1748 – Cracking the Code of Clear Messages with Ben Guttmann

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0:58with us right now it's ben gutman ben you are the author of the book simply put why clear messages win and how to design them you're also an adjunct professor and you do some consulting as well ben it's great to have you here thanks for having me josh it's great to be here and i'm so excited to talk about your book and I couldn't agree with you more in a world where we are inundated with noise. And most often, you know, again, we kind of work with a lot of folks that are out there promoting their message or out there promoting their offer or what they do. You know, I think that there's often a disconnect, you know, between particularly when we're, you know, empathetic to that audience that is just exhausted with just an endless supply of noise being foisted upon them.

1:53Oh, absolutely. The average American consumes about 13 hours of media a day. I mean, that is a lot, right? We are bombarded by thousands and thousands of messages, ones that we asked for in terms of, you know, our emails and our social media and our articles we read, as well as plenty we haven't asked for, which is what a lot of us are in the business of doing, which is advertising and marketing and political slogans or advocacy slogans, all these things, it just is more and more and more every year. And it's harder for us to break through. Yeah. Well, let's talk about this concept of simplicity.

2:26Would you mind maybe just kind of setting the stage for us? Absolutely. So the book, simply put, Why Clear Messages Win and How to Design Them. If you only read the first page, you kind of get a piece of it, which is the question that has driven me in my work, in my teaching has always been, why do some messages work when others don't? Why do some ad campaigns work when others fall flat? Why do some political slogans rally a nation and others don't? Why do some emails and pitches and proposals sell and others don't? And it turns out that the answer is simple, quite literally. The messages that are effective are simple.

3:04And if that's enough, look, the book's 208 pages. I say on the first page, It, you know, it's a book about simplicity. It sounds like I didn't take my own advice. It could have, but if that's enough, great. But it turns out once you peel back the cover that simplicity, the science of the why is really interesting. And the business of the how is also something that we can all learn from. Yeah. You know, there is, there's this, I think we, a lot of us have this inclination is that if we can just get people to consume more words from us, that somehow we win or somehow that will be the path to conversion.

3:41I mean, it sounds like it makes sense, right? We're earning proximity together. We're earning more time together. But is that not the case? Well, I mean, certainly exposure is helpful, right? If you look at all of these arenas we're talking about, a lot of times making sure we have enough contacts is an important part of marketing, of sales, of politics, of whatever. What I'm concerned about a little bit more is in the messaging itself in the so that's all i break it out into saying marketing is actually kind of simple we have the vessel and we have the contents the vessel is all that stuff it's the hey we're gonna you know do this retargeting ad hey we're gonna do this instagram sponsored content hey we're gonna do the super bowl ad that's the vessel it's a lot of work a lot of professionals work in that i'm more focused on the content which is okay what are we saying in that and what's important is that if you look at the science, if you look at the statistics, look at the history, messages that are easier, that are more fluent, that's the cognitive science term, more fluent, they tend to perform better in every attribute.

4:45There's something that we like more. There's something that we trust more. Something we're likely to buy is when things are fluent and they take less mental load for us to get into our heads. And things on the other end of the spectrum, things that make us sweat, things that are complicated, that take a lot of work, a lot of thinking, we have a host of negative reactions to. Don't trust them, don't like them, don't buy them. And if we're in the business of persuading, of informing, we always want our stuff to be in the other category, not in the negative bucket. Yeah. Well, I guess let's think about maybe some things that folks could do, something that might be actionable, that might provide clarity and simplicity to what we're already communicating.

5:26Any suggestions on maybe a course of action. So I have identified five principles that we can all use as design tools to allow us to be simple. And that's my background. I'm a designer. By trade, I'm a designer. I've worked in running an agency for 10 years. And so that's what I looked at. I was saying, how do we take this problem and how do we solve it using this skill? And there's five principles. It's not a checklist. It's not a step-by-step, but if you are able to hit more of these, you're going to be on your path to becoming more fluent, more simple, more successful. Number one is beneficial.

