The 3 Types of Messages - EP030

There are 3 types of messages. Which one is or should be yours? It all depends on what question your message answers. I'm Tamsen Webster of TamsenWebster.com, and this is Find the Red Thread. I don't know anyone who doesn't want their message to hit its mark, and yet when you're trying to figure out how to craft that message for all the different kinds of people that could be watching, reading, or listening, that can feel pretty mysterious. And in the face of that mystery, we do something that actually makes our job a little harder. We end up answering the question we, the message maker, wants to answer rather than the question the audience needs us to answer. Well, how does that simplify everything? Because all those different people could be asking all sorts of questions. True, but remember that there are 3 universal questions that every person needs an answer to before they will change their behavior or before they will change their action. And those 3 questions are: why, what now, and how. Why am I not achieving the thing that I want to achieve? Once I understand that, then before I'm ready to go to a how do I solve that, I need to understand what now, what is the nature of the new opportunity? What do I need to understand now in order to really solve that problem and achieve my goal? Then and only then, once I understand and agree with that, am I ready to understand how, how can I fix it? What do we do with this information? Well, here's the thing to remember that Their question determines your answer, which means you have to step back and really think about, on the whole, who is in that audience, the kind of person that you most want to reach. That means you need to go back to that question of who are you for, or whom are you for? Who are you for? Where is that person in their expertise where it comes to this topic? Where is that person in their readiness when it comes to this topic? Topic? Once you understand that, then it's fairly easy to figure out where you need to spend the most time. Do you need to spend a lot of time getting someone to understand and agree with the problem? Well, then you have a why type message. Do you need to spend more time getting them to this new opportunity? And then once they got that, no, they're going to be pretty open to what to do with it. So you're going to want to spend about equal amount of time on how to put that new idea and that new change into action. Well, then that's a "what now" talk. And then the final talk, as you may have guessed, or the final type of message is that "how" message where you don't need to spend much time at all on the goal, the problem, or the idea, maybe not even on the change because people are already ready and willing to hear you on that. Well, that's where you're going to spend most of your time explaining exactly how to do something. As you might guess, that's the How message. So what does that look like in real life? Well, here I'm gonna turn to TED Talks because that's an easy, quick way for you to go see these messages at work. Some great examples of Why type messages are Malcolm Gladwell's The Unheard Story of David and Goliath, Jill Bolte Taylor's My Stroke of Insight. I would also include Nyla Fermerchan's talk, Got a Meeting? Take a Walk talk here. Now, that sounds like a How talk based on its title, but if you look for the red thread in that, you'll see that she's really establishing the case for a new problem. What are some What Now talks to go look for? The number 1 TED Talk of all time, Ken Robinson's "Do Schools Kill Creativity?" is absolutely a What Now talk, as is Amy Cuddy's talk, "Your Body Language May Shape Who You Are." If you're looking for a short talk to see this in play, then look for Melissa Marshall's Talk Nerdy to Me talk. And how talks? Well, this is where one of my all-time favorites comes in, and that's Joe Smith's How to Use a Paper Towel. You can also check out How to Make Stress Your Friend from Kelly McGonigal. So the next time you're trying to figure out, well, how do I pitch this message? Remember, start with that question: who is this message really for? And once you know that, then you'll understand which of those 3 questions they most need an answer to. Why? What now? Or how? Now, to make sure you're capturing everybody in the audience, make sure that you're always including the answers to all 3 questions in your message. The goal, the problem, the idea, the change, and if appropriate, the actions. But then spend most of your time on where most of the people that you want to reach need that time spent. And that will leave you with a why, what now, or how type message. If you need help figuring out that red thread of your message in the first place, go to findyourredthread.com and download the free red thread worksheet. I'm Tamsen Webster of tamsenwebster.com, and I hope you find your red thread.