Communicating Impact
Communicate Clearly, Innovate Freely
In the noisy and bustling marketplace of social impact, any organization that aspires to be successful must not only be good at achieving impact but at creatively communicating that impact. What’s more, to snag (and keep) attention from the valueholders that give practical support to innovation–you’ll need to be good at finding and expressing the kind of impact that often goes unnoticed or unreported. These types of impacts, like trust, power and social capital, and systems change, which are often the most important things to measure, are also among the most difficult and elusive things to measure. However, they provide some of the best fodder for impact storytelling that stirs people and captures their imagination. This is why creative researchers like us start high up in the impact-storytelling value-chain by using novel combinations of art, science and tech to both capture impacts and express them.
“When you as a child learned to speak,
It’s not that you didn’t know words—
It’s that from the centuries, you knew so many,
And it’s hard to choose the words that will be your own.”
—Albert Riós, A House Called Tomorrow
How Can We Help?
Reimagining Your Theory of Change (or Action)
As renditions of possible future states, theories of change (ToCs) (also referred to as theories of action in some contexts) should stoke the imagination; all too often they exist as a maze of rectangles and arrows that do anything but inspire. There is a better way; we often incorporate metaphors and other storytelling elements into Theories of Change as this provides a relatable and memorable concept that inspires and intrigues. Whether your team needs to build a theory of change from scratch, or to visualize, rethink, or revamp a current ToC, we can help. Our combination of monitoring, evaluation and learning expertise, combined with our skills in data art and storytelling, will help you transform your ToC into a powerful metaphor or visual narrative. See an example of our own metaphor-based ToC below!
Weaving Data into Visual Stories
Through stunning visual tableaus or landscapes, we tell a visual story within which more standard elements of data visualization, e.g. graphs, quotes and word clouds, can be embedded. We regularly incorporate interactivity and movement into our illustrations. While data is often combined with storytelling for greater resonance, we build on this by also combining data with art, through the aforementioned tableaus. Whether it's for reports, presentations, or fundraising materials, let us help you communicate your work in fresh and captivating ways. Contact us for an example at info@ignitedword.com.
Social Assets and Impact Reports
Stop counting outputs alone (e.g. number of workshops held, quantity of supplies delivered) and let us help you find ways to gauge where change is happening, including through measuring the social assets like trust, local knowledge, and creative assets that often go unmeasured. Then let us find you a format–whether video, data-art, or web–that beautifully conveys your impact story. See examples of impact stories here.
Evocative, Jargon-Free Writing
Ignited Word was founded out of a desire to uplift the struggles and triumphs of the human condition through accessible, beautiful language. While we are social scientists ourselves, we noticed that the dry technical and jargon-heavy language routinely used to describe the work of social impact workers and activists doesn’t do justice to the vibrancy of the work. So, we leaned into our literary foundations (there are lots of English and/or Communications majors on the team) and set out to change that through writing that is both clear and compelling.
Fiction and Creative Non-Fiction
What if your team or organization’s impact work was as captivating a read as your favorite engrossing novel? Our fictional short stories, inspired by real-life vision statements, strategies and similar documents, can invite you audience to imagine with you like never before. See Our Dreams of Trees Spread Like Branches as an example.
We can also help make your stories of impact leap off the page and capture the attention of larger audiences through our creative non-fiction storytelling techniques. See our origin story, The Foxes and the Frozen Red Lake as an example.
Video Production
Here’s a statistic that should take root in our brains: “Up to 56% of nonprofit followers take action, such as donating or volunteering, after seeing a compelling story from a nonprofit they follow on social media.” This is a fruit-bearing idea if we grasp it. So we should tell stories. Stories about our vision, about how we have brought about change, stories that spark people to action. The best, most pithy way to get your stories in front of the people who need to see those stories (donors, volunteers, etc.) is through video. Our videos use a combination of data visualizations, storytelling, interviews, and metaphor. We can help you create change through impact videos, promo videos, and pitch videos! See an example of one of our videos.
Our Metaphor-Based Theory of Change
