Marketing Archive - Page 3 of 12 - The Art of Communicating

What customers want

Many failed products are built on what the makers think people should want. Successful products deliver on what people actually want or need (if not both).

Meta’s virtual reality products are built around what they think people should want: an artificial metaverse that looks kind of childish and that enables experiences that no-one has asked for. They try to conquer the world by creating something entirely new in the hopes that people would want that.

On Monday, Apple has unveiled their take on headsets. They chose not to create something entirely new. They built an (arguably) better way to experience the things that people already know. At the core, their headset is a way superior display compared to any other display that we used before. On that display, we can do the things that we already do, browsing the web, watching movies, enjoying family photos or collaborating with colleagues; most of these things seem to work better than on traditional displays. Movies will be more immersive, screens for our work will feel bigger etc.

Instead of creating something entirely new, the Vision Pro looks like it is about doing the things that we already love to do with the apps we already love to use, but better. That’s literally their pitch: “So you can do the things you love in ways never before possible.”

Apple doesn’t make customers want something entirely new. It tries to sell customers on a better way to get what they already want.

A no-brainer

If customers knew everything that you know, it would be a no-brainer for them to buy from you, right? They would queue up in an instant.

Why then don’t they?

What’s the missing piece? What do they not see?

More importantly: how can you make them see it?

The dishonesty of paid speaking

Something’s wrong in the professional speaking world and it’s paying to speak.

There’s a significant number of large scale events where many of the speakers in the lineup pay to speak on the big stage.

In and of itself, there’s nothing wrong with this. Businesses pay to get in front of people all the time. It’s basically an advertisement.

Like with other forms of hidden promotions, the problem is when it’s intransparent.

If you buy your speaking slot, say so. If you’re the organizer of such an event, say who paid to speak and who got paid by you to speak. If you’re sitting in the audience, demand transparency.

It’s a simple rule that applies to any kind of advertising.

Just be transparent!

Your marketing agency’s words

This week, I’m asking one simple but important question each day for you to ponder (on your own or with your team):

When you read out loud the words that your marketing agency came up with, how does it feel? How would you say it in your own words?

Would they still buy?

This week, I’m asking one simple but important question each day for you to ponder (on your own or with your team):

If you told your customers the full truth about your product, would they still buy? What do you need to change so that you can tell the full truth?

Ideas that spread

How many businesses have you seen fail because there was no easy way to tell your friends what they actually do? How many ideas have you seen die because there was no easy way to explain them? How many projects lost traction because no-one could clearly state what they were for?

Your audience is very unlikely to want to figure this out for you. If you want your idea to spread, your chances will dramatically increase if you yourself work out a way that makes it easy to spread.

So, what should spread for your idea? What should people think when they think about you? What should they say when they pass your message along to their friends?

How is this different?

When you’re building a new product, the question “How is it different?” is mostly pointless.

Because “different” can be hugely misleading as a metric.

Business developers love “different”. But the customers couldn’t care less. Customers care for specific.

In fact, many customers have no sympathy for “different”. They prefer “familiar”. Familiar is proven and safe.

Customers do care very much about whether your product solves their specific need.

Therefore, a better question to ask is: “What specific problem does this solve that isn’t solved properly, yet?”

(And, by the way, when you have an answer to that question, you’ll get the answer to “What’s different?” for free.)

Repeating yourself

Say something often and people will start to believe it.

Repetition doesn’t make the thing you repeat any more true or false but people are more likely to believe a statement when they hear it more often (that’s true even for smart thinkers).

Bullshitters know and embrace that. For them, that’s easy because true or false doesn’t matter the least bit to a bullshitter. The only thing they care for is whether a narrative serves their goal. And so, they repeat whatever statement serves them best.

It’s party time for them when others chime in to the repetitions, preferably mass media, the press or the social media mob.

In light of that it breaks my heart every time I speak to brilliant people who say that they don’t want to repeat themselves, e.g. because they think it’s impolite.

I don’t think it’s impolite at all. If it’s true it deserves to be said repeatedly. Looking at how often bullshitters repeat their bullshit, it might even be necessary.

Don’t shy away from putting your best thoughts on hot rotation.

What do you want to be known for?

What do you want to be known for? You won’t believe how many businesses don’t have a compelling answer to that simple question.

And yet, every action they take contributes to their fame. Every product they release. Every keynote their CEO gives. Every post they publish. Every sales presentation they make. Every call to customer support. Every mail. Proposal. Conversation. …

If these actions are inconsistent, the story of that business will be fuzzy at best.

Hence, marketing.

Huge budgets are allocated to create a public image. Agencies come up with something that sounds good and looks good. But more often than not, that image doesn’t match what customers experience when they reach out, use the product, or are otherwise exposed to the business.

What do you want to be known for?
If you don’t decide someone else will.

The biggest lever to own what the public thinks of you is to find clarity about that yourself. Uncover what a) you’re incredibly good at, b) you are passionate about, and c) makes you a profit. Based on that define what you want to be known for. The shorter the better.

Then light the path for the whole team. When the path is lit brightly (and when it’s aligned to what the team aspires to) you can trust them to do the right thing. Their actions will be aligned with the path. And so, every action anyone in your business takes contributes to becoming known for the right thing.

How not to change minds

Insisting that you are right and the others are wrong has never changed anyone’s opinion.

Repeating the same arguments, only louder, doesn’t work, either.

Making fun of someone’s argument won’t encourage anyone to re-consider that argument.

And decorating an argument with sarcasm (even when it’s hilarious) won’t open anyone’s mind to that argument.

I’ve always found it way more helpful to assume that the other person is at least as smart as I am and that there’s a reason for why they don’t see what (I think) I see.

Another helpful attitude when you want to change someone’s mind is to be open to changing yours, too. Getting it right is so much more useful than being right at all cost.

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