Show me someone who knows it all – and I’ll get them to run for god.

Luckily (or unluckily, depending on your point of view) no one knows everything.

No writer, no matter how intelligent, can know the ins and outs of a particular industry or sector.

No business person, in spite of a depth of knowledge about their sector, can also be superb with words.

That is why, most especially when it comes to uncovering and refining a message’s one central truth the only way it can be done is TOGETHER.

The notion that a writer can (or should) go away to a darkened room and come up with the essence of company’s story, on their own, is folly.

Such a distillation of message can only be done by at least two people – one of them a writer, a wordsmith, one or more of them with deep understanding of the business.

This is because shooting for simple takes a willingness to punch ideas around, propose and discard notions, look at key descriptive words from alternative angles, be willing to start at square one, again. And perhaps again.

Just as new business, product and social enterprise ideas are created in the space between people (ideas have sex and create a new idea!), so does the creation of the first few words of a company’s story which must ring true.

This is why Secret SAUCE’s (currently available for free download) recipe for crafting persuasive messages starts with SIMPLE – and the essence of simple is defining the soul of a message as one central truth.

But a writer alone cannot do this. Neither can a business person alone.

Together they can.

Together there is a synergy that allows 1 + 1 to equal 3.