how to create great messaging
TRANSCRIPT
THE ART & SCIENCE OF MESSAGING
MARK EVANS ME CONSULTING
MESSAGING ISYou need it to connect with customers, investors, potential employees, the press, etc. and if you don’t have a simple, compelling message, they won’t bother to learn more.- David Skok
>The averager person sees or hears 100,000 words/day of content
WHAT IS GREAT MESSAGING?
Simple.Compelling.Specific.Differentiated.Defensible.
Des Traynor, Intercom
MESSAGING
How how can it really be to tell
people what you do, who you
serve and why it matters?
MESSAGINGIS DIFFICULT
Startups struggle due to 2 reasons:- They product-centric (love to talk about product,
features, price), rather than customer-centric- They don’t know their customers well enough.
Many don’t have buyer personas.
MESSAGINGFRAMEWORK
DISCOVERYThe brain
dump
RESEARCH Looking at the
competitive landscape
BRAINSTORMING Focusing on ideas, words
and phrases
MESSAGINGDrawing a line in the
sand
TESTINGWhat do others think?
POLLINATIONSpreading the word
A case study:
Our overall message didn’t match our sales pitch.
At first, this was on purpose. Then, it was holding us back.
Here is where we started.
No storytelling.
Message was boring.
Not seen as thought leader.
Picked“scrappy”.
It’s in ourDNA!
SCRAPPY
Tested it.
SCRAPPY
Failed.
Created trust issues.Made us look small.
We killed it. And any similar words.
Prospects said their mission was to have great customer experiences.
Settled on “happiness”.
Happy employees sell the most.Happy customers stay for life.
We tested it during sales process. It worked!
Now it’s our theme. Everywhere.
Making people laugh.
Illustrations
Security doc
Cards
Activities
Messages should affect everything.