You have new messaging! Now what?

You’ve just finished a brand new messaging project.  Maybe as part of a rebrand or repositioning initiative or product launch. If you hired an agency to help, you probably spent a decent amount of money (I’ve personally overseen messaging projects of over $100k but it varies, greatly.) and now you have a beautiful deck with lots of copy and charts that say things like “messaging architecture” and list out your value statements, problem statements, tagline, personality traits, etc. 

Now what? 

Hard truth: That 10 min segment on an all-hands meeting or a lunch and learn with sales to show them the new messaging will do nothing. 

Below are four key steps to help you get the most out of your messaging investment and make it stick with your target audiences.

1. Roll it out like you would a rebrand and get it everywhere.
   When you roll out new messaging, the day you announce it internally, have it everywhere, asap.
   
   Specifically, update and be ready to flip the switch on the following: website copy, social media profiles, internal sites like sharepoint/jira/atlassian or your intranet, CRM library, the primary Sales and Customer Success deck templates, and primary internal company meeting deck templates, for starters.
   
   Hopefully you have a plan for this in advance but if you’ve never been through a rebrand or need some general guidance on executing this type of broad update, shoot me a message.
   
2. Train the writers and the gatekeepers
   
   Your content team should have been involved in the messaging development but make sure they are not just comfortable with the new messaging, but are so in-tune with it that they could spot mistakes and train others on it.
   
   Get the internal influencers from all departments on board. Hopefully you pilot tested with this group during the messaging development process, but empower them to be ambassadors of the new messaging. Bonus: ask them if there is an asset they use a lot and make sure that specific item is updated.
   
   Hard Truth: Leadership can kill progress in adopting new messaging in a lot of ways, even if they were deeply involved in its creation. Connect with the CEO to make sure she/he is enthusiastically supportive (the enthusiasm is important there). They can make it clear to the rest of leadership that adopting the new messaging is part of the organization’s future success, setting the expectation that everyone learn and use it.
   
3. Make old messaging painful to find and use.
   
   This is where a good relationship with IT and RevOps is important. Work with the owners of any asset libraries, template tools, etc to pull down anything that has old messaging in it. Yes, people will have things saved in their own folders, but first deal with what’s in your control.
   
   Call it out when you see people using old assets/messaging. Don’t be dick about it and be ready with updated materials, but if people know that it’s not cool to use old messaging, they will eventually stop.
   
4. Keep talking about it.
   There is an old rule in comms that says “when you’re sick of hearing about it, your audience is just starting to listen.” In my experience, this is true for a lot of reasons, so keep talking about your company’s new messaging. Highlight newly updated assets or pages via meetings and slack/chat, ask for 5-10 min on different department team meetings to train and answer questions, after a few months, run a survey. Keep. Talking. About. It.

New messaging can have wonderful effects and positive revenue impacts on an organization, but like any change, adopting something new can be challenging. Make adoption and internal marketing part of the overall strategy of the new messaging project and you’ll be well set up for success. 

Getting ready to roll out new messaging and need some help? Let’s connect.