Comments on: How to craft a memorable key message in 10 minutes

By: PowerPoint Slide Design: 9 reasons to put words on slides

PowerPoint Slide Design: 9 reasons to put words on slides — Tue, 24 Aug 2010 09:41:49 +0000

[...] A clear and succinct sentence expressing your key message gives your message longevity. If you say it, and an audience member didn’t quite hear it or [...]

By: live your talk » Blog Archive » 3 Tips to Ensure Your Team Is Ready to Represent Offline

Mon, 01 Mar 2010 11:20:57 +0000

[...] opportunities. To bolster team readiness, it’s worth it to craft a mini, ongoing archive of key messages that reflect your business values, service, and industry relevance. These can be on-hand for future fleshing out for speeches or even networking [...]

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The Key to the Code… » Key to Success - 196th Edition — Mon, 01 Mar 2010 07:50:08 +0000

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The Key to the Code… » Key to Success - 195th Edition — Sat, 27 Feb 2010 19:07:09 +0000

By: Best Presentation Tips | Speaking about Presenting: Presentation Tips from Olivia Mitchell

Thu, 21 Jan 2010 18:38:32 +0000

[...] The first thinking step is to decide and develop your key message. For more tips on this see my post How to craft a memorable key message in 10 minutes. [...]

By: Olivia Mitchell

Olivia Mitchell — Tue, 19 Jan 2010 23:11:33 +0000

You raise an excellent point Tripp! Should you include the benefit to the audience within the key message?

I definitely agree that the benefits to the audience should be in the presentation – preferably near the beginning of the presentation.

However, whether it’s a part of the key message is a matter of judgement in each case – and there’s no perfect answer.

There’s a risk that when you try and include the benefit within the message, then it gets too cluttered and no longer has one focal point.

Olivia

By: Tripp Frohlichstein

Tripp Frohlichstein — Tue, 19 Jan 2010 22:11:31 +0000

Your points are good, Olivia. However, a key message isn’t about the what but rather the why. The why is where the emotion is to reach your audience. Take your example above. “We must record every health and safety incident.” That isn’t a message, it is a directive. Why is this important? That is what really matters to your audience. So it might be to make the workplace safer. And that is the TRUE message. “We want to make our workplace safer so everyone goes home to their families at night. Therefore, we must record every health and safety incident. This will help us understand where deficiencies are and how to correct them. That will mean a safer workplace.” Or take another example. “You can now earn carbon credits from your forests.” So? What’s in it for me? The message must answer that or you lose the audience. SO the real message here is one of a better environment for all us and tie the carbon credits in to that. In essence, all that you say is correct. But it doesn’t go far enough for truly analyzing what makes a “more” effective message. Final example. I worked with a worldwide fast food company on their message. Execs came up with healthy, good service, tasty, clean and so on. But those are really “proof points” to the overall message we developed several years ago (and is still being used today) – and the message is that we want to provide a great customer experience. All of those other “messages” really support our main message (I call it home base because home is a comfortable place to be – your message should be comfortable to you as well). It makes it easy to discuss each element and them bring it back home. “We have healthy food which is an important part of our customers’ experience at our restaurants.”

By: Olivia Mitchell

Olivia Mitchell — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 07:53:52 +0000

Thank you Jeff – yes, I agree – I call these supporting points “assertions”. I’ll write a post soon covering both assertions and evidence. Olivia

By: Pivotal Public Speaking » Create your key message in a snap

Pivotal Public Speaking » Create your key message in a snap — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 19:29:14 +0000

[...] Mitchell has written a great post on “How to craft a memorable key message in 10 minutes”. Her post is an excellent [...]

By: Jeff Hurt

Jeff Hurt — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 14:10:14 +0000

Olivia:
Excellent, wise and sage advice for anyone getting ready to deliver a presentation. If all presenters would follow this simple step, so many more presentations would be enjoyable to attend, as well as memorable.

I take it one step further. Once you have the memorable key message, what two-three points do you want them to remember about that key message. (That probably comes under your heading of crafting the evidence.) From there I build the learner objectives and flesh out the rest of the presentation.