A quick recap so far: The purpose of your Actionable Messaging Playbook™ is multifaceted. It ensures a unified message that resonates across different mediums and audiences, both internal and external.

The messaging playbook should be a mirror reflecting your company's vision and goals to get there. This alignment is crucial for crafting messages that not only engage but also drive your audience to action aligned with your long-term business objectives. Bottom line, your messaging playbook is a business tool.

Your messaging should be a stepping stone towards your long-term objectives. Whether it's market expansion, brand recognition, or customer loyalty, every massage should inch you closer to these goals.

Integrating Vision, Mission and Values into Messaging

As I said before, the messaging playbook activates your vision, mission and values. Therefore, you’ll start the process of building your playbook by revisiting these foundational elements of your company.

First, let’s get really clear on how your company vision and mission are different so we can use them as key inputs to the messaging playbook.

A lot of folks confuse vision and mission, but they aren’t the same. I heard someone give a great explanation once using World War II as an example (I only wish I could remember who said it). It went something like this:

Vision: The vision was to win WWII and establish a world order based on democratic principles, freedom, and international cooperation, ensuring lasting peace and security.

Mission: The mission was to defeat Hitler in Europe by 1945.

Values: The values included a commitment to democracy, human rights, and the rule of law.

You can see how the Vision and the Values are somewhat fixed, and how the Mission is the means of accomplishing the Vision. The Mission however is more specific, similar to a SMART goal in business.

Now let’s take a business example.

I remember when I walked into IKEA for the first time. I was in college. It was probably around 1988 or so, in the Washington DC area, and my mind was blown. The size. The inventory. You could get everything from a bedroom set to a new set of forks. The designs were modern . . . but affordable. I was broke, but I could afford forks! And I relished the IKEA catalog, so full of possibilities.

IKEA, lucky for me and you, also publishes their mission, vision and values.

Here’s what they say:

The IKEA Vision: “To create a better everyday life for the many people.”

The IKEA Mission (They call it the “business idea”): “To offer a wide range of well-designed, functional home furnishing products at prices so low that as many people as possible will be able to afford them.”

The IKEA Values (I love that they call these their “forever parts”):

• Togetherness
• Caring for people and planet
• Cost-consciousness
• Simplicity
• Renew and improve
• Different with a meaning
• Give and take responsibility
• Lead by example

So let’s just see how these fit together.

Their vision of the future is [to create a better everyday life for the many people] by [offering a wide range of well-designed, functional home furnishing products at prices so low that as many people as possible will be able to afford them]. And they will do it while embracing the behaviors that express [togetherness, caring for people and planet, cost-consciousness, . . . and so on].

So far, we have a sense of their personality and their point of view (a bit). But, we don’t really know how they will apply these ideas on a day to day basis in their messaging, do we?

They haven’t said anything about how to talk about the style of their products besides them being well-designed and functional. They haven’t said anything about their product quality. There’s nothing about how to write an ad, or build an instagram story, or why to build a Home Report each year, or the reason to have Annie Lebovitz as an artist in residence. Or, how meatballs fit into their product line! (I love those meatballs).

In other words, the Vision, Mission and Values are absolutely the place to start. But without a playbook, the way you express those elements is up for grabs. The messaging playbook picks up where the Vision, Mission and Values leaves off.

So, before you do the work of building your messaging playbook, grab your mission, vision and values. Even if they’re not perfect, they’re a great starting point. You can use the template we used with IKEA as a headstart.

Our vision of the future is to {our vision} by {our mission}. And we'll do it by embracing the behaviors that express {our values}.

And if you don’t have these documented, fear not. The process of building your Messaging Playbook will give you the tools to develop them.

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