The process behind joint messaging

Remember that Schitt’s Creek scene where David and Moira are making enchiladas and get to that one part: “fold in the cheese”? David asks what that means. Moira tells him to just fold it in. Yes, but how, he asks, how? And with even more conviction, she says, you just fold it in. David loses it.

If you’re new to JMPFs, the process can feel a little like that.

What’s your better-together story?
Well, we’re better together.
But I mean, how are you better together?
By being… together?

And now we’re folding in the cheese.

A JMPF is the shared messaging and positioning framework two tech partners use to tell that better-together story. Our primer gets into the framework itself. The process is how that story gets made.

When we start cooking up better-together messaging, we know what we want to serve: a cohesive, tested story, built collaboratively, that makes clear what each company brings, where those capabilities connect, and what customers can do as a result.

What takes some technique is getting everyone there.

If you’ve been tasked with building joint messaging with another tech company, you’re probably working with people who know the partnership from different angles. One may know the technology inside out. Another knows why the companies chose to partner. Someone closer to customers knows the language that lands in the field, while someone else brings the proof.

They may all work on the same partnership without many chances to compare those perspectives in one conversation. Bringing them together gives the group a chance to test those perspectives against each other and start working toward a shared story.

Without a process for doing that, though, it is easy for everyone to leave with the same angle they brought in.

The last thing you want is to bring everyone together only to ask them to “fold it in” five different ways. At 2A, we get ahead of that frustration by paying attention to a few things:

• Do the prep before everyone gets to the kitchen. Read what exists, identify what still needs expert judgment, and come in ready to ask better questions.
• Bring together the perspectives that need each other. Not every SME needs every meeting. Thoughtful scheduling gives the right people time to compare notes without filling everyone’s calendar.
• Use the room for what requires a conversation. Let people react, clarify, question, remember examples, and follow an answer somewhere you could not have planned in advance.
• Keep coming back to the customer. We often ask: What can customers do with both companies that they could not do with either one alone?

By the time drafting starts, the group should have more than two companies’ worth of good input. They’ve had the chance to test ideas, make connections, and build consensus around what they want to say together. 2A helps the group work through those ideas together, then turns the shared thinking into a story both companies can stand behind.

That’s what we mean by folding it in.

Cooking up a better-together story of your own? Bring 2A into the kitchen.