By Alan Keane, Account Executive
A good friend of mine was recently in a marketing meeting where the gentleman conducting said meeting spoke of the company having the potential to go on a “very crispy journey.”
As my friend looked around the boardroom table to see if anyone else was struggling to contain their laughter, he was greeted with many heads nodding.
When he told me, I realised we’ve hit peak marketing shite-talk.
It’s become a version of the Emperor’s New Clothes, where unless someone speaks up and calls out the nonsense for what it is, it’ll continue to get worse.
There's probably a joke about the over-used term "low-hanging fruit" here, but I won't be the one to make it.
Of course it’s part and parcel of marketing and PR to use fancy words when speaking to clients, we need to demonstrate the breadth of our knowledge and experience. There’s a limit, however, and furthermore when the language liberties extend to communications with the consumer, they’re savvy enough to smell a rat.
Stop diluting the power of words by using them out of their proper context. Your new soap is hardly “revolutionary.”
It won’t take blue sky thinking on the part of our professions. The best thing about this is we can start small, because this innovative idea is scalable. Wean yourself off one buzzword a day, and you’ll soon see organic growth in your vocabulary as you find more authentic ways to get your message across.
It will be a seamless transition from talking out of our backsides to talking like normal human beings. This will empower us to forge a ground-breaking level of connection with our key demographics. It’s a win-win, where the average consumer feels less patronised, and we can focus on providing quality work for our clients.
And please, for the love of all that’s good, stop “touching base” or “reaching out”. Call or email someone by all means, but bases and the touching of same is preserved for men in pyjamas swinging bats. The phrase “I’m just touching base,” is like a red rag to a bull, particularly to journalists who have no time for your word-fudging.
Using terminology like that is only going to get their backs up, and make them less likely to talk to any of us, and that’s just disruptive, in the original sense of the word.