For those of you that don’t know, almost everyone from Vintage 56 is at Echo Conference 2010. It is amazing, and many of us will be posting our takes on the sessions here. For the most part, I will just be giving you my notes. I hope you enjoy.
Breakout Session 2: Kem Meyer – Less Clutter. Less Noise – Beyond Bulletins, Brochures, and Bake Sales (Her book) @kemmeyer – She is Communications Director at Granger Community Church. She spent 15 years in marketing for an ad agency before working for her church.
It is not what we say, it is what people hear. Are people letting you in or shutting you out: It is not our job to send the right message, it is our job to release the right response.
3 Keys to take away 1. Check Your Ego
- So often we create clutter because we overestimate what we have to say and we underestimate how it will effect those that we have to say it to.
- A lot of times we care more about the what and less about the who
- People are not motivated by your need, they aren’t motivated by your change prescription, and they are offended by insider language
- Less about what you have to say is what you want to spend your time and and more about how it affects people
- Get an Image Consultant
- Sometimes the picture we are drawing is not telling the story we think it is
- You are often the last person to realize what you are really communicating
- You should always have someone check your words for context
- You have to have people that check your ideas and work -People with other perspectives
- She has two at work, and her spouse at home (life and work)
- Your communications adverbs will be exponentially more effective if we tune our M.O.
- You have to know about your audience before you craft your deliverable. (Google the yahoo commercial where they introduce their new homepage.)
- Don’t expect the person you are talking to to do the hard work (more psychological)
- Keep it Simple
- If you want to maximize response you need to minimize options
- People not looking for more information, they are looking for how to handle all the information that is coming out them
- Think progressive dinner, not potluck.
- Think what do they need right now. and then now. (Food pyramid vs. 3 months or 3,000 miles)
Example: If you want to buy a pair of size 8 running pants, what do you do:
- Go to a store
- Look for a general area – women
- Then looking for a rack that is Adidas
- Then browse the inventory
- The brilliance is, anyone in the store would be able to send you to the right area. (and then you can drill down)
- You don’t drive down the street looking for a sign that says size 8 running pants
- Everything can’t be at the top of the list.
- It is not the volume of content, it is about how we present the info.
- Her church broke everything down into 8 major categories, and then anyone would be able to drill down to the right info.
A generation ago, the question was, “What is Truth.” Now it is “What’s the point?” – Billy Graham
The biggest secret to navigate people’s egos is asking questions instead of just telling them what should be done. And then work through it with giving them options. If you help to communicate the worth of the chaos you are about to create for them, they will buy into it. You have to leave room in your time budget for a lot more conversations. You need to increase your budget by double. You will have 1/2 the deliverables, 2x the conversations, and exponential amounts of effectiveness.