Your marketing copy will make more sense when you drop the buzzwords and write in plain English

Posted on February 8, 2010 by Gary Chow | No Comments » | Trackback URL

Why is there so much nonsense written about products and services?

I bet you know what I’m referring to.

Take a look at any marketing material on just about any product – software, computer hardware, cars, washing machines, shampoo – and what do you see?

More often than not, what you will read is pure and utter gobbledegook; copy littered with meaningless industry jargon, clichés and buzzwords.

Terms like ‘leading-edge’, ‘user-friendly’, ‘turn-key’, ‘value-added’, ‘best of breed’ and on it goes.

Why do marketers write like this? Why don’t they simply say things in plain English?

I’d say one reason is because marketers don’t bother to truly understand the benefits of the product or service they are marketing.

They don’t take the time to look at it from the perspective of the buyer. Instead, they take the easy way out and simply plonk a bunch of buzzwords into the copy in the hope that the reader will eventually make some sense of it. It’s the result of habitual action and lazy thinking.

The problem is the reader will not make sense of it because those terms are largely meaningless. Their eyes glaze over. You might as well have written in Swahili.

Saying something is ‘best of breed’ means nothing unless you explain exactly what you mean by that, and, importantly, how being best of breed would benefit the buyer. Without a clear explanation, it’s just an empty claim; hot air.

Here’s a tip: instead of relying on buzzwords and clichés, why not simply explain the benefits of a product in plain English, for instance, like you would when speaking to a friend.