How Politicians Speak in Key Messages, and Why You Should Too

In Public Relations, whenever you speak to your public, you need to address them, and fill them with the idea that you want them to acquire. It can be:

• Companies to Media

• Companies to Shareholders

• Politician to Voters

Whatever it is, you need to make sure that you are communicating the right thing. The trouble is, when you want to just be friendly, and get into conversations, who knows where the friendly conversation may end up, and what the journalist ends up penning down.

You see , the journalist is a typical worker. Goes in to work, does what needs to be done. He or she would need to go for the assignment or event, see what is happening, and report to as accurate as possible. And they would be penning down and taking pictures of what is happening.

That is why it is so important to give the right impression, and tell the right story. As they are coming to take pictures and notes.

So delivery of information cannot be casual or as it comes. It would need to be carefully planned, as part of Corporate or Political Communication Strategy - and rolled out accordingly.

Even if the journalists ask questions that derail off to say scandals - it is important to remember that the journalist won't pen down things that aren't uttered, so deflecting away and bringing the topic back to where you want it to go should always be in your control. So whatever it is, they always go back and end up writing what YOU want them to write. So YOU control the show, not them.

What are your Key Messages

So now that we know how important it is to have the information flow from your side strategized and in clear direction, how exactly do you arrange this information? Human studies have shown that we remember things in bundles of 3. Like if we have to remember a telephone number with 10 numbers in it like 0183712737, we would remember it better by breaking it up into 018-3712-737. It is also easier for the eye to catch and capture the information in the brain. It's like pockets of information sorted so that everything doesn't go all over the place. So Key Messages should be engineered the same. When you meet your audience, whether you are a politician giving a speech, or a CEO of a company, you would need to see what are the main 3 key messages you would like to get across for the day. Some of guides for you could be:

1. Why are you meeting your audience, for a celebration? Or to get more support? Write down the main key reason why you would like to greet everyone who is there

2. What do you want everyone to remember when they walk away?

3. What do you want printed in social media and in newspapers or TV?

Strategising key messages and stringing them in a way that hits the right note is also important. As they say, it's not just what you say, but also how you say it. If you ever need help with Public Relations or Key Messages, do get in touch with us at Wunderboom, or visit our Public Relations page.