In my years as a science communicator, I’ve heard many scientists express difficulties with science communication. They want anyone and everyone to learn from their science.
At the same time, they don’t know how to get started. The thought of adding a SciComm project to their agenda overwhelms them.
I get it; I’ve been there.
The lack of a clear idea and goal can be frustrating. It may even prevent you from getting started.
But as with all projects in life, it ultimately comes down to establishing an efficient and sustainable strategy. By developing habits and workflows to create engaging SciComm content consistently, you are already one step closer towards achieving your goals.
So, investing effort and energy upfront to establish a SciComm strategy provides you with a protocol for the content creation process. This automates the creation workflow so you can focus on developing engaging and impactful content.
Your motivation drives your SciComm strategy
To create content with impact requires you to remain authentic in your SciComm project. This means your SciComm strategy needs to be tailored to you, your schedule and your passion for science communication.
Hence, you want to develop a SciComm strategy that relies on your habits, fits into your lab days and is driven by your core values and inner drive. This ensures you’ll remain motivated and authentic.
With your inner drive to share your science being fundamental to creating a sustainable SciComm project, it’s good practice to reflect on your own motivation—independent of where you are in your SciComm Journey. While there are countless reasons to engage in science communication, it’s helpful to remind yourself why sharing science is important to you.
Create unique science communication content with consistency
Another key aspect of impactful science communication is consistency. A consistent strategy will not only make the project sustainable for you but also help your audience recognise you, your project and—most importantly—your message.
By maintaining consistency, you’ll build trust with your audience. They’ll begin to trust your content, your science and eventually the stories you tell. Only then will you have a chance of your audience returning, learning from you and potentially changing their behaviour.
Consistency is also the basis for establishing habits around your SciComm project. I suggest you treat this new project as a hobby, meaning making time in your diary to commit to it. Just as you schedule workout sessions or language lessons, ensure to have a fixed time slot to work on your SciComm project.
The 7 pillars of a successful SciComm project
With your inner drive and a certain level of commitment to your SciComm project, you should be able to develop a strategy that works for you. For this, I introduced the following 7 pillars which I deem essential for a successful project:
The topic of your project
The underlying topic of your SciComm project is probably already clear to you. As your research field is inherently important to you, you also understand why everyone else should know about it. You probably already have an idea about what you want your audience to learn.
Your superpower to create content
This pillar is probably also easy and clear to you. Many have a favourite activity—or superpower as I like to call it—which they use for their SciComm project. Whether you prefer writing, talking, creating videos or drawing; go with your gut here and choose what you love doing.
The format of your content
The content format for your SciComm project pretty much depends on the activity you choose to create content. Still, you can and should tweak some aspects around what your content pieces will look like.
The stories you’re telling
The three previous pillars provide a solid foundation for considering the types of stories you want to tell. Think about how much detail each piece of content should provide to your audience—how deep you want to dive into your story and how much you want them to learn.
Your audience
Think about who you want to reach and who should learn from your science. Maybe you picture certain people reading your posts, listening to your podcast episodes or watching your videos. Imagine these people and ask yourself what they need to learn from you to improve their lives.
Logistics for a sustainable project
To make your SciComm adventure easy and sustainable, you want to integrate it into your daily life. By considering your new SciComm project your hobby and establishing habits around it, you will stay motivated as you always have something to look forward to.
Your SciComm Team
As always in life, we know we cannot do it all by ourselves. We need people with complementary communication skills to create truly amazing projects. And the same is true for your SciComm project. Be brave and reach out to someone who could support and improve your SciComm project.
Develop a unique SciComm strategy to reach your goals
These 7 pillars are like the puzzle pieces in your overall SciComm strategy. Each pillar can help you get clarity for your project. As they are also interconnected, working through one pillar might even give you ideas for another one. All together, I hope that reflecting on these pillars gives you a clear vision of the unique angle of your SciComm project.
Some of these pillars may not seem relevant to you now and require more thoughtful planning at a later time. And that is totally fine. As I said, you can set up your SciComm project exactly the way you want.
So, are you ready to get started with your new SciComm project? To get more insights into how to develop your SciComm project, check out our SciComm Strategy Guide. We will explore the pillars in more detail and you’ll gain practical advice on how to make your SciComm project as unique as yourself.
Let’s start sharing your science with the world and making a real impact!
