The greatest revolutions in our history hint one thing in common, and that is consistency of the message. Be it the Renaissance, the French Revolution, the war years, among all these centuries, the most consistent were only able to build a great brand, one that inspired change, one that inspired trust. Irrespective of the context, the magnitude of delivery, or the medium employed, the message sand its delivery stayed consistent with the most trusted brands, most memorable stories. Now why are we talking history here, in the times that is largely driven by technology, innovation, and now a more paradigmatic shift in the focus on the involvement of more reasoning?

Communication at most becomes effective, only when the message is consistent across all touchpoints. Irrespective of the organization we are working for,or the cause we stand for, there is a strong need for a check, if our message is consistent among all the stakeholders, customers, investors, society, employees. Remember a child learns a language, when the messages are consistent and the words are repeated again and again. We somewhere forget to take this principle into communication. If a brand thinks communication is corporate communication team’s responsibility, then we have grossly mistaken, every moment that the brand lives, every stakeholder who is impacted, is into communication.

Not everyone can wear the same shoes on this journey, sizes differ. But everyone needs shoes to journey well, that is we need to remember. Imagine, a brand where every stakeholder converts into a brand ambassador and speak the same message, and the messages are based on their experiences with the brand. Here are some aspects of the brand’s journey that we now need to focus more intensively:

Define Stakeholder journeys: Most brands since their inception, till they journey, just send out messages. Nothing wrong in it. But it is incomplete. Every stakeholder is a different context, the loyalty with the brand differs grossly. It helps immensely to define a logical and more realistic stakeholder journey and ensure there are continuous engagement with each one of them. And engagement should always be meaningful and measurable.

Communicate to your employees what your customers experience:

Honestly, most business strategies preach to be customer-centric, but miss out the reverse messaging. If it’s not a dialogue, it surely is an unknown silo that we create. Ensure at all points, the customer feels heard and is served in the most agile way without any bureaucracy. And ensure too, employees who serve customers directly or indirectly, get to know what all the customer goes through while having business with your brand. Taking it further, the prospective customer, prospective job-seeker and stakeholders alike are heard well. At the end it only serves your brand in becoming a truly listening organization.

Repeat the core message in every interaction: Be it the Annual General Meeting with your investor, be it while answering a customer query or even a performance review of your employee, ensure the core message gets repeated. Leadership rarely know that all stakeholders interact beyond the definition of work and build perception, basis which they decide. This builds phenomenal trust. And trust inspires loyalty for your brand. The truth is we still operate in a very traditional way, having functions and businesses who follow protocols that are hardly collaborative. It is essential now more than before to have enough resources assigned, who ensure consistency and message effectiveness.

Ensure consistency in experience of Technology platforms for all stakeholders: We have apps, algorithms and innovation still continuing. We invest a lot on these too. But is the technology the same for all stakeholders? It may not be. However, it is much needed, stakeholders experience what the soul of our existence, that is the customer goes through. Equally important is how consistent is our leadership standpoint to all of them. We can’t speak different messages to different stakeholders. If at all possible, bring all stakeholders to the same platform. Imagine the media, the investor, the employee and most importantly the customer are all together on your social platform. Bringing them is not tough, engaging them into an ongoing dialogue is an opportunity never explored.

These are the times when we need to be more committed to collaboration, not just platforms, but the people we deal with. Collaboration multiplies the message beyond human calculations. To all those in leadership, communication and those involved with brand, these are most promising times in human history to build in consistency as a key parameter of all that we communicate. Build TRUST!