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Above is a graphic that illustrates TWO THINGS I often have a hard time explaining in communications strategy: how something can go “viral” without money or power, and the ratio of effort to audience.
There is nothing I hate more than working with someone to create something powerful that goes nowhere because of factors outside of our control.
An example:
Let’s say you’re working with someone who loves to write, working to “shift the narrative” on their issue or campaign. You and that person might decide on the “medium” of an opinion piece for your narrative shift goal: you want to include their expert policy knowledge AND stories from their lives that take a lot of emotional labor to share. That means the two of you are probably going to spend hours brainstorming, outlining, writing, editing, editing each other’s edits, and finally, getting the piece out into the world.
Who is actually going to see this?
And this last step, which seems like it could be the final and easiest step, is where many groups run into problems. Sometimes people will pitch their op ed to a specific group or newsdesk without a personal contact, where it might sit, unread, for the rest of eternity. Sometimes their op ed might get…
