ICS 2025: Turning brand spokespersons into brand ambassadors

Time of India

27-05-2025

How can
communication
s professionals transform subject matter experts into compelling brand evangelists without sacrificing their authenticity? In a dynamic
media
landscape, where credibility and relatability are paramount, communication professionals face the challenge of balancing technical expertise with accessible storytelling when subject matter experts from their brands interact with the media.
At the recently concluded
India Communication Summit 2025
, industry leaders convened for a panel discussion to discuss how communication professionals can turn subject matter experts into brand evangelists.
The session featured Anjali Kakkar, VP - Corporate Communications, CoinDCX; Shonali Chakravarty, Head of Enterprise Tech Comms, ISG & SSG, Lenovo Asia Pacific; Rashmi Vasisht, VP – Corporate Communications & Employer Brand, Cognizant, India; Rachit Mishra, Head - Brand Marketing & Communication, CJ Darcl Logistics.
It was chaired by Prasad Sangameshwaran, Editor, ETBrandEquity.com.
The discussion kicked off with a key question: Should modern corporate communicators allow subject specialists to engage freely with the media, or leverage their expertise to guide these interactions for maximum impact?
Vasisht began the discussion by emphasising the critical role of communication professionals in lending a hand to the brand spokesperson so that they resonate with a wide range of audiences. 'Every brand has leaders with expertise, experience and media credibility. The challenge is evolving these experts, who deeply understand their field, into advocates for the broader brand narrative. Can they connect their knowledge to the bigger picture? If communication professionals get this right, they can truly succeed,' added Vashisht.'
Reflecting on a personal experience, Vasisht shared a lesson she learned. 'I once arranged for a globally recognised expert to speak with a senior editor for 40 minutes, confident in a successful outcome,' she recalled. 'But two weeks later, no story appeared. I then realised that journalists pursue specific angles, while my expert delivered an academic white paper. Reflecting further, I saw the mismatch: he would have excelled on a podcast, but perhaps not in a print story. As communications professionals, we must strategically align leaders not only with the right message and moment but also the right medium.'
Building on Vasisht's response, the question arose: When preparing key spokespeople from brands, for media interactions, how much control should communicators exert and how much should they allow these experts to leverage their own strengths?
Mishra shared his perspective, emphasising the importance of authenticity. 'These are subject matter experts, over-controlling them risks stripping away their authenticity, which audiences crave,' he said.
'Today's experts are channel-fluid. However, their insights can be rigid. If we restrain them too tightly and their insights fall flat, it undermines the expert, the interviewer and the audience. The key is to maintain flexibility while preserving the essence of their authenticity,' Mishra noted.
Deviating from Mishra's stance, Chakravarty highlighted that the challenge and the opportunity of working with subject matter experts, especially whether it's technology or any core area where there is a lot of technical knowledge required, is that you have to turn these specialists into generalists.
There are a lot of subject matter experts in every company, but are all of them expected to become spokespersons of the organisation? 'No,' she said.
'We want spokespersons to be a little bit more generic, a jack-of-all-trades when they're speaking to the press. So, there is an element of unlearning. You've got to force the specialist to do so that the person puts himself or herself in the shoes of an average reader.
The spokesperson may know everything about IT services or technology or logistics, but my average reader, even for a mainline or a financial, is hoping that we meet them somewhere in the middle. How do we make this exciting, interesting? That's where I think, to Rashmi's point as well, that grounding in, maybe it could be through a grounding of the organisational values, how do you link it to the larger vision of the brand, or a grounding in what
B2B
communications experts do best, data, can make it all a little bit more desirable,' Chakravarty highlighted.
Joining the conversation, Kakkar underscored the importance of subject matter experts adopting the perspective of the reader, rather than simply evaluating media interactions through the narrow lens of ROI. She emphasised that such interactions play a pivotal role in long-term
brand building
.
'When I joined CoinDCX, I went to my founder and presented two media opportunities, encouraging him to participate. His immediate question was, 'What's the ROI?' I had to explain that while you might not see 100 sign-ups on the platform the moment the article is published, media exposure builds credibility. It shouldn't always be viewed from a sales conversion perspective,' Kakkar resolved.
She continued by underlining a broader point about subject matter experts—a principle she believes applies across industries. 'All industry leaders are experts in their domains. But it's our responsibility as communication professionals to help them understand that effective messaging requires seeing things from the reader's point of view, not just their own,' said Kakkar.
Using the example of her industry, she said, 'Take crypto, for instance. It's already considered a cryptic world and when experts fill their messaging with jargon, they alienate the audience. A subject matter expert's messaging must be crafted around what his audience understands and needs, not just what they want to say.'
To conclude, in today's dynamic media landscape, communication professionals face the challenge of transforming subject matter experts into authentic brand evangelists. By aligning the expertise of subject matter experts with storytelling techniques, brands can reach a wider audience. Prioritising the audience's perspective and the right medium while maintaining authenticity allows corporate communicators to build credibility and resonate with customers.