you need to respond to the

following questions:• Who?• Why?• How?• What?

But what does “key messages” stand for?

How to best craft your messages?

• If you have a completed research, list your key findings and policy recommendations• If you have a research proposal, list its objective(s) • If you have a development project, list its achievement(s)

Now, think about the following questions:1. What is the objective of your message?

2. Why is this important?

3. Who are your target audiences?

4. What do you want them to do?

5. How exactly should they do it?

What does an effective message look like?

“The 4Cs model is a useful tool for objectively evaluating the effectiveness of many forms of communication: what’s working, what isn’t working, and why.”

The 4Cs model: 1. Comprehension 2. Connection3. Credibility4. Contagiousness

What does it take to make a message memorable?

• What do you want to say, how and to whom? Messages should be designed with audiences in mind and

tailored to fit their needs – identify your audience

Messages should be memorable, engaging and limited in number – KISS!!

Messages should be simple – avoid jargon and scientific terminologies

Messages may need to answer the question: ‘why do I care?’

• A Attract the attention of the audience• I Raise the interest in the message or evidence• D Encourage a desire to act or to know more• A Prompt action and present a solution

Make your messages pass the ‘Grandma Test’

Message pyramid

Communicating Food Policy Research, IFPRI (March 2005)

Policy Implications Key recommendations

•What policy changes or actions do the results point to?•Supported by evidence•Must be actionable•Less direct than recommendations •Useful when advice not requested or not welcome

•What does the researcher think should happen?•Supported by evidence•Must be actionable•Describe clearly what should happen next•State as precise steps

Remember!

All great ideas are simple at heart!

Example 1 – MIDP 2012Title of Project: Cloth for Work turning old material into resources for poor in rural

areas of India.

Example 1 – ORD 2012

Title of Project: Economic incentives for discouraging urban sprawl in Mexico City

Methodology and/or TerminologyThe study will be based on a cost-benefit analysis and on microeconomic theory to determine a cost-effective alternative to discourage urban sprawl. First, the institutional framework of urban planning, housing policy and urban land policy, will be described to understand the phenomenon of urban sprawl in Mexico. Then, the problem will be described on the grounds of microeconomic theory, from the perspective of public goods provision and internalization of negative externalities. Next, we will describe a set of policy alternatives to solve the problem. For this, a cost-benefit analysis will be developed, assigning economic values of benefits and costs for each alternative and comparing the net benefit with a base alternative (current situation). For instance, individual costs of transportation will be estimated as a function of distance, time travel and households’ revenue, while environmental costs will be estimated by assigning an economic value of the emissions generated by transport. Based on this analysis, a set of policy recommendations will be assessed in order to find the must cost-effective alternative. Additionally, a case study will be conducted. A sample of households in a social housing development in the outer area of Mexico City Metropolitan Area, will be selected to collect quantitative and qualitative data, which will help to validate the results and generate additional information not available in the data sources (e.g. household location decisions). Interviews to stakeholders and key actors are considered, in particular to the housing federal institutions, national authorities of urban and regional planning and transport sector..The research will rely on the use of public access databases containing information about: population (census); transportation (travel patterns in Metropolitan Area); income and expenses of the households; greenhouse gases emissions; finance reports for the three levels of government; housing credits given by National Housing Agencies; investments on infrastructure provision by the three levels of government. Policy ImplicationsThe team is expecting to produce cost-efficient policy recommendations consisting on a set of suitable economic instruments that encourage inner-city social housing projects.