Key Communicators are...Key

People talk to people...and those people talk to other people...who talk to others...and so on and so on and so on.

The holy grail of any professional communicator is generating positive word of mouth communications.  We all know that people find messages from their friends and neighbors to be more trustworthy and worthy of consideration than messages from ads or other "professional" communications sources.  Word of mouth messages are seen as trustworthy because they are filtered through the opinion of a disinterested third party.  The thinking is "I trust Becky and if Becky is giving me a message, that message must be trustworthy!"

The challenge, from a professional communicator's point of view, is that the very factor that makes word of mouth so desirable makes it very hard to manage!  To someone who is used to developing style books,  overseeing every comma and semicolon of an organization's communications, and who's mantra is "stay on message," this is difficult to accept.

You may not be able to control the message when it comes to word of mouth communications...but you can influence it!

Developing a key communicator network of key opinion leaders in your community or industry is one way to let the grapevine work for you.  The concept is simple.  You identify those individuals who are opinions leaders within your target audience.  These are the people that other people listen to and believe.  These are not always just the community or industry leaders.  They might be the hairdresser or PTA Mom or the blogger whom everyone listens to in order to find out what's what.

Once you identify who you want to be in your group, you invite them to join.  You tell them that as they are the opinion leaders of the industry or community, your organization will be providing them with extra information on your organization.  The only thing you ask in return is that they participate in some future survey or focus group once or twice a year that allows you to collect THEIR opinions on what people are thinking about regarding issues important to you.

You supply your key communicators with additional information about your company, your issues and/or your industry.  It is important that you provide your key communicators with accurate, realistic data.  Don't try to "spin" your key communicators or you will lose them.  However, if you provide them with real, trustworthy information, on a reliable basis, amazing things can happen.

This works for a few reasons.  First, being recognized as a Key Communicator is an honor to most people.  Better yet it is an honor that comes with few obligations!  Second, you are giving your Key Communicators something that they truly value, access to unique information.  Since they are communicators, they should value being able to share information with their various contacts.  Access to the information you are providing them increases their stature as a communicator.  Third, if you are doing this well, this works because you are not putting any caveats on their access to the information.  You are not even suggesting that they go out and share the information.  You are sharing it with them because you feel that they would find it interesting.

Once again, the frustrating part of this is that you, as a professional communicator, cannot control the message or the flow of information.  You have to just put it out their on faith that it will do your organization good.  And you may never know what good it does, but every once in a while you get confirmation that the process makes sense.

A week or so after my school district celebrated a rare referendum victory, I was talking to a community member who was in my Key Communicator group.  She was congratulating me on the referendum and started talking about how some people in the community had had misunderstandings about the referendum.  She proceeded to tell me about a couple of neighbors who told her why they planned to vote against the school district and then shared the arguments she told them in favor of the school district.  Her arguments, coincidentally were taken almost directly from a referendum fact sheet I had sent our Key Communicators.  This Key Communicator, without even realizing it, had helped promote the district's point of  view.  I became a committed believer in the power of Key Communicators at that moment.

Know Your Stuff

I once had a salesperson make an appointment with my boss and myself to tell us about his company and the product that he felt we could use.

He was on time, well dressed and did the required small talk very well.  But when it came time to give the presentation, he couldn't get the PowerPoint presentation on his laptop to work.  After watching him struggle with trying to get things to work for 10 minutes or so, it was clear that he couldn't give the presentation without the PowerPoint crutch.  He asked if he could reschedule the meeting.  We declined.

If you are going on a sales call or making a presentation, know your stuff.  Things happen with technology.  If you aren't prepared to move forward without laptop assistance, you aren't prepared. Be prepared!

Make 'em Laugh, Part 2

Today's post is the gift of a smile!
You can find more of Hugh MacLeod's cartoons at GapingVoid.com

Public Speaking is NOT Open Mike Night

Many "experts" on public speaking, right after they tell you to picture the audience in their underwear will tell you to start with a joke.  It loosens up the audience, they say.  Makes them like you and more receptive to you and your message.

The problem is, telling a joke to a large group of people is hard!  There are lots of reasons for this including the subjective nature of humor, the importance of delivery, the wariness of most audiences these days when a speaker sets out to tell a joke, and the fact that most jokes have only a tenuous relation to the topic of the speech.

I like to use humor when I give a presentation, but I rarely tell a joke.  Rather, I prefer to make a comment on my presentation or the circumstances of the event.  I like using situational humor because it shares an observation with the audience, which helps to create a connection.  Wry or slightly sarcastic comments can come off as more natural and spontaneous than set jokes.  I do usually plan these comments, but I don't always use them.  I try to read the audience and judge how well such comments will be received.  There is nothing more disheartening than making a comment that you expect will result in laughter and instead getting silence.

You should ONLY use humor in a presentation if you are comfortable with it. Don't feel that you have to tell a joke.  Also, if you do decide to use humor, you should NEVER make jokes that are disparaging or degrading to someone else.  More often than not, those types of jokes are alienating and will work against you as a speaker.  I tend to use self disparaging comments, where I make fun of myself, which for some reason often gets a laugh.