6:05What does your message matter to the receiver? What's in it for them? Features versus benefits, kind of sales 101 type stuff. Number two is focus. Are you trying to say one thing or are you trying to say multiple things at the same time? Priority, the word priority is singular, by the way. Salient. Number three, does your message stand out from the noise? Does it rise to your attention? Does it zig when everybody else is zagging? Is it different? Does it have contrast? Number four is empathetic. Are you speaking in the language that your audience understands? Are you meeting them where they are emotionally, what their motivations are?

6:43That's a vital component. And then lastly, and these are again, not in order, but the reason this one is at the end, is it's minimal? Is it everything you need, but only what you need? Have you cut out everything that isn't important? And when we talk about minimal, by the way, this is not about the fewest number of words, fewest number of sentences or paragraphs or pages. It is about the least amount of friction. That's the user experience design terms, friction. We don't want people to have to work for our stuff because they're not going to. And every time we give somebody that bump in the road, it ends up being the off ramp.

7:18They go and they say, hey, you know, I got 13 hours of other messages that are bombarding my brain every day. I'm going to go pay attention to that instead of your message. Yeah. I know that there's quotes out there about how easy it is to, you know, say something, right. But to say it succinctly can be a challenge, like giving a speech. You know, it's like, you know, I think we could all say a lot of words, but condensing it down to the most critical message that that audience needs to hear. That's tough. It's editing it down. I would imagine you experienced some of this in your own book. What was the editing process for Simply Put?

7:54I've never had more pressure than selecting the title and the cover and the back cover copy for this book because you're not supposed to judge the book by its cover. This is a book you should judge by its cover. If it doesn't convey what I wanted to convey immediately, then I have failed in taking my own advice as part of this. That was a very laborious part of the process was analyzing every single pixel, every single word on that. So yeah, if anybody's thinking about writing a book, this is a fun topic. I really enjoyed it. I don't recommend writing a book about this because every single thing you do is going to be analyzed to make sure that you are also following the simplicity.

8:35We worked with a number of clients over the years that they would write books about nutrition and exercise and diet leadership. Nobody is reading your diet book and also knows what you had for breakfast that morning, but they'll read your book about communication and understand, is this a good book? Is this a person who had to communicate? So yeah, it was a very intense process. Yeah. Who are some brands out there that are really good at simple messages and simple branding. Easy to, like you get it, you understand it. And I don't know if you have any examples of maybe notorious examples of messages maybe they didn't work so well because it was just like, what?

9:16Oh yeah. I mean, there's a ton of these. I try to actually pull ones that are marketing related and ones that are not marketing related. It's cliche to use Apple as an example because they're just so good. They're an outlier. And I actually, in my class, I banned my students from using Apple's examples because it's just, it's too easy. But it's hard to think of a better illustration of benefits than the way Apple talked about the iPod when it was first introduced. They didn't talk about it has this many gigabytes, has this many pixels, has this much megahertz on the chip. They said it's a thousand songs in your pocket.

9:50It's not about what the features are. It's about what the benefits are. It's a thousand songs in your pocket. And at the same time, Microsoft was stumbling over and over again. And they had the Zune, which if anybody remembers that, it was this horrible product. And it was music the way it wants to be, right? That was one of their many slogans they had for it. It doesn't make any sense. It's just a bunch of nice words that you're putting together. But a thousand songs in your pocket, concrete, simple, beneficial, simple. And then my other favorite one that I like to bring up when I talk about both an example of salience and empathy, but I think it's maybe a little more the empathy.

10:24FedEx for years when they first launched, what was their slogan? It is when it absolutely positively has to be there overnight. They didn't say, you know, hey, overnight shipping guaranteed. They didn't talk like a stiff brand. They talked like a person. When it absolutely positively has to be there overnight. That is how you can imagine their customer, who's somebody sitting in an office somewhere, was what they're saying, right? And I can imagine how that's how they're talking. So those two, I think, are great examples that illustrate some of these elements. Yeah. I still remember that FedEx.

