Words That Work: God is what’s left when everything else is gone.
God is what’s left when everything else is gone
What did you just feel right now when you read that?
God is what’s left when everything else is gone
Before you even understood what that means your brain already registered it as “profound.”
That exact same quote can be shown to people of different political parties, religions, etc and each one will think something different.
I share this quote with you to demonstrate that the reality you perceive is largely subjective.
That’s why it’s not what you say, it’s what people hear that matters.
You can have the best message in the world, but the person hearing it will always understand it through their worldview made up entirely by their own emotions, preconceptions, prejudices, and pre-existing beliefs.
It’s not enough to be correct, reasonable or even brilliant.
The key is to understand your audience deeper than they understand themselves.
How that person perceives what you say is even more real, at least in a practical sense, than how you perceive yourself.
Once “your” words leave your lips, they no longer belong to you. The act of speaking is not a conquest, but a surrender.
Upon entering the mind they belong to someone else.
When we open our mouths and speak to the world it inevitably interprets and can sometimes distort the original meaning.
That’s why the worldview of your audience trumps whatever “objective” reality a given word or phrase you use means.
What matters isn’t what you say, it’s what people hear
The rules of language are especially important given the sheer amount of communication the average person has to contend with.
Political pollster Dr. Frank Luntz (the guy who changed Global Warming to Climate Change and Estate Tax to Death Tax) wrote a book that outlines 10 Rules to Effective Communication. I recommend the book but in the meantime, follow these rules and watch your communication elevate to a more impactful and effective level.
Rule 1. Simplicity
Use Small Words. Avoid words that might force someone to reach for the dictionary, because most Americans won’t. The average American did not graduate from college and doesn’t understand the difference between effect and affect.
Rule 2. Brevity
Use Short Sentences. Be as brief as possible. Never use a sentence when a phrase will do and never use four words when three can say just as much.
Rule 3. Credibility
Is as Important as Philosophy. People have to believe it to buy it.
If your words lack sincerity or if they contradict accepted facts, circumstances or perceptions, they will lack impact.
Rule 4. Consistency Matters
Repetition. Repetition. Repetition. Good language is like the Energizer Bunny. It keeps going … and going … and going.
Rule 5. Novelty
Offer Something New. In plain English, words that work often involve a new definition of an old idea.
At a time when cars and the promotion of them were expanding in size, Volkswagen took exactly the opposite approach in design and in a message.
It worked because it made people think about the product in a fresh way.
Rule 6. Sound and Texture Matter
The sounds and texture of language should be just as memorable as the words themselves.
A string of words that have the same first letter, the same sound or the same syllabic cadence is more memorable than a random collection of sounds.
Did you notice the first five rules (Simplicity, Brevity, Credibility, Consistency, Novelty) all string together quite nicely?
Rule 7. Speak Aspirationally
Messages need to say what people want to hear.
The key to successful aspirational language for products or politics is to personalize and humanize the message to trigger an emotional remembrance.
Rule 8. Visualize
Paint a vivid picture. From M&M’s “Melts in your mouth, not in your hand” to Morton Salt’s “When it rains it pours” to NBC’s “Must See TV,” the slogans we remember for a lifetime almost always have a strong visual component, something we can see and almost feel.
Rule 9. Ask a Question
“Got Milk?” may be the most memorable print ad campaign of the past decade.
A statement, when put in the form of a rhetorical question, can have a much greater impact than a plain assertion.
Rule 10. Provide Context and Explain Relevance
You have to give people the “why” of a message before you tell them the “therefore” and the “so that.”
Without context, you cannot establish a message’s value, its impact or, most importantly, its relevance
These ten rules of effective communication, all summarized in single words: simplicity, brevity, credibility, consistency, novelty, sound, aspiration, visualization, questioning, and context.
If your tagline, slogan, or message meets most of these criteria, chances are it will meet with success.
If it meets all ten, it has a shot at being a home run.
