Dr. Michael Gerharz, Autor auf The Art of Communicating

“About us” – but who is us?

There’s a better way to write an “about us” page than the usual way.

The “us” in the “about us” is usually taken to refer to the company that writes the “about us” page. But it becomes so much more effective when we broaden the meaning to include the audience.

So that they discover that this company shares their values and values the same kinds of things. This company is “one of us”.

Us – that’s not only us who write the page, it’s us who belong to our tribe.

This is similar to what great movies do. It’s the hero we look at, but it’s us who we see.

With the “about us” page we can make it obvious that we’re one of them. E.g. that we’re creatives just like them. Or that we’re just as much in love about the details as they are. Or just as crazy about biking as they are. “Us” includes both – the company and the customers.

This kind of an “about us” page takes your audience by surprise. When visiting the page, they expect to read the usual blurb about the company background, buildings, figures etc. But what they really find is a profound truth about themselves.

Of course, what’s required is a profound understanding of these values. To live them and speak the truth.

But when you do, things get so much easier because now, our communication automatically resonates deeply with what matters to our audience. Because it’s who we are. And who they are.

The risk of passing a message along

When we tell our story, the ultimate result is when people pass our message along. But let’s face it: Passing anything along is kind of a risk for our audience.

Think about yourself. When, for example, you recommend something to someone, you’re extending your credibility to the thing that you recommend. That’s why we recommend only things that we feel comfortable with ourselves.

It doesn’t stop there. We intuitively understand that, ultimately, the person who asked for our opinion needs to be happy with the thing we recommended to them. And so, we put one extra layer of carefulness on top of our recommendation. Because what if they don’t like it, right?

It would be a threat to our status.

On the other hand, the more someone can be sure that the thing they pass along will boost their status, the more likely they are to actually pass it along.

Will it boost your audience’s status when they pass your message along?

Spelling things out is a compass

When you feel like you haven’t really nailed your message, one of the most powerful things that you can do is to write it down – because it forces you to commit to one specific version of saying what you want to say.

When we keep a message in our mind, we tend to keep things a little abstract. And vague. We keep juggling alternatives. And objections. Worse, by constantly altering it, we are never entirely sure what the current version actually is.

All of this changes when we write it down. It forces us to commit. But here’s another aspect that’s even more powerful: As soon as we write it down, we can hand over to our gut. Because as soon as we commit, our gut will immediately tell us whether this version feels right or not.

Suddenly, we have a compass. A compass that shows us the direction. All we need to do to make it work is listen to our gut. And then, once we recognise the feeling, we can start asking questions: What exactly doesn’t feel right? Why? What would happen if we changed this word? Or if we flipped the order? Also: What do others actually think?

Spell it out, write it down, and then trust your gut to guide you to a solution that feels right.

Delight

If there was one thing you could do today to delight one of your customers and put a smile on their face, what would it be?

Why don’t you?

Who cares?

For many communicators, the default way of communicating is to try and make people want what they have to offer. Thus, they work hard to shine the brightest light on their offer.

They praise all the benefits. They detail all the features. They explain why this was so hard to manufacture. And, most importantly, why we should care.

Only that we don’t. And so we tune out.

Almost certainly what we care about overlaps only partially with what our audiences care about. When communicators focus on the left circle and try to make us care for the things they care about, they speak so we get them. But in doing so they have a much harder communication problem to solve than those who start at the right side, at what we care about.

It’s super hard to change what someone cares about. It’s a lot easier to make them see a new/simpler/better way to get what they already care about.

Plus, this approach creates tension: “I hear that you desire this. You could get it much more easily than you thought. Because we built something that can get you there this quick. Wanna try it?”

Compare it to the default approach to communication: “We built this. Look at all these bells and whistles and stuff. So, you see it’s really great. Wanna try it?”

When we want others to choose us, we tend to speak a lot about ourselves. Yet, starting with empathy gets their attention much easier. When they feel that we get them and then, when they feel that our solution is just the right fit for them, we make it easy for them to choose us.

Speaking with confidence

Most of your competition leads with vague statements such as “improving efficiency”, “providing flexible solutions”, “using high quality materials”.

One of the easiest ways to differentiate yourself from this competition is to be really specific in what you promise. What does “improving efficiency” mean? What does it look like? How will it change our processes?

And then make a bold statement about it. “X will increase Y by at least a factor of 3.”

There’s one important pitfall: You need to keep your promises. It’s easy to make bold promises. It’s a different thing to actually keep them.

Yet, this is the actual differentiator – and the reason why so many companies shy away from making specific promises. They lack the confidence to actually make them happen. They don’t go all the way to make sure that this will always work (or figure out which version of the promise will always work).

The best pitches start with empathy: Understand what matters to your customers. Make a bold innovation to improve this aspect. Work hard to be able to keep a promise around it.

When you’ve done this, speaking about it with confidence will be the easiest part.

Reading their news

What are your customers reading?
How do they speak with each other?
What are they saying about your product?
Or about other products?
What words do they use to describe their problems?
What bothers them?
What excites them?

These are all questions that have become much easier to answer than before. Thanks to social media we can much more easily immerse ourselves in the world of our customers. Doing so is a great step to learning their language and understanding their problems.

Relevance starts with empathy. Empathy starts with open eyes.

Bill Gates doesn’t get the Internet

In 1995, Bill Gates really struggled to make a case for the Internet:

Funny isn’t it? The CEO of the dominant software company can’t clearly say what the benefits of one of the most significant technological advances in mankind actually are.

Now, here’s a question to you: 26 years later and knowing what you know now, would you do any better? Could you answer Letterman’s question about what’s the big deal about the Internet in a TV compatible way?

As Letterman said: It’s easy to criticise something you don’t fully understand. And yet, that’s exactly the position that our customers are in. They don’t fully understand the thing we’re trying to explain to them. And one of their most pressing questions is this: So, what’s the big deal about this?

It’s easy to make fun of one of the most successful businessmen in history. But again, would you do better? Or more precisely, do you do better for the things you sell?

(PS: This fall, I’m launching the “Leaders Light the Path” masterclass which helps you do better. Get notified here.)

Clarity is a leadership responsibility

A great team is a group of people who trust each other with working towards a common goal. Trust is created when people say what they mean and mean what they say. Plus – and this is easily overlooked – when others get what they mean.

Speaking with clarity is one of the main ingredients that makes great teams trust each other. Cutting to the core, avoiding the bullshit, and using plain language make it so much easier for our team mates to get what we mean.

This is a genuine responsibility of a leader. When a leader uses confusing language it gives the team permission to do the same. When a leader tolerates ambiguous framing, the team will see it as permission to use it. When a leader doesn‘t insist that a statement is clarified, why should the team?

Trust starts with common ground and common ground starts with clarity.

No, you don’t owe me for the years

Our customers couldn’t – and shouldn’t – care less for how long it took us to make something. It’s our decision to spend the time and it’s our decision to make the offer. If we decide to offer our service or product to a customer, all our customer needs to know is whether our offer does what we promise it does.

They owe us for the result, not for the effort. If someone comes along who provides them with the same result but less effort or less experience, there’s no reason why a customer should pick us – let alone pay more because it took us 10 years to get to the point where we can make that job in 30 minutes.

Rather than focus our story on the experience we have, it’s much better to focus our story on the experience we give. Make that the best they have ever had … and our customers will stop worrying about why we charge what we charge.

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