An outline for developing overarching key messages for any organization or situation.

1. Key Message Workshop
Turning the obvious into news

2. Key Messages
The spine of your communications efforts.
Use them throughout brochures, media releases,
web site, corporate profile.
Create specific key messages for every media
release & for different stakeholders.
aka 'must air' points

3. Must-air points
The rule of threes: from Aristotle's Poetics, initially
(beginning, middle, end).
Three 'must air' points and three facts each that support
those points.
Start with overarching organizational key messages.
• First key message is 'boilerplate' (About Us)

4. Singing from the same song sheet
We remember only 20% of what we hear/ 40% of
what we read.
It takes ~ 47 repetitions before we learn a word in
another language.
Journalists still need want As to the 5Ws and how?
• Combine As in three key messages.
who, what, where, when, why and how?

5. Claim, Fact, Example format
Make a claim
Add a fact that supports the claim
Give an example
walk the walk

6. Claim
We are champions of education

7. Fact(s)
Last year we gave over $100,000 to local charities
to support education of K-12 students in the
community.
We also had over 40 rotating volunteers reading to
students every day for the entire year during their
lunch break.

8. Example
One 11th-grade student, was able to move up
from a regular English class to an AP class and is
expected to earn an A.
She says her mentor helped her realize
reading was fun.
No one had ever done that for her before.

9. Slogans
Claims without any kind of explanation
Accompanied by images
Set to jingles
• At Ford, quality is Job One.
• It's mainly because of the meat (because of the meat!)
• Just do it!
• ads

10. Features vs Benefits
Features are specific
Benefits are simple and usually generic
Tendency with anything scientific or pseudo-
scientific is to focus on features/facts
jargon alert

11. Want your own key message
workshop?
ruth@nospinpr.com
ruth.seeley (Skype)
ca.linkedin.com/in/ruthseeley/