I’ve read a couple of executive messages lately – mentioning no names to protect the extremely guilty – that fall prey to a common problem; the messaging is all focused on what the company wants to say and not enough on what their audience needs to hear. In marketing terms, execs all too often talk about features when their audience would be far more interested in benefits.
Result? Boring messages and disengaged audiences.
It’s not because execs don’t care. The problem is that they are focused on delivering a strategy – that is the day job, after all – which means they have spent weeks, months, years, immersing themselves in the detail and internalizing all of the anticipated benefits.
As a result, the things that are top of their mind often relate to details and delivery – we’ve completed X, we’re staffing up for the next phase – rather than the expected outcome or “benefit” of those moves, leaving audiences to connect the dots, or not.
But there’s an easy solution when a piece of content goes down this path – just ask “So What?” after every declaration.
Asking “So what?” immediately puts you in the position of the audience, making it much easier to get to the heart of the message or where the emphasis really needs to go.
Getting into the the habit of asking that question will help create content that works for a living and provides the opportunity for real connection with the audience.