10:55I have an association with what is FedEx. Oh, that's when it absolutely, you know, regardless, I mean, I've used, you know, the post office, I've used UPS, I use them all the time. But, you know, it's like when it's life or death, it's like, it's going on FedEx. I, you know, just because again, good, good branding, good marketing, good messaging. So let's think of maybe why this might be helpful in our personal lives. In addition to maybe just professional examples, can you kind of explain why this might be a good adage for how we show up in relationships with our friends, family, and so forth.

11:29Definitely. I can tell you a story about my dentist. So I've always had bad luck with my teeth. And I go to my dentist one day after neglecting to go for a long time. I'm sitting there having some very painful procedure done. And the dentist goes, well, you only have to floss the teeth you want to keep. And I said, well, that's, that is a good line. As soon as he said that starting that day, I have flossed every single day because that, again, talk about empathy, it met me where I was, right? It's direct. It was different than everything else that I heard before. It's not saying, oh, you used to floss twice daily below the gum line to prevent plaque buildup.

12:06Oh, that's nice. All that makes sense. That's correct. But something that broke through was that sentence, which is you only have to floss the teeth you want to keep. And I put that up there with the FedEx one, with the Apple one, as a proof positive in the power of simple messaging. Yeah. So Ben, we kind of talked just a bit about the book. It's available on Amazon now and everywhere else. It's called Simply Put, Why Clear Messages Win and How to Design Them. Who should be reading this book and what would you expect the transformation to happen by the end of its reading and application? So the book, yeah, it was certainly available Amazon, Barnes & Noble, wherever books are sold.

12:47It is going to live on a business shelf. It's going to live in the marketing shelf of a bookstore. However, it is something that is broadly applicable to anybody who is a leader, who is an entrepreneur, who could be an advocate, a faith leader, anybody that has some, in some capacity has to inform or persuade. And that's a lot of us. That's almost everybody. And so, you know, I don't want to say, Hey, the books are everybody, But it's about if you want to become a better communicator, that's what this book is for. Yeah. I also want to, on your website, bengutman.com, so it's two T's, two N's. When folks go there, it looks like you have some pretty good resources along with a three simple things message or email.

13:31Any other resources that you'd recommend? Yeah, I would say if anybody's interested in signing up, I'd love to have you on in my community there. I send an email every Tuesday. That is something for me, something from somebody else, and an interesting idea to think about. So those are the three simple things. I'd love that. It's free. It comes once a week. And there's a few other things you can check out on my website there if you're interested, some different downloads. Or you can connect to me on LinkedIn, and I post and share stuff there on a regular basis. You speak on this as well. Who do you speak for?

14:02And obviously, I would hope the messaging is, again, kind of simplicity and communication. but do you want to share just a bit about your speaking experience? Absolutely. So I speak all the time because I am a adjunct professor of marketing at Baruch College. And I love that. If anybody's thinking about teaching, go teach. It's the best thing. So I'm very, very comfortable and experienced doing that. I've also hosted a number of meetups. I've spoken to different meetups. I've presented different corporations and business groups and nonprofits and conferences. I am passionate about sharing both the stuff in this book as well as other topics.

14:40And any way which I can do that, if that's the written word, if that's getting up on stage, I am happy to do that. You do some consulting as well. Absolutely. So I ran a marketing agency for 10 years. It was a ton of fun and I sold it. I sold it about a year ago. And since then I've been working with a few select clients on different projects. And if you're interested in collaborating on something, please reach out for sure. But not like a big upsell here. Hopefully, this is a book that a lot of people will enjoy. And if you want to keep in touch, reach me on my email, reach me on LinkedIn. And this book is not meant to be something that is just trying to push people into some other kind of trap.

15:20So I hope that people enjoy it for what it is. It's the be all end all. Ben Gutman, again, your book simply put why clear messages win and how to design them, your website, bengutman.com. Ben, thank you so much for joining us. Thanks for having me, Josh. This has been a blast.

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