No. 11: The devil is in the details
With one tiny change, you can become a brilliant communicator
“I can take him in a canoe,” said Robert.
The ‘him’ in question? This guy:
This weekend, I’m traveling to Togo for an epic client storytelling project. Since I’ll be gone for one month, I want to take Gus with me. [For new AK/NF readers, Gus is my beloved 5-kilo Brussels Griffon.]
The original plan was to drive to Lomé. It’s only 320km from Lagos or a 7-hour trip according to Google maps. [With Lagos traffic jams, take that with a grain of salt.]
But it’s still not clear if borders are open. And, it’s not easy to find a reliable driver willing to make the long-distance voyage.
I decided to fly, but I can’t take Gus on a plane.
And then my friend, Jaco, suggested asking his Beninese cook, Robert, to deliver Gus to the Benin-Togo border.
For Robert, borders are porous and include modes of transport (canoes) that aren’t very accessible to me.
Once Gus is Benin-bound, I’m ready to hit the road.
I’m really looking forward to this trip. I’ve only ever transited through Lomé - I’ve never stayed in Togo. I can’t wait to explore another tiny piece of West Africa.
On to the newsletter.
Show me the fish farm
During my VC4A PR workshop, an Egyptian entrepreneur asked an excellent question:
What comms tips can you give to early stage startups that aren’t ready to work with a publicist? Where should they start?
Perhaps my answer surprised her. Because it seems obvious.
There’s one tiny shift you can make in your comms that will unleash a big impact: be specific.
Whatever you’re writing - a pitch to a journalist, a personal essay on your startup journey, or even a tweet - it needs to paint a picture. You want your audience to visualize what you’re talking about.
Readers can’t visualize abstractions. Success, failure, ‘scaling a business’ (insert tech or business jargon here) are like dandelion wisps -- they float away in your reader’s memory.
There’s nothing concrete that they can seize and hold in their memory.
Look at these two snippets from interviews in How We Made It In Africa:
vs
The first answer is meh. It lacks meaty language. There’s no visual examples for the reader. I give it a 4/10.
The second one is much better. It illustrates an abstraction with a mini story that features a concrete case. Unlike a check-in, I can picture a floating restaurant. It’s kind of quirky, too, which makes it memorable. It scores an 8/10.
I want to show how I weave specific and visual examples into my writing in order to bring my client pieces to life.
I’ve been writing a deep dive for a client, a solar energy company. At first glance, their business is not very exciting. They sell hybrid solar power systems to businesses and manage them for their clients.
Like any industry, it’s peppered with technical jargon: kW vs kVA, power uptime, and energy efficiency.
But, Nigeria’s power sector is rich with interesting stories. You just have to dig for them. The din of generators, the plumes of exhaust smoke, oil splattered streets from diesel trucks -- no city’s DNA is more shaped by the power deficit than Lagos.
When I write for a client, I focus on three things:
Zero in on people
Create a sense of place
Raise the stakes
For this piece, I focus on one of their customers: a fish farm.
I want to set the character - Dayo the fish farm owner - within a larger context to create a sense of place.
[It’s important to note that as a foreigner I’m filtering places through my own lived experience. This can go either way, leading to positive and negative outcomes. Think original or banal observations.]
Lastly, I want to raise the stakes. My readers need to know what happens to the fish farm if there’s a prolonged power cut.
Imagining a pool of dead catfish, belly up, shows the disastrous consequences of erratic power. It is much more powerful than “lack of power uptime” which, you guessed it, is too abstract.
In conclusion, startups can connect with mainstream audiences with one tiny, but powerful, change in their comms:
Weave specific and concrete examples into your writing and speech.
Use language that paints a picture for your readers and listeners.
Show them the fish farm.
Leaving you with this collage from Papillon (1973) a Steve McQueen classic that I watched over the weekend. What a gorgeous and uncompromising movie.
Wishing you a lovely holiday season.
Until next time,
Victoria
Victoria Crandall | African Startups | Communications & PR Strategist | Lagos 🇳🇬