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Marketing and content trends, tools, and tips that are always one step ahead of leading edge


Show, don’t tell
Wednesday September 03rd 2008, 2:42 pm
Filed under: Bill Golden, Content Strategy

It’s safe to say that every marketer wants his or her customers to figure out that a certain brand is right for them. By that I mean reach the conclusion on their own, through an emotional connection that says, “Yes! This is the product or company for me.” Implicit in this truth is that customers can’t be told to connect with a brand. They must be discreetly led to the conclusion, usually through deftly chosen words and images.

I’m working with a client to do this right now. I won’t lie, it’s tough. Distilling values, ideas, and attributes down to a few short, pithy sentences is hard. But fortunately, we all learned how to do this in our freshman fiction-writing class in college. It’s all about showing, not telling. To move your readers, don’t say it was a sad day for the grieving mother. Show her sad eyes, inconsolable expression, and heavy heart. So that’s the strategy, though how exactly we get there is still under discussion. And who says a degree in English doesn’t prepare you for the business world…? —Bill Golden, managing editor



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