This week I was working with some colleagues on messaging for a client to prepare for a series of interviews. This is a client with a compelling story, a contrarian view point and a CEO who is thoughtful, intelligent and easy to like. And these colleagues are brilliant, successful and among my favorite people to work with because they are thoughtful, passionate about their work and continually challenging themselves, and me, to be better.

But that thoughtfulness and excellence somehow became “over-thinking” this week. And our first pass at the messaging was so complex that it became obtuse, practically requiring an interpreter to understand the story.

Your client’s messaging should not be like a treasure hunt – weeding through reams of content for the nuggets of truth, and piecing them together to make a story. Members of the media are dealing with the issues we are all struggling with – doing more with less, fewer people, more work. Newsroom staff has been reduced, often dramatically. We need to make it easy for them to understand the story we want to tell. To adapt an old adage, if we are OVER-explaining, we are losing.

I recently wrote about the Corner Office column in the NYT, and the beautiful simplicity with which iconic leaders reveal their “secrets to success” which really aren’t secrets at all. If it is good enough for the who’s who of Corporate America, it is good enough for me.

Let’s keep it simple.

Carreen Winters can be reached at cwinters@mww.com

cwinters General Corporate Corporate Reputation, messaging, Reputation Management