When you know your organisation inside out, it can be difficult to know what to explain first and how to communicate it. Services, activities, audiences, outcomes and background can all compete for attention. Clear communication starts by identifying the one thing people need to understand, then building the right detail around it.
Clear communication starts with the one thing you want people to understand, then gives them the detail they need.
Charities, CICs and other organisations often have a lot to explain. Different services, programmes, audiences, partnerships and ways of working. When everything is given equal importance, the main message can get lost. People can encounter programme names, processes and internal language before they understand the bigger picture. A better starting point is to ask “What does someone need to understand first?” Once that is clear, the rest of the information becomes much easier to organise.
Start with Problem > Outcome > Service
A useful way to explain your organisation is to answer three questions in this order:
Problem: What needs to change?
Outcome: What difference are you trying to make?
Service: What do you do to help make that difference?
It is natural to start by describing your services, because they are at the centre of your day-to-day work. But someone discovering your organisation for the first time needs the bigger picture. Help them understand the problem you are addressing and the difference you want to make, then explain what you do. ‘Problem > Outcome > Service’ gives people a simple route into your organisation and helps them understand why your work exists.
Keep one core message across different audiences
Your organisation may need to speak to service users, referrers, funders, commissioners, partners, volunteers and supporters. They do not all need the same information. A person looking for support may need to know whether you can help and what to do next, while a funder may want to understand the need, your approach and the evidence behind it. A partner may want to know where collaboration fits. The emphasis may change, but the core meaning should not. A clear central message gives those different communications something to come back to. Without it, the organisation can gradually start sounding different depending on the page, proposal or person explaining it.
Clear language should still say something
Simplifying your message does not mean replacing complex language with vague language. Phrases such as “empowering communities” or “creating positive change” may sound purposeful, but on their own they do not explain who you help, what you do or what changes as a result. Clear communication should make your work easier to visual and grasp. This is also good content-design and accessibility practice. GOV.UK guidance recommends starting with user needs and helping people quickly find what they need to know or do. W3C guidance recommends clear, familiar words and explaining jargon or acronyms when they are needed.
Try the Grinning Graphics Clarity Check
Take the main description of your organisation from your homepage, proposal or presentation. First, answer three questions without using your existing copy:
What problem are we responding to?
What outcome are we trying to create?
What do we actually do to help?
Then compare those answers with your current message. Are the important ideas obvious, or are they buried beneath programme names, jargon or organisational detail? Finally, give the message to someone who does not know your organisation well. Can they explain who you help, what you do and why the work exists? They do not need to repeat your words. They do need to understand the meaning.
Sometimes the wording is not the real problem
If your team cannot agree on who you help, what matters most or what people need to understand, rewriting a few sentences will only take you so far. Sometimes unclear copy points to a deeper issue with messaging, priorities or positioning. Those questions need resolving first. The aim is not simply to make the wording better. It is to make the value of your organisation easier to recognise and understand.
Make your organisation easier to understand
If people struggle to understand what your organisation does, Grinning Graphics can help you identify what they need to understand first and build a clearer message around it.