You Can't Communicate Your Way Into Legitimacy

I've been thinking a lot about legitimacy lately.

Partly because of the communications work I've been doing around launching something new into a market.

When you're introducing a new platform, event, brand or idea, there are all the usual communications questions.

What's the story? Who should we invite? Which media should we speak to? Who should be on stage? How do we create enough attention around the launch?

All valid questions.

But underneath them sits a much more fundamental one: Why should anyone believe you?

You can call yourself the region's next major platform. You can say you're transforming an industry. You can describe yourself as groundbreaking, premium, innovative or category-leading.

But essentially, those are claims.

For someone encountering you for the first time, there is no history behind those words yet.

They need a reason to believe you. And that's where legitimacy comes in.

Legitimacy becomes invisible once you have it

The interesting thing about legitimacy is that we rarely notice it when it's already there.

Nobody questions whether the FIFA World Cup or the Olympic Games deserve to be called major global sporting events.

Nobody walks into the Singapore FinTech Festival wondering whether it's a "real" global fintech platform.

Chanel doesn't need to explain why it belongs in luxury fashion.

Their legitimacy precedes them.

And once enough evidence has accumulated over time, legitimacy becomes almost invisible.

It's when something is new that we start looking for signals.

Who is behind this? Who else is involved? Who is participating? Has anyone credible put their name to it? What have they done before? Why is this happening now?

And perhaps most importantly: Is there actually something here, or are they simply very good at making it look like there is?

Legitimacy isn't the same as looking legitimate

It's surprisingly easy to create the appearance of importance.

Book a beautiful ballroom. Build an impressive stage. Put up a media wall. Invite a famous person. Fill a press release with impressive-sounding language. Add enough logos to the backdrop.

Suddenly, everything looks very official.

And to be clear, presentation matters. The environment you create, the people you bring together and the way you communicate all influence perception.

But these things can only signal legitimacy.

They cannot manufacture it.

A press conference doesn't make something newsworthy simply because there's a press conference. A celebrity doesn't automatically make a product credible. A prestigious venue doesn't make an event important. And media coverage doesn't automatically make a business valuable.

At some point, people look underneath the presentation.

What's actually there?

So where does legitimacy come from?

I don't think there's one universal formula.

A 50-year-old company has very different reasons for being credible from a startup that launched six months ago. A government-backed initiative derives legitimacy differently from a creator-led consumer brand. And something new shouldn't pretend to have decades of authority it simply hasn't earned yet.

But when people encounter something unfamiliar, I think they're often looking for some combination of these signals.

1. Who is behind you?

The people and organisations attached to something matter.

Founders. Institutions. Industry bodies. Investors. Partners. Experts.

If credible people are willing to put their names, resources or reputations behind something, that tells us something.

This is borrowed credibility, and for something new, it can be incredibly powerful.

But borrowed credibility has limits.

Eventually, you have to build your own.

2. Who is participating?

Sometimes the strongest evidence isn't who's organising something.

It's who is willing to show up.

If you say you're building a regional platform, are people from across the region actually participating?

If you say you're creating an industry conversation, are people from that industry actually in the room?

If you say you've built a community, is there a community?

Participation turns positioning into something tangible.

3. What have you actually done?

Claims become significantly more believable when there's evidence behind them.

Customers. Results. Case studies. Products. Data. Experiences. A track record.

For established businesses, there may be years of proof to draw from.

For newer brands, the evidence might be smaller—but it still needs to exist.

You don't necessarily need decades of history to be legitimate.

You need enough evidence to support the position you're asking people to believe.

4. Who talks about you when you're not in the room?

This is where third-party validation becomes powerful.

Media coverage. Customer recommendations. Reviews. Industry recognition. Partners talking about the work you've done together.

People tend to place more weight on what others say about you than what you say about yourself.

That's part of why earned media still matters.

Not because getting featured automatically makes a brand important.

But because independent recognition can become another signal that says: Perhaps this is worth paying attention to.

5. Does the reality match the position you're claiming?

This might be the most important one.

If you're positioning yourself as premium, does the experience feel premium?

If you're claiming to be innovative, where is the innovation?

If you're positioning yourself as an industry leader, what are you contributing to the industry?

If you're calling something regional, is the region represented?

Every inconsistency creates friction between what you're asking people to believe and what they're actually experiencing.

And eventually, reality wins.

Communications makes legitimacy visible

This is where I think the role of communications is sometimes misunderstood.

Communications cannot simply declare something legitimate.

What it can do is bring the evidence together.

A press conference can put credible voices on the same stage. PR can explain why an initiative matters now. Media can provide independent validation. Content can demonstrate expertise. Partnerships can show who is willing to stand alongside you. Events can turn participation into something people can physically see and experience.

The communications strategy isn't creating legitimacy from nothing.

It's making the reasons to believe you easier to see. Eventually, if you've earned it consistently enough, something interesting happens.

People stop asking whether you belong.

Your legitimacy becomes invisible.

And perhaps that's the goal.

Because you don't build legitimacy by repeatedly telling people that you're credible, important or worth paying attention to.

You give them enough reasons to reach that conclusion themselves.