Reputation management - 3 tips to better presentations, speeches and dialogues

Reputation Management: 3 Tips to better Presentations, Speeches and Dialogues

If it is ever upon your desk to inspire, motivate, or guide either your colleagues or a certain target group, then read on. 

Working with communication should always include working with reputation whether it’s for you as a person, your brand, or your company. That’s what reputation management is about. Strategic communication is supposed to build a reputation. An Image. A Character. Strategic communication is neither about shouting out loud nor is it about paying the most to be able to communicate.

When we in Essencius work with leaders or brands it is often our job to help them become more reliable, more compelling, and more enthralling. Whether the job is to communicate with employees, key target groups, or stakeholders we use well-established tools and methods to guide our work and counselling. We hope that the below mentioned three methods can help you work with communication in a way that inevitably will affect your reputation.

1: Convince and Convert using ‘Rule of Three’

When reading the above you might have noticed that triad, or examples of three, is used several times. It is not accidental.

Triads suggest wholeness, balance and completion. Triads structure much of our culture, from the three branches of government (executive, legislative, and judicial) to fairytales like Three Little Pigs or nerdier, in Aristoteles ‘Logos, Ethos and Pathos’ not to mention in films such as ‘The Good, the Bad and the Ugly’. Triads are easy to remember. To cut to the chase we recommend that you build your communication the following way:

  • Use one element to state a fact or a result. Use two elements to describe conflicts or contradictions, and use four or more to list something.
  • Use two elements to describe conflicts or contradictions, and use four or more to list something.
  • You should always use three in order to make a point, to emphasize the most important, and to make something stick.

A very good and recent example on a triad is WHO’s mantra during the pandemic ‘Test, test, test’. This leads on to our second tip.

2: Use Repetitions to Enhance the Emotional Effect

Brands and leaders often need to make a point stick with an audience. Quickly.

Often there is a need to give the audience time to relate to the points. However, time is a limited resource and the number of times you will be able to reach your audience are limited as well. This makes it crucial that your points are memorable, convincing, and appeal to emotions (yes – the rule of three again).

An efficient way to emphasize a memorable, convincing and emotional point is to repeat, repeat and repeat. You can either repeat words, sentences, or the way you phrase your sentences. A well-known example is Martin Luther King who emphasized his points in his ‘I have a dream‘-speech through repetition. At Essencius we could effectively stress our strengths with repetition such as ‘We love PR, we love reputation management, we love brand building’.

3: Give your Public Relations audience a 'KISS'

In communications the golden rule of ‘Keep It Short and Simple’ – KISS – really does apply. Remember to keep your sentences short and simple no matter whether you’re about to make a speech or hand in a text. It is more powerful, and you are more likely to get the attention of your audience – and they will more likely be able to remember what you’re communicating!

If you would like to have a talk more about Reputation Management and PR, call Christina at +45 4055 5306 or write to csl@essencius.dk