Have you ever tried to explain an ill-gotten traffic ticket to a five-year-old?  No matter how elegantly you frame it, they’ll never understand all of the subtle nuances or reasoning behind your account of the situation, nor, quite honestly, do they care.  While you may be seeking empathy or righteous indignation, you’ve simply chosen the wrong audience for the exchange.

Many businesses make the same mistake when it comes to communicating an important message or development.  The audience puzzle is a three-dimensional one, and it’s much harder than it may seem to differentiate and navigate amongst different groups with a uniform message.  Some examples:

• employees can be both customers and shareholders or neither, so be cautious around how you discuss items like budget cuts that may benefit the stock price for one audience and streamline customer service for another audience.  Union audiences add a whole new dimension.  Rule of thumb: “whatever is widely internal is widely external”.
• some media representatives are customers too, which means that prices increase notifications and product recalls that go to customers have the potential to go to much wider audiences sooner than you might have imagined.
• sometimes your competitors are also your customers and vice versa.  Think about competitive intelligence, and just know that you’re always being watched.  Sometimes paranoia is a healthy thing.
• and, (heavy sigh) some people don’t even know who you are or what you offer.  If you want to grow your customer base, you’re going to have to continually introduce yourself to new audiences (the trick is not alienating existing audiences while you do this).

Before we get bogged down in logic puzzle semantics, the point I’m trying to make is that audiences are not all the same, and the subtle yet distinct differences between them are critical to not only notice but also respect if you want to connect with each successfully.  Reaching the “right audience” is one of three critical elements in a very straightforward communications formula that also adds “right message” and “right vehicle” to get an expanding sum that is greater than each of the parts.

Given the multi-layer differences between them, many companies develop complex databases to track and segment their audiences to help ensure that each group’s distinct relationship with the company is managed as such.  All audiences, however, share a common relationship element or “exchange”, as they are groups who you want something from (a purchase order, media attention, a meeting arranged, attendance at a special event. . .whatever) or who want something from you (information, new product announcements, retail selections, an invitation to that special event, financial data, etc.).  As with any business deal, the key is to affect the most advantageous exchange possible – the tremendously over-used “win-win” scenario – though to do that, you have to recognize which audiences you’re dealing with, you have to know who they are and what they want. 

If you have to start from scratch every time, you’re making far more work for yourself than you need to.  Can you imagine having to introduce yourself, time after time, to the entire group at every family gathering?  At some point in time, hopefully earlier rather than later, they should know who you are and you can build from that to interact at a less introductory level.  Companies who know and keep up with their audiences in a customized way are like Cousin Shirley, who knows when you graduate, generally what’s happening in your life and, from a distance, supports you and keeps up with your main events.  Then there are those like Uncle Arnott, who can’t be bothered to remember your name, where you live or which side of the family you come from – sending the not-so-subtle message that he doesn’t care about you, who you are or what you do at all.

Which one would you be more willing to spend time (and money) with?  “Shirley” you know by now.

LaRae Marsik is the co-founder and CEO of October Strategies, Inc., an award-winning strategic communications and promotional marketing company based in Denver, CO.