“Our strength is in our people-and how far they will go for customers. “What sets your company apart from the competition?” While all of those are excellent key messages, when they’re used with no supporting points, they seem cliché, trite and hollow.īut imagine if instead the conversation went like this: You might be inclined to answer with any of these common key messages “Innovation is at the heart of all we do,” or “Our location well positions us to serve customers,” or “Our strength is in our people.” Imagine a reporter asking, “What sets your company apart from the competition?” At Bluestone, we call these “message enhancers.” Not only is that bad for the reporter, it’s bad for the executive who will either be quoted saying something forgettable, or more likely, not quoted at all.īut here’s the rest of that media training secret: Most company messages sound alike until we back them up with interesting stories, examples, analogies, metaphors, etc. It’s true! So while communications teams may be pleased when executives “stick to the messages,” reporters and other audiences are frustrated that they can’t get beyond the predictable, abstract and boring rhetoric they’ve heard time and again. So we organize our thoughts into bundles of three or four messages and repeat those over and over.īut here's a media training secret: Most company messages sound a lot alike. Neither a reporter nor any other audience can reasonably remember more than three or four main points from any conversation. This is the fundamental rule of media training-and for good reason. If you’ve ever worked with a media trainer or PR person, you’ve likely been coached to identify and then stick to your key messages.
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