Want better comms ROI? Get on the same page.

Somewhere in your company right now, three different comms pros are writing three different versions of the same story.

• They might not even know about the duplicative work.

• They might not even know about the duplicative work.

👀 You're reviewing next week’s comms calendar when you spot it: your VP of Engineering is speaking at an industry conference about your company’s innovative approach to sustainable manufacturing.

• The PR team has their press release ready.

• Marketing has their social media plan set.

• And you're supposed to write an intranet article about it.

Three teams, three different messages, three separate workflows—all about the exact same story.

Sound familiar?

The artificial divide between these functions is problematic:

• it’s inefficient, therefore

• it’s costing your company money, and

• it’s diluting your impact.

Every piece of content you create should serve multiple audiences and channels.

• The press release should rhyme with the Instagram story should rhyme with the intranet article should rhyme with the town hall prezo should rhyme with…

Maintaining artificial barriers between internal and external comms wastes resources, dilutes messaging, and misses opportunities.

It’s also embarrassing and annoying. Three or four members of the comms department pick off our unsuspecting stakeholders, demanding they answer questionnaires, fill out templates, and agree to a 45-minute meeting where they talk about the same things they told your teammate last week. 

• Stakeholders don’t have time to meet with so many people who are supposedly on the same team.

Back to the engineering conference prezo. With minor adjustments a singular “narrative” (or “messaging doc” or “storyline” or “single source of truth” or whatever you call it) becomes compelling content for:

• your intranet

• social channels

• media advisories

• department town hall

• engineering newsletter

• etc., etc., etc.

In just minutes your communication ROI has quintupled without quintupling the work.

Let’s return to our engineering conference example.

Instead of creating separate content streams, approach this as one cohesive story that adapts to each audience’s needs. The core message remains consistent—your company’s innovative approach to sustainable manufacturing—while the depth, technical detail, and call-to-action shift based on the audience.

What does this look like in practice?