And for the record, I have never pictured an audience in their underwear.  I am pretty sure that would make me forget where I was in my presentation!

The Lament of the Luddite: Frozen out by new technology

I consider myself technology friendly.  Really I do.  But I am also on a budget, so I don't have all of the latest electronic toys I would like to have.  I haven't really missed them, but in the last week a couple of things happened that made me wonder just how much of a Luddite I have become.

I was at a presentation at which the presenter gave QR codes as links to her presentation slides and tip sheets. Very cool and very of the moment.  However, for those few of us who have not joined the Smart Phone revolution (as I wrote about here) QR codes are just funny looking square patterns.  I could not link to her materials.

Shortly after that, I got this month's issue of FAST Company, a magazine that I highly recommend.  It is a fun, thought provoking publication and always has something in it that I can use at work (and in this blog!)  This month's issue of FAST Company had a cover sheet proudly proclaiming that I could now get the magazine on my tablet device.  Unlike smart phones, I have never even considered getting a tablet.  The promotion cited all of the additional content I could get on my nonexistent device.  Which made me wonder why I am being short-changed because I only experience the publication in its archaic paper format.

My point is that as companies rush to meet the surge of new ways we can access content and information, they should make sure to remember those of us who are a little slow on the uptake.  Don't let your loyal customers or subscribers be frozen out by new technology.

FINE Communications

I sometimes get asked to define "good" communications.  Defining communications is a bit like defining good marketing or good art.  It is hard to put words to but you know it when you see it.

Unfortunately, when I give that answer, almost no one is satisfied.  While there are many different definitions of communications, most don't seem to include all of the elements that I consider important.  So, in the interest of keeping  people who ask me about communications from walking away muttering rude things under their breath, I cobbled together a workable definition.

In my opinion, good communications should be FINE communications:  Familiar, Interactive, Newsworthy and with Everyone involved.

• Familiar: For communications to be effective, you need to communicate to your audience in a language and using a medium that they use and are familiar with.  We all know people to whom it is useless to send an email, because they never check their email.  Similarly, you can talk to me all day in Portuguese, but you won't do much communicating because I am not familiar with the language.

• Interactive: Truly excellent communications is always two way and interactive. We have all heard the old adage that we were given two ears and one mouth because we should listen twice as much as we talk.  There is a lot of truth to that.  The best communicators are ALWAYS those who connect the most with their communities, constituencies and audiences.  The only way you can do that is by listening to them and hearing what their issues and concerns are.

• Newsworthy:  For communications to happen, the receiver of a message has to value the message enough to accept it and process it.  The message has to have value to that person.  It has to be newsworthy to them.  It is important to remember that newsworthiness is determined by the receiver of the message, not by the sender.  It doesn't matter how important a message is to the sender, if the receiver isn't interested, it is not received.   Also, our definition of what is newsworthy varies significantly depending on the situation. While virtually everything my 4 year old nephew says is newsworthy to me, if a coworker said the same things, it would not only NOT be newsworthy, but would be a cause for concern!     

• Everyone involved:  For communications to be effective and to have impact, it must reach an audience.  As we discussed above, first  the message must have value to the receiver and they must accept it.  Good communications is not a spectator sport.  Both the sender of the message and the receiver of the message must be actively engaged in the communications any communications to happen.  Furthermore, communications is most effective when it spreads.  For that to happen, the receivers of the message need to become the spreaders of the message.  They need to believe enough in the importance and newsworthiness of the message to pass it along to their communities, to their contacts.  Everyone needs to be a part of the communications.

If you can get these four elements working in your communications, everything will be just FINE.

The Answer is Leverage

Communications is like breathing to most companies.  They know that they need to do it to survive, but they don't give it a lot of thought (except when something goes wrong!)

One of the reasons for this is that most companies or organizations don't see communications as their primary function.  They sell cars, make steel beams or educate children.  They don't communicate as their primary business, or so the thinking goes.

Because of that mindset, these companies often don't invest much in the communications function within their organization.

The problem is that in reality ALL companies are communications companies.  Selling cars is ALL about communications.  Making steel requires coordination with suppliers and customers not to mention shareholders and boards of directors.  Teaching is, well, 110% communications: to students, parents, colleagues, administration, licensing boards, the community, grantors, evaluators, and just about everyone else!

So the reality is, while organizations don't invest like they should in communications support and infrastructure, they do a whole lot of it.  Which means that they expect and need a whole lot out of those communications resources they do have.

Hence the age old questions that is heard in marketing/PR/communications offices throughout the land...How can I do ALL of that with just this amount of resources?

The answer is leverage.  Leverage your efforts through partnerships.  Mobilize everyone else in your organization to serve as informal spokespeople.  Develop a Key Communicator network of opinion leaders that can help you get the word out about your organization.  Take advantage of existing platforms to help broadcast your messages further than you can on platforms you have to build and/or fund.  In other words, get EVERYONE you can involved in helping to spread your message!

Leverage can help to expand your results without expanding the amount you spend (in time as well as money).  Leverage, when done well, can appear effortless but seemingly work miracles.

If communications is like breathing, then leverage must be like shouting.  At the top of your lungs.  Without losing your breath.