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Hey Reader,

Each week in this newsletter I usually answer a question from a reader. Today I’m doing something slightly different to help you tackle a challenge I know a lot of you struggle with. I’m going to expand on something I shared on LinkedIn last week. I can see from the comments that it really struck a chord with many of you so let’s dig into it deeper and I’ll give you more practical tips and advice.

Here’s the topic I posted about: How to decide when content should be posted on 1 channel, on 2 channels or across multiple channels?

This post took off, with 75,000+ views on LinkedIn. Here's the decision tree that sparked all the interest:

In this newsletter, let's dive into how you can create a decision tree like this for your own team. I'll talk you through it step-by-step so you can take this tool and use it yourself. And guess what, creating this tool is my favourite price: free! You don't need any special tech or software to do this.

Ready?

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Figuring out content duplication

Let me start by telling you about a client I worked with earlier this year who were struggling with content, messages, channels and stakeholder demands. One challenge they kept coming back to was around when they should (or should not) duplicate content across multiple channels.

Up until this point, they simply made decisions based on what stakeholders asked for. If a stakeholder said "I want you to post this on the newsletter, intranet and digital screens for me" then they would go ahead and post it on the newsletter, intranet and digital screens. They didn't really have any strategic approach to screening content and giving it more or less exposure based on the level of importance of the topic.

And they really had no clear criteria for what content should get blasted across multiple channels or what content should be given a more minimal approach and put on one channel only. This meant that critical messages were competing with basic FYI updates and important information was getting lost in the noise.

The team contacted me because they knew it was time to take the reins and make a change. They felt like a service provider rather than a strategic function, and they were right, that’s exactly what was happening.

We worked together to build a system that would help them be more strategic in their approach, a system that would better serve their audiences and the business too. And one of the things we did as part of that system building was to create a decision tree for content duplication.

We wanted to create a very simple way that the team could make quick, consistent decisions about how to treat content across their channels. And a core idea in building this was that a stakeholder would get pretty much the same answer from the team no matter who they talked to - because this decision tree helped to make the answer easy to arrive at and pretty consistent from person to person.

Building the decision tree: The process

This is the decision tree we created together and I'll talk you through how we came up with up it so you can build your own.

The most important thing about building a system like this is that you don't start with a final graphic on Canva and try to fill it in. You start with sketching out tons of ideas on papers/ flipchart/ whiteboard/ miro board and figuring out what kind of questions you need to ask to arrive at solid decisions.

Here's how I discussed this with my client (this was all done virtually btw, so you don't need to be physically together in the same location to do this) so you can get a step-by-step walkthrough.

The first thing we agreed quite quickly is that the content going across multiple channels should be high priority or critical information only. Which leads us to step one:

Step 1: Define what “high priority” actually means

Before we could create any decision points, we had to get super clear on what counts as high priority or critical information in their organisation. This is where many teams can get stuck because they find it hard to agree on what counts as high priority and don't know how to convince stakeholders that their vanity project ISN'T high priority (but of course it is the most important thing in the world to the stakeholder.)

If you don't get clear on this bit from the outset then you are going to be in trouble, so slow down here and talk about what this means for you.

In my client workshop, we started with their organisation’s strategic priorities. What were the top 3-5 business goals for the year? What was top of mind for leaders? What information did employees need to help deliver on these priorities? What changes or actions were critical for business success?

We talked about things like:

• Information that requires employee compliance (e.g., new safety protocols, regulatory changes, adherence to laws)
• Updates directly tied to strategic business goals (e.g. major organisational changes, employee actions required to make progress against business priorities)
• Crisis or urgent business communications

All of these things will be different across different organisations and different industries. The key bit for you is to get out of the comms bubble and think about the bigger picture of the business. What would your leaders say is high priority? What matters most in your context?

If you have a long-term comms strategy aligned to business goals, then also refer to this and see what your overall goal is and what your objectives are. This will help you get clear as a team on what counts as high priority.

Step 2: Determine the key decision points

Once we had clarity on what 'high priority' meant for this organisation, we identified the two most important questions that would drive channel decisions:

1. Is this high priority or critical information? (Based on our agreed criteria above)
2. Does it require action from employees, or is wide awareness still important?

These weren’t random questions. They emerged from analysing the type of communications they were currently disseminating, splitting them into categories, seeing what themes emerged and identifying the patterns that separated high priority messages from low-messages.

You may choose to include different questions in your decision tree, depending on your context and situation. The beauty of a simple tool like this is that you can easily customise it to your own situation.

Step 3: Map the outcomes of each tree branch

For each branch of the decision tree, we defined specific outcomes for each decision:

• Multi-channel push (3+ channels with reminders as needed): For critical, action-required information
• Strategic placement (Primary channel + 1 reinforcing channel): For high priority information that needs awareness but not necessarily action, or lower priority items that still require action
• Single channel (Best-fit channel for key audience): For information that doesn't require action and not everyone needs to know about it

The key was keeping it simple. We could have created a complex tree with 10 different outcomes, but that would have made it harder to use consistently. Again, you can develop any tree you like but I urge you to keep it as simple as possible so that you can use it quickly and easily over and over again.

Using this as a decision-making tool

This client now uses their decision tree in their weekly content meetings to make quick, easy decisions about whether a piece of content should be duplicated across multiple channels or not. This has saved them tons of time and effort - they used to debate content decisions like this for ages, but now it's simply following a branch of the tree to land on a decision.

They also use their decision tree in conversations with stakeholders, which has been wildly successful. Before they had this decision-making tool they struggled to push back on stakeholders who wanted their piece of content blasted on every channel in the company. The team felt they had no evidence-based way to say "no, it doesn't need to go everywhere" and found it very hard to say no to stakeholders, especially senior stakeholders.

But now they can easily use this decision tree in meetings and conversations and simply show the stakeholder why a content decision has been made and what the decision is about channel placement. They can say things like "You can see here that because this content isn't linked specifically to a top business priority and it doesn't require any action from employees, it falls into the single-channel category". It's much easier to push back and say no armed with a tool like this because stakeholders find it much harder to argue with a systematic approach than with what felt like arbitrary decisions.

For pushback and negotiation:

And when my client is faced with stakeholders who continue to insist that their content was “high priority,” the team can simply refer to the specific criteria they used at the start of the decision tree and ask questions like: “Help me understand how this connects to our strategic goals of X, Y or Z?” or "Can you unpack why this information is critical to business success?"

This approach either helped stakeholders realise their content wasn’t as critical as they thought or it helped the team understand context they’d been missing.

What I love about this approach is how it completely shifts the dynamic. Instead of being reactive service-providers who feel guilty about saying no, you can become strategic decision-makers with clear criteria. You're no longer at the mercy of whoever shouts loudest or has the most senior title.

This simple tool transforms how you work, both as a team and with stakeholders. Critical messages get the attention they deserve, routine updates don't compete for precious real estate and you can confidently defend your editorial choices.

Most importantly, you're serving your audience better. Employees aren't overwhelmed with noise and when something truly important comes through multiple channels, they know to pay attention.

Is this something you would try out for your team? If you build your own decision tree, hit reply and let me know. Share it with me, I'd love to see it!

Thanks for reading and stay curious,

Joanna

Find me on YouTube, LinkedIn and check out my book​

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