When people are self-obsessed, they retweet their own tweets and like their own posts. When marketers feel vain, they write ebooks about their company.  

While I clearly mean that as a joke, sometimes you can tell a marketer’s self-obsession (or that of their bosses) from a brand’s messaging. It might not seem all that different at first but we’re all hardwired to ignore/dislike people who can’t stop talking about themselves. Brands and ads that do that are rarely ever forgiven. 

The trick to high-converting copy isn’t actually creativity or tangential analogies, it’s actually communicating the value proposition in the consumer’s language. This seems pretty basic, right? 

Next time you see a mobile phone ad, do notice how most phones are sold in terms of their processing power, megapixels of camera, wattage, etc. 

Meanwhile, notice how Apple markets its flagship phones. It does come up with jargon during each unveiling but that’s for journalists. When it goes outside and talks to phone buyers – it tells them its phones are……smooth/cinematic/super-intelligent(??).

I don’t know another company where a writer can come up with ‘super-intelligent software’ and still gets to keep their job. 

And yet, Apple is the only smartphone maker that generates billions in free publicity and another couple of billion dollars in free cash flows from selling these super-intelligent phones.

Mario marketing

The power of storytelling can only be harnessed when people *tell themselves a story about your product and why it’s good for them*. Not the other way around – if you feed them a story that’s factual and feature-driven – then they will rationally evaluate features and possibly never get out of that loop.  

B2B companies make this mistake a lot because they think they’re somehow more refined just because the buyers are other companies. And hence, we see jargon and proper technology faff make their way to websites, ads, and even media releases.

They forget that even B2B buyers are humans and not robotic corporations. 

And thus, nobody cares about that feature except perhaps the two engineers who built this and their bosses. People care about their lives and their stories. Brands that know this employ something called Mario marketing to ensure their communications are never self-absorbed. 

The image above is pretty much self-explanatory. And I suggest you print this and place it in front of you like I did to really internalize this message. 

When in Rome, speak Italian

The simple trick to writing copy that converts is to make the messaging all about the consumers. The wordplay, flair, and analogies can make it fancy but it won’t work if the copy isn’t speaking your buyer’s language. 

Marketing is what people say about your brand when you’re not in the room.

Now, every leader thinks their product does solve a very real problem for their audience, and hence talking about their product is the best way to achieve this. But it’s the worst thing you can do for a product. 

Instead, writers and content marketers should reach out to consumers – potential and existing – and find out about their lives. Maybe they use your product and love it but phrase it in different ways. Maybe you think you’re selling the best milkshake but what you’re actually providing is a relief from the heat through accessible vending machines. 

For B2B companies, this is much more crucial because it’s likely that your product description itself is jargon stuffed together to not make any real sense. But how many times you’ve bought something you really haven’t understood? 

Siren words

It’s a worthy exercise to do a buyer persona mapping and generate perhaps a set of problem statements/keywords that they are likely to use and discuss a lot in conversations. These are the golden keys that will unlock opportunities. 

In a previous engagement, we realized that it’s tough to sell technology solutions to automakers. Why? Because technology companies describe technology as earth-shattering paradigm-shifting and automakers couldn’t care less. They are obsessed with the cars they make and the driving experience they provide – not how low-latency the 4G antenna can be. 

But after running campaigns and carefully analyzing a lot of audience conversations, we realized that there’s a single word that keeps all automakers up at night – it’s ‘vehicle recalls’. It rings alarms of paranoia whenever they encounter it and framing our product messaging in terms of its potential to reduce recalls worked wonders!

I call these phrases ‘Siren words’. And they exist for all buyer segments. Phone buyers care about taking better pictures than their friends’ iPhones. Millennial grocery shoppers might care about ‘zero calories’ more than any other nutrient profile or even taste. Bankers tend to notice phrases like ‘interest margins’ and ‘portfolio quality’ from a mile away – even while they’re giving speeches around digital banking or customer experience in the 21st century. 

These phrases aren’t necessarily exhaustive but they often provide invaluable clues about what someone really cares about versus what they say they care about. And these phrases often hide in plain sight – you just have to eavesdrop a fair amount to find them.

Before you go, think about the ten phrases/words that your buyers say out loud on a daily 

basis and how can you map your product to their lived experience. We are all self-obsessed. And marketers of all people should know this insight and exploit it. Ebooks can wait. 

PS: If you liked this post, do consider sharing it within your network and giving me a follow at @AZenGuy. I look forward to reading your comments and thoughts.