Ideas for profitable
communication
by Baruch ter Wal
‘Jaws’ on a spaceship
August 19th, 2010
According to Hollywood legend, that was the four-word pitch used to sell the concept for the original ‘Alien’ movie.
The game plan here is to sell something new using concepts that people are already familiar with.
This is an important tactic for Kiwi firms who are trying to market a bleeding edge product. How many global customers want to take a risk on the New Zealand firm doing things in a way that nobody else is? Nobody ever got fired for hiring IBM and all that.
You can still be completely unique without using any unique words.
“We are the only point of sale software that operates on a software-as-a-service model, but also works offline” is wordy but intelligible. “POS – reinvented” is punchy but scary.
Vanished into thin air
July 22nd, 2010
Shakespeare came up with that. You wouldn’t think so: it sounds so mundane and cliche. But when he first composed those words they were fresh, edgy, genius. Imagine it being said on stage for the very first time in 1600.
The moral is that an idea that once upon a time was a stroke of genius may not have cut-through today. The first person to say, “Hey, we don’t sell services, we sell solutions” was a genius. Describing your offering as a “solution” today does not set you apart. Yesterday I saw a dented tradesman’s van with the tagline “Solutions for Every Industry”.
Somewhere in the world, someone is coming up with the idea to call their services “solutions”. They’ve never heard the term used before. They too are a genius. But it’s still not going to have cut-through.
That’s why research, especially competitor research, is so important. Without it, you or your creative team could be re-inventing (at great expense) an idea that was once shiny, but is now dull from overuse.
Do you act like an owner?
May 13th, 2010
Sometimes a design turns a client off. When this happens the design can end up getting rejected, even if it will turn the client’s customers on.
If the client who is turned off is paying for the design out of his or her own pocket, you might expect a 100% rejection rate. At LTW our experience is very different.
In fact, one of the reasons we enjoy working with business owners is precisely that they’re paying us with their own money. Owners have the strongest possible incentive to decide if what we’re suggesting will pay off. That makes for an open mind and very productive debates.
If you’re commissioning design work, ask yourself: “What would I do if it was my money?”
The key to owning your presentation
March 30th, 2010
This is a guest post from my colleague Angus Blair, and introduces a simple but killer tip for PowerPoint and Keynote.
You want your audience to remember you and your message, not your slides. Gorgeous visuals can therefore be your biggest enemy in a presentation.
When I find my audience distracted by my visuals instead of listening to me, I walk over and hit the ‘B’ key. Check out what happens.
It has the dramatic effect of shifting all attention in the room to you. It gives you a chance to demonstrate how well you know your message. And it tells people that you personally want to share the idea with them, because it matters that much to you.
Don’t forget to test on (real) people
February 8th, 2010
When designing something with a clear call to action (brochure, ad, website landing page) it’s easy to be captured by textbook or expert opinion. But there’s no replacement for user testing.
The toughest part is not finding the people. The toughest part is getting them to be real. When marketing advice is just a blog away, most people you “test” your design with will put on a marketing hat and try to say what an expert would say. That’s of little use to you.
You need them to act like your customers would act. Don’t ask, “What do you think of this?” Set the scene properly. “You’re a really busy engineer. What would you do if one of your staff put this on your desk?” Or “What would you click on next?”
Jakob Nielsen says that testing with five people will reveal 85% of the usability problems in your design. He means five real people.
I’ve got you pegged
November 9th, 2009
I know that if you talk fast, dress in a business-like manner, and quickly get to the point that you hate people who sit on the fence and will judge me by my track record.
Here’s the full table, simplified and adapted from conversations with the experts at RogenSi.
If you weren’t aware of models like this, now you are. There are many more. http://www.humanmetrics.com/cgi-win/JTypes1.htm
If you’ve known about these tools for some time, ask yourself: “How often do I apply them in my interactions with clients and prospects?”
Most sales people revert to their own style. Analytical thinkers will provide lots of detail and focus on process – even if they are boring their Expressive client to death.
Just as common are so-called “experts” who will tell you to lose the detail and cut down the word count in all situations. If your audience in an Analytical one (like a majority of lawyers, systems analysts and financial controllers) you’ve just sunk your battleship.
Another interesting trick is to talk to all the styles at once on the same piece of paper. I’ll leave that for another post.
