There’s a version of this problem that shows up in almost every strategic communications engagement we take on. An organization has good work, credible research, and a compelling case. Their communications are solid — clean, well-designed, on message. And their message is landing beautifully with exactly the people who already agreed with them before they started.
Getting beyond that group — into the persuadable middle, or toward audiences that hold genuinely different values and worldviews — is a different challenge. Not harder in the sense of requiring more polish or a bigger budget. Harder in the sense of requiring a fundamentally different approach.
Most communications strategies aren’t built for it. Here’s what needs to change when yours is.
The first problem: you don’t actually know who you’re trying to reach
When organizations talk about reaching new audiences, they usually mean reaching more people. What they often haven’t done is the prior work of identifying which specific people, whose choices and behaviors can actually move the needle on the issue they care about.
We call these people actors rather than audiences — because the distinction matters. An audience receives your message. An actor takes a specific action that changes something in the world. The question isn’t “who might find this interesting?” It’s “whose choices, if different, would produce the outcome we want?” Those are not always the same people, and the communications approach for each is different.
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This diagnostic step — identifying the actors, understanding what they already believe, and mapping what it would take to move them — is what most organizations skip. They go straight to message development without doing the prior research that would tell them whether the message is aimed at the right people.
The second problem: you’re using the wrong messengers
Source credibility shapes how people receive a message — and the messenger who works inside your network is often exactly wrong for people outside it. This is one of the most consistent findings in persuasion research, and one of the most consistently ignored in practice.
We saw this clearly in our work with the UF Center for Coastal Solutions on a water quality initiative in Florida’s Peace River Basin and Charlotte Harbor. The project required reaching seven distinct actor groups — from state legislators and regulators to ranchers, tourism directors, boaters, and local homeowners — whose choices about land use, fertilizer, and septic systems collectively affect the health of the water system.
What the research showed: trusted messengers varied sharply across groups and across specific solutions. For wetland construction and conservation on agricultural land, farmers were essential voices. Scientists were trusted broadly, but government messengers — including elected officials — were not. Activists carried credibility only when their messages included data. And the same person who was persuasive on one solution was actively counterproductive on another.
The implication is uncomfortable for organizations that have a stable of spokespeople and a single communications infrastructure. Reaching different actors often means deploying different voices — not your most prominent ones, but the ones with proximity to the specific problem and solution you’re advocating for.
The third problem: there’s no single channel that reaches everyone
Another finding from the Peace River Basin project: there was no single outlet or information source that cut across all seven actor groups. None. State legislators, ranchers, boaters, and homeowners were all reachable — but through entirely different channels, different trusted publications, different social platforms, different professional networks.
This is more common than organizations want to admit. The newsletter you’ve built, the social platforms you maintain, the conferences where you present — these reach people already oriented toward your work. Reaching actors outside that orbit requires going to the platforms where their conversations are already happening, not expecting them to come to yours.
People use different information sources depending on their role, their level of involvement with an issue, and how much uncertainty they feel. A rancher making decisions about wetland construction on his property isn’t using the same information ecosystem as an environmental journalist or a state legislative staffer. Treating them as if they’re in the same audience — reachable through the same channels with the same message — is why so many campaigns plateau at the edge of the converted.
The fourth problem: your message is built for people who already care
This is the most common failure mode and the hardest to see from the inside. Messages that work for your base — that resonate with your newsletter subscribers, your donors, your existing coalition — are usually optimized for people who share your values and your framing of the issue. They assume a level of prior concern that most persuadable audiences don’t have.
Reaching people outside that circle requires starting where they are, not where you are. Research on moral reframing shows consistently that messages are more persuasive when they connect to the existing values of the audience rather than asking people to adopt the communicator’s values first.
In the Peace River Basin work, this meant connecting water quality to Florida identity — to pride in the state, to the economic interests of the tourism and boating industries, to the agricultural heritage of ranching communities. Not because those frames were more accurate than environmental ones, but because they were the frames that gave actors outside the environmental community a reason to see this as their problem too.
The practical implication: message development for a new audience has to start with research on that audience’s existing beliefs, values, and concerns — not with adapting your existing message to fit a new container.
What a different approach looks like
Getting beyond your base isn’t a communications problem that better copy or a new visual identity will fix. It’s a research and strategy problem. Here’s what it requires in practice.
Know your actors before you build your strategy. Who specifically needs to act, and what actions would they need to take? What do they already believe about the issue? What are their existing interests, and how does your issue connect with them? Where do they get information, and who do they trust? This research doesn’t have to be expensive, but it can’t be skipped.
Match your messengers to your actors. The spokesperson who moves your base may actively alienate the audiences you most need to reach. Identify trusted voices within each actor group — people with proximity to the problem and the solution — and build your communications infrastructure around them, not just around your organization’s leadership.
Go to where the conversation is. Social listening — tracking where conversations about your issue are already happening, and in what language — tells you which platforms, publications, and communities to prioritize. It also tells you which frames are already in circulation, which is essential for knowing where you can build on existing understanding and where you’re working against it.
Connect your ask to their values. For each actor group, identify the existing value or interest that makes your issue relevant to them — without asking them to adopt your framing first. The ask should feel like a natural extension of who they already are.
Design specific calls to action for each group. A rancher, a city commissioner, and a state legislative staffer can all take actions that affect water quality — but those actions are completely different, and so is the information they need to take them. Generic calls to action don’t move people. Specific ones do.
How we can help
This is diagnostic and strategic work before it’s communications work. At the Center for Public Interest Communications, we help organizations figure out who their actual actors are, what research is needed to reach them, and how to build a communications strategy that’s honest about the difference between preaching to the choir and genuinely moving new audiences.
That work draws on the behavioral, cognitive, and social science of how people make decisions — and on the practical experience of doing this research across issues ranging from water quality to immigration to public health.
Talk to us about your strategy. Or if you want to start building this foundation yourself, our self-paced training is a good place to begin.
FAQ
Why isn’t my advocacy messaging reaching beyond our existing supporters? Most advocacy messaging is optimized for people who already share your values and framing. Reaching persuadable audiences requires different messengers, different channels, and messages grounded in the values of the people you’re trying to reach — not your own.
How do I know which messengers to use for different audiences? Messenger credibility varies by audience and by specific issue. Research — including interviews and social listening — is the only reliable way to identify who each actor group actually trusts. The answer is often counterintuitive: the most prominent voice in your network is frequently the wrong choice for audiences outside it.
What does “knowing your actors” mean in practice? It means identifying the specific people whose choices and behaviors can produce the outcome you want — and doing research on their existing beliefs, information sources, and values before you build your message. An actor isn’t just anyone who might care about your issue. It’s the person who can actually do something about it.