3 ways to bring your purpose into your messaging
Your purpose is one of the most valuable assets your brand possesses. It fulfills what both your employees and your customers desire from your organization. In doing so, it creates fertile ground for you to engage with them and all those you hope to serve.
Once clarified, organizations will look to their purpose to influence the strategy and tone of their messaging. But I have found that most organizations want more than that. They want their purpose to have a more overt presence. But they struggle with how to do it in an effective and elegant way.
3 ways to communicate your purpose
Here are three techniques I have used throughout the years to represent an organization's purpose in the messaging.
Rallying Cry
This is perhaps the most powerful way to associate your purpose with your brand. The Rallying Cry is the outward-facing, encapsulating statement of your purpose. Some have called it the tagline (which sends me into fits). A tagline sounds like an afterthought. Something tagged onto your logo. On the other hand, a Rallying Cry is bold, energizing, and aspirational. In 5 - 7 powerful words, it expresses your brand purpose. Since it is teamed with your logo, it naturally appears in all your messaging, ensuring your purpose is always present.
Sign off
For varying reasons, I've had some organizations prefer not to use a Rallying Cry tied to the logo. In these instances, you can still bring the purpose into the messaging by creating a Sign Off. A Sign Off is the last line of text you deliver in a message.
In my work for First Federal Bank, I used the line "Welcome to Wellbeingville" (a representation of the organization's purpose) as a Sign Off. No matter if we were talking about checking accounts or loans, the last three words in the message was "Welcome to Wellbeingville".
Like a thoughtful Rallying Cry, so much can be read into a well-crafted Sign Off. It can ensure your purpose has a presence in your messaging while communicating on multiple levels.
Purpose Badge
A purpose badge is a visual approach to representing your purpose in your messaging. It can include a mark or icon that stands on its own. Or it can combine a mark and type to create the badge. This visual approach has advantages since we process visuals much more quickly than we do words. Just be careful that you're not creating a second logo or building something that competes with or detracts from your logo.
Your purpose is invaluable. To you and to those you hope to serve. Bringing it consistently into your messaging can help further your pursuit of that purpose. It deserves its place there.