Funmi Ogundare
As social media, employee commentary and instant public reactions increasingly shape corporate narratives, Director, Business Transformation and Strategy, SKOT Communications, Edafe Onoriode, has called on organisations to develop coherent messaging frameworks to protect their reputation and maintain stakeholder trust.
He said the speed at which corporate decisions can trigger public reactions, particularly in Nigeria, has made it increasingly difficult for organisations to rely on traditional communication channels such as press releases, scripted interviews and annual reports.
Onoriode made this known in a statement titled, ‘The Architecture of Messaging: Designing Narratives That Speak to Your Market’, which examined how organisations can create communications that remain consistent across audiences and platforms.
According to him, an organisation’s identity is no longer shaped solely by its official statements but by a combination of executive pronouncements, customer experiences, employee feedback, investor briefings, regulatory comments and public perceptions.
He noted that an aggrieved customer could use a smartphone to influence a brand’s image overnight, while an employee’s account of workplace experiences could reach thousands of people.
“An employee can share an unfiltered view of workplace culture with thousands of strangers. A regulator can spark a national conversation with a single brief statement, while a chief executive’s comment can be clipped, shared, and reinterpreted completely out of context,” he stated.
The director argued that the solution was not for organisations to produce more messages but to ensure that their communications were connected by a clear strategic framework.
He described messaging architecture as a framework that gives an organisation’s communications coherence, direction and meaning across different audiences, functions and communication channels.
“Effective communication should begin with an understanding of the audience rather than simply what an organisation wants to say,” he stated, while identifying customers, employees, investors, regulators and the wider public as stakeholders with different concerns and expectations.
He noted that while customers may prioritise value and service, investors may be more concerned about growth and resilience.
Employees, he added, may focus on organisational culture and leadership, while regulators are likely to be more concerned about compliance and accountability.
The director therefore advised organisations to establish a central narrative that can be adapted to different audiences without losing their core identity.
He also identified brand purpose and positioning as essential foundations for effective messaging, explaining that purpose establishes why an organisation exists beyond its products or services, while positioning determines how it wants to be understood in relation to competitors and the wider market.
Onoriode said effective messaging should be built around clarity, consistency, credibility, relevance and emotional resonance.
He further emphasised the role of storytelling in making corporate communication more meaningful, arguing that facts could inform audiences while stories could help them understand why those facts matter.
“Storytelling therefore should not be confused with embellishment,” he said, adding that it could provide structure and human meaning to an organisation’s purpose, actions and ambitions.
The director however, cautioned organisations against overloading their communications with corporate jargon, broad claims and competing priorities, noting that polished language could still result in communication that says little.
“Organisations should instead identify what they want stakeholders to remember, believe and ultimately do,” he stated, adding that a clearly defined messaging architecture could help organisations respond more consistently to emerging issues and crises.