Attract and Retain Talent and Customers...A Story, A Problem, The Answer.
As a quick refresher, our last topic debunked the old saying, “It’s not personal. It’s just business.”
Using anecdote and data, we concluded that business is absolutely one of the most personal things in our lives!
We also covered what we can do to make that knowledge usable and valuable for our businesses.
(In case you missed it, get it here.)
Ok. So moving on to today’s pearl…
It’s a story at the intersection of music and message. And you can rest assured you will get value for:
attracting and retaining talent,
attracting and nurturing prospects and customers.
I’ve been married for nearly 24 years (with all praise to Lord Jesus, and much gratitude to a patient wife…yes, just one wife).
In this nearly quarter century of bliss is the theme that I routinely get music lyrics wrong.
If I’m not mumbling through a pre-chorus, I’m sure to get something wrong in the chorus.
My most recent “miss” is with the song Old Town Road. It’s a cool little song from the little know genre of Country Rap.
Anyway, this miss was particularly bad because the lyrics are perfectly clear. But instead of singing “I’m gonna ride till I can’t no more”, I sang “I’m gonna ride till the cows come home”.
Of course my wife does not get any words wrong to any song…ever. But she’s a classically trained music person…a maven.
This maven is also mom to two daughters, of whom our youngest (16) is musically gifted.
This gifted child had the “opportunity” to share in this creative sing-a-long of Old Town Road.
There are no words to describe her face when she heard my “version”. But since it all went down during a drive, this gif pic of Adel might give you an idea…
So, what does this story have to do with using a B2B Brand Voice, to earn and nurture trust…and eventually trigger an exchange in mutual value?
While it’s not a scientific anecdote, it does bring light to the fact that perception is reality for many people.
Yes, I began this email debunking one cliche, only to go on and use a different one. But cliche does not automatically equal false (or true)!
Just stay with me here as we ferret this out a bit more.