Effective Communication: Creating Messages That Sell Ideas, Services, and Products

For many organizations, communication with the intent of convincing people to engage in some desired behavior is a key function. Whether seeking to convince someone to buy a product or service, support a position on a political issue, or change personal behavior (e.g., smoking) - communication requires framing messages such that recipients can understand them and are motivated to respond accordingly. While the most critical component of what many organizations do, all too often very little thoughtful planning is put into the messaging process.

To a certain extent individuals have done a better job of identifying and developing “messaging” skills than have organizations. Dale Carnegie’s book “How to Win Friends and Influence People” and Dr. Chester Karrass’ Effective Negotiating® seminars have garnered international recognition and helped thousands of individuals develop the discipline and interpersonal skills to successfully develop and deliver messages that aid their individual success. Many organizations would benefit from undergoing a similar process.

In this report we provide some of the basic concepts behind a good messaging program, and the steps an organization can take to ensure that they have the highest likelihood of success. Today, with a mountain of information competing for an individual’s attention it is not enough to simply have the correct data or the right idea – the information needs the right path to get to the right people at the right time in the right manner for something good to come of it. In this report we try to give you some of the basic tools to make that happen.