Murder communication with a thousand buzzwords
I read an article on a site called Marketingtoday.com which caught my eye; it was about the use of meaningless buzz words and management speak in communications. I love this stuff, and it will only get worse I'm sure.
We (and our customers) are comstantly bombarded with communications through an increasing number of channels; email, print, blogs, your mobile phone. So what is the impact of using meaningless words, and why do people use them?
* They use them because it is easy; words like "solutions" and "synergies" are so generic and meaningless that you can stick them in a text willy-nilly and it won't make any difference.Now thinking about what you actually mean takes a lot more effort.
* They believe that using these words make them sound professional, as if they know what they are doing. Wrong. It makes you sound like everyone else.
Buzzwords, management speak, marketing speak essentially do two things: they make you sound like everyone else and they make your readers switch off in boredom. And that is the exact opposite of what a marketer wants to achieve; i.e. stand out and excite.
Have a look at this page on the BBC website and scroll down to find contributions from readers...it's a worry...
"Marketing departments tend be real experts in this area - if anyone can put a pig in a dress and call it grandma, they can! For example, Private Eye magazine runs a series called "Solutions" containing gems like "inter-paper fastening solutions" (staplers)."
I think you get the picture.
Get to the point; it’s not that easy
Concise is nice. it is also much harder to convey the same message with fewer words.
Everyone gets caught up in all the wonderful new ways to deliver the message, but what about the quality of the message?
How interesting is your message/offer?
How clear and concise is it being communicated?
Apart from the challenge to clearly define what the value proposition is (and how competitive it is) translating that into a concise message is often the greatest challenge.
There are a few good ideas to consider though:
- Before you start, write down in bullet form what it is that needs to be communicated
- Use images where you can to convey (part of) the message. The trick here is to either create or find an image that represents what you want to say.
- Have someone else edit your work with the instruction to take out anything that is superfluous
Oh, and don't forget; anything written for the web should be about one third of what you would write in print. Yes, we are an impatient lot, aren't we?
As a reader, what frustrates you most in marketing writing? Drop me a comment!
White Papers – 38.5% say they pay more attention to white paper offers than…
According to Marketing Sherpa (a leading marketing e-zine) white papers are still by far the preferred communication over any other b2b ad. It makes sense, as consumers are filtering out more and more advertising and look for added value in communications.
"How to Use eBook Offers to Stand Out in a Sea of White Papers."
As of this moment, roughly 48,000 white papers are being promoted online by business-to-business marketers. The good news is, prospects are still interested -- 38.5% say they pay more attention to white paper offers than any other type of B-to-B ad.The bad news is ... 48,000. How can your offer stand out in the sea of white papers?
Check out our new Case Study on a marketer who's testing ebook offers instead. Includes white paper versus ebook click and conversion data for ads and emailed offers:http://www.marketingsherpa.com/sample.cfm?contentID=3100(Open access until Oct 29th) "
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