Maine Creative Services

Dilbert creator Scott Adams has a blog, of course. I mean, who doesn’t? But unlike most blogs, his is both funny and thought-provoking.

The other day Adams mused about the most obscene letter in the alphabet. He figures it must be the asterisk, “since it appears in almost every naughty word you see in print.” He calls it a loin cloth that protects our eyes from seeing all the smut out there.

“That smutty little character is attracted to obscenity like flies to sh*t. To be fair and balanced, it should be noted that the asterisk protects you from seeing naked cuss words that would otherwise blind you and put you on the slippery slope to porn addiction. But when you cover a naughty word’s turgid genitalia with an asterisk, no one knows what the f*ck you’re trying to say.

Enjoy it all here. (Obviously not suitable for those offended by naughty language.)

As a freelance copywriter for tech and corporate clients (and a former technical writer), I have found a LOT of resistance to clean, simple “shirtsleeve English”. Too many corporate types seem to fear that clear language and everyday words will somehow reduce the value of their ideas or offerings.

Quite the contrary. Keep it simple, focused on your target audience, pack it with mouth- watering benefit statements, and conclude with a compelling call to action — and you’ve got a winning formula.

Sure, jargon is sometimes appropriate. But it has to be your audience’s jargon — not your own. I once rewrote a Web site that was hip-deep in obscure, mystifying corporate-speak and computer terminology describing asset management offerings for global corporations. Yet their target customer was the kind of guy who spends more time wearing a hardhat and toolbelt than using a computer.

Look, it’s hard work to read, analyze and (hopefully) find the meaning in corporate memos and marketing materials these days. But I get paid to do it. Don’t do that to your customers. Your job is to make it easy for them to understand what you’re selling and why it’s right for them.

An interesting thing sometimes happens after rewriting a case study, capabilities brochure or collateral. After most of the buzzwords and corporate-speak has been exorcised, the clients sometimes want them put back in. They think saying “utilize” instead of “use” makes them sound smarter. They think the word “solutions” still has a clear meaning in today’s marketplace. They think “interface” sounds way smarter than “meet.” They LIKE their jargon — even if their prospects and customers have to struggle to figure out what it means.

Sometimes I think good writers like Twain, Strunk and E.B. White would all be unemployed today. Their resumes would be far too underwhelming. Not enough buzzwords.

What’s your position on buzzwords and jargon?

PS: For more thoughts on this idea, visit 37 Signals, “Buzzwords say all the wrong things.” Link.

What would you say if you had only two minutes of your customer’s time?

What would you show if your sales presentation could only be three minutes long?

What would you talk about if the big new customer you’ve just spent weeks getting in to see refused to sit through your PowerPoint presentation? What if she said you have three minutes to convince her?

Answer those questions and you start to develop your core message. As I’ve explained before, effective business communication begins by answering two simple questions:

• What are you trying to say? (The answer should take only a sentence or two.)
• What do you want your prospect to do after you tell them?

Don’t make your marketing message into a mystery novel. Say it clearly, concisely. Don’t beat around the bush — they’re just as busy and distracted as you are. Stop thinking about yourself. Put yourself in your customer’s place.

What do you think?

Many spelling misteaks, er, mistakes, are caught by your spell checker. But a spell checker is no help for typos or word usage errors. Think: Did you mean “to,” “too,” or “two?” Should it be “it’s” or “its?”

There’s nothing worse (or more embarrassing) than getting 5,000 copies of your shiny new brochure back from the printer — and discovering (too late) that your phone number has two numbers transposed. Ouch!

Lori, the self-described “Grand Poobah” of Better at English talks about her “pubic” humilation when an embarrassing typo crept into one of her projects.

“Typos can make you look careless at best, ignorant at worst. Modern spell checkers are useful tools, of course, but they don’t catch everything. My spell checker didn’t save me from the unfortunate “pubic incident” because… pubic is a perfectly good word, just incorrectly wielded in this context.”

Lori offers two good suggestions for catching those naughty little typos or word usage errors that creep into everyone’s writing (or typing) now and then. 1) Have someone read your copy slowly, out loud, while you review it for errors. 2) Use text-to-speech software to read it aloud while you review a hard copy. Link.

Here’s another solution I’ve used that can be very effective for certain kinds of errors: read your text backwards. That extracts the spelling of the words from their meaning. That way, your brain is less likely to subconsciously “correct” the typo for you.

What’s your favorite method of finding typos in your work?

“Blogs don’t have to be badly written. It’s just that most are.”

