Get up, stand up, communicate and change
Communications used to be like putting varnish on a wooden chair.
Someone would have designed the chair, discussed the details with colleagues, executed the design and then, two minutes before it was shown to the rest of the world, we at the communications agency would embellish it with some varnish hoping for someone to sit down in it. Some other decoration could be added to convince people that the chair was comfortable (even if it wasn’t) but the chair itself would not change at this stage.
If you work at a think tank or any other knowledge production organisation, you can replace chair with research. But this is basically how advertising and marketing used to be, and sometimes still are. However, we now see communications as an integral part of the process of building something, because there’s no better communications strategy than creating a really outstanding product. And to achieve that, we need an iterative process that considers the audience, the product and its communication, all together.
Communications also used to be all about consistency and stability. Find and sustain the unique voice of your brand. Don’t alter your logo for years and, if you do, change it only minimally. Be consistent across all channels and with all your audiences. These principles still apply to the way we think about branding, especially for institutions. However, some of this is changing.
We have learnt that segmentation is useful and that we might need to have different personalities for different audiences. That being flexible about which topics we discuss can make us more relevant, particularly when a big topic emerges overnight (hello, Covid-19). That interaction is key and we cannot wait for a dozen approvals before replying to a post from a member of our community. And that if we act too quickly and make a mistake, organisations can also say sorry.
Some of these ideas connect very well with those of a book that is neither about communications, nor about think tanks: Antifragile, by Nassim Taleb. Taleb argues that being antifragile is even better than being resilient or robust: it is gaining from disorder. Maybe our organisations cannot go that far, but the idea makes us question whether consistency should reign, or if we should rather give the crown to flexibility, trial and error, adaptability and good use of chance.
So here we have two facts about present day communications:
- It happens alongside the process of building something and not afterwards, when the thing is finished.
- And it is not necessarily coherent and solid, but unstable and a bit unpredictable.
In other words, communications equals change. We could call it communichange.
The process of communichange
At Sociopúblico we don’t communicate chairs but complex ideas. Our ‘chairs’ are research results, databases, public awareness campaigns, and public policy recommendations. They are not always as stylish as, say, this Bertoia — a classic from modern design.
However, as contemporary furniture producers planning for a new release, we follow a process that starts with audience research to define how we are going to communicate with them, continues with iterations to refine those first ideas, and — when possible — adds some testing.
There is a design thinking methodology called ‘jobs to be done’ that encourages us to always ask ourselves: What job is [this product/research/piece] doing for my audience?
Answering this question leads to decisions on which formats and devices to use for the communication of a product, the tone we will adopt, the cases of consumption we will prioritise. And also sometimes leads to a reformulation of some aspects of the product itself.
Even when an organisation separates the production process from the communication process, this approach often brings them together again. We have seen it dozens of times. These are real examples:
- A think tank working on education hired us to rethink their data portal, and we ended up discovering that users were not that interested in the data but ready for action — so we launched a WhatsApp campaign.
- A startup focused on sustainability decided to go from NGO to private company after a branding exercise showed that their community valued their business model and how it made them sustainable.
- A team integrating four different areas at an international organisation started working with us to unify their message. In the process they discovered it was better to write a network of different messages for different audiences and topics, and at the same time launch a cross-teams ideation programme to build real connections among verticals.
Over time, I have found three advantages to this approach. The first and most obvious is that we can be more effective at connecting knowledge producers and their audiences, to everyone’s enjoyment. The second is that, although communications products and research are increasingly solved through the use of software and algorithms, what we do through this process is an exercise of human collective thinking that cannot (yet) be automated. And finally, that an iterative and user-centred approach opens a space for reflection and ideation in researchers’ and specialists’ crowded agendas, which enriches us all, and lets us spend many happy moments together.
What else could we ask for?
Oh yes, a cushion would be great, please!
Sonia Jalfin
Director | Sociopúblico
