Make communication as easy as ABC

Comedian Bob Monkhouse advised that brilliant presenters should remember ABC and XYZ

1. Always
2. Be
3. Confident

And

1. Xamine
2. Your
3. Zipper!

Good advice.

Using initial letters can make things easy to remember

For example, one way to remember the best structure for a communication is to use a different ABC

1. Attract – ensure your first impression attracts/engages them.  Start with something they’ll find interesting
2. Bare minimum – keep your content as short as possible
3. Call to action – end by asking them to do something

And we can also use initial letters to make the Call to action even clearer – remember the two Ds

1. DO – ask them to DO something
2. Diary – schedule these actions in their diary/calendar. This helps ensure it happens on time

A good technique, yes?

Two important notes though

1. Use it sparingly. If you give people 293 sets of memorable initials… that’s just confusing and irritating
2. Short lists only. For example, I once saw a strategy summarised into ten points, whose initials spelled RESPECTFUL.  Yes, it’s clever (I bet it took them ages to create). And everyone could remember the word “RESPECTFUL”.  But nobody could remember what any of the letters stood for!

Here’s how to do it

1. What are your key points? Identify the very few, very important points that you want people to remember
2. Initials – highlight their initial letters. Are they memorable? If not…
3. Need to edit? For example, my ABC above could have been ESA – Engage, Short, Action. But ESA isn’t memorable. But choosing different words gave me ABC – and that’s much better

I can’t think how to make these three steps memorable for you. Can you?

Action Point

Next time you want someone to remember a few, important points – consider using this technique to help you WIN.