Is your story ready to tell? 10-point message test
Is your customer, employee or investor message ready for launch?
You’ve been slaving away for days, weeks or months to develop your company’s story. How can you be sure that it will take root with people, be remembered, and be acted upon at decision time?
Keep it simple. Tell your whole story on one page with a 1-Page Message Map.
To gain internal buy-in, co-create your Message Map with all the principals who will deliver the message – executives, sales, R&D, human resources, finance, and marketing. Get them around a table with a neutral facilitator to cook up your message together.
When it’s time to launch your message externally, how can you ensure customers will cotton to it? Use this 10-point message test to test your message before you launch it.
10-Point Message Test
- Do you boil everything down to one main message that people can remember – instead of multiple messages they are likely to forget?
- Does your message answer your audience’s main question: What’s in it for me? (WII-FM?) Or does it leave them wondering: So what?
- Do you hook your audience and convey the gist of your story in 7 seconds, 23 words or less?
- Does your message ring true? Is it factual?
- Does your message speak customers’ language, not the jargon of your industry or specialty?
- Do you back up your message with proof such as third-party social proof?
- Does your message address your audience’s unconsidered needs?
- Do you keep your message consistent throughout the buyer’s journey, even if it takes years? No matter who tells the story? In every medium? Everywhere in the world?
- Do you shed light on your company’s higher purpose by answering the question: Why?
- Is your message positive, inspiring and uplifting?
When you can honestly answer Yes to the 10 questions on this message test, your message is ready to roll. That means your story is likely to have a strong impact on your audiences and their future decisions.
That’s what a great story is all about. Learn more about how to create powerful messages with 1-Page Message Maps here.
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