That’s the mournful cry from Tony Long, copy chief at Wired News. He’s written a curmudgeon-like response to those who claim the Internet has improved the quality of writing in general.

It’s called “You, To, Can Right Like a Blogger.”

If advertising is so effective, why don’t ad agencies advertise? That’s the question Simon Sinek poses in a recent issue of BrandWeek. After all, ad agencies recommend clients spend 10% their revenues on marketing. But do they practice what they preach? Sinek points out:

“According to Nielsen Monitor-Plus, Interpublic, Omnicom, Publicis and WPP spent a total of $3.7 million to promote themselves in the U.S. in 2005, down 15% from the $4.4 million they spent in 2004.”

That’s a paltry .01% of their combined $29.3 billion in global revenue. He says that’s proof that advertising doesn’t work, and that the agencies know it. But does it? Let’s dig a little deeper.

First, it’s a well-written article. I especially loved his crack about agencies’ “Faustian resistance” to using their own product. Great line. I also agree with his argument that most advertising, like the media they run on, have been commoditized. Nothing stands out. He says:

“In truth, it’s what’s IN the advertising that is not working. Ad agencies are doing a poor job creating messages that affect long-term value for their clients.”

Agreed. Here’s part of the problem, IMHO. We’re all overwhelmed. Our work and lives demand we juggle a flood of data, and we’re constantly blitzed by additional stuff like advertising “impressions,” sp@m, pop-ups and other annoyances.

And the media are willing accomplices. Cable news channels blitz us with multiple images: 2-3 lines of text crawling across the bottom, windows with the weather forecast in El Paso popping up next to the anchor who’s delivering the news. Are they deliberately trying to distract us from the news they’re reporting? (No wonder ADD is epidemic in the USA.)

But I digress. Sinek is right: Too many ads suck, and so do most of the shows they’re aired on. Too many stink of sameness, lameness and slickness. I’m no defender of ad agencies, but I have to disagree with his basic thesis. Agencies have a very good reason for not advertising their services. It’s simply not appropriate to reach the audience they’re targeting.

Here’s why.

Every marketer begins by thinking about WHO they’re trying to reach. If you’re selling Chevys, there’s a couple hundred million potential buyers. Selling Porsches? Maybe a few million. But if you’re selling advertising services to the S&P 500, for example, your target audience numbers around, uh, 500. There are far more effective ways to get your message to an elite niche like that.

Using mass media to reach a market of 500 is expensive and wasteful. That’s true whether you’re a B2B or B2C business, by the way. Until you have a mass audience, stay away from mass media. You’ll go broke before you break through.

This reminds me of a client I had years ago. She insisted that we advertise on the market’s top-rated rock radio station, and only in the most expensive daypart, morning drive. But we were trying to reach a very narrow, high-level I.T. audience, looking for advanced technology training.

The campaign cost beaucoup bucks, and was a dismal failure. Why? The biggest reason: only about 1-2% of the audience were potential buyers of her services. 1-2%! The same money spent on a targeted direct mail campaign would probably have been much more successful.

You CAN do two things at one, as long as you don’t care about quality. I’ve long preached that the secret of good writing is not trying to write and edit at the same time. Write first, edit later. And that goes whether you’re writing advertising copy or code. Your brain has to get in the zone.

Juggling multiple client projects never used to bother me. But as I get older (and hopefully a little wiser) I find that I really prefer to start one project and see it through to the end before tackling another. It just seems to go faster and work better.

Well, it’s not just me. A study published in the Journal of Neuroscience confirmed what many of us suspected. It takes your brain four times longer to get re-focused, back in the zone, when it’s switching back and forth between tasks. Makes sense.

Organizing and productivity guru Julie Morgenstern talked about it in her most recent e-newsletter:

“Once thought to be a critical time management skill, multi-tasking has been scientifically proven to impair memory, increase stress, and make us LESS productive…

“Multi-tasking does not bring out our best selves. Instead, it leaves us feeling exhausted, ineffective, and ultimately, deeply unsatisfied.”

Morgenstern goes on to suggest making a time map — basically just a simplified schedule — so you have a certain time to do this, and another time to do that. She says it eliminates your need to multi-task, and puts you back in control of your days.

“It’s a tool I’ve been teaching for years—but which used to generate mixed reactions in audiences. Lately, everyone LOVES the concept—the Time Map is a tool whose time has clearly come.” Julie Morgenstern

What about you? Do you prefer doing many things at once? Or having a one-track mind? Which way is most productive for you? Leave your thoughts in the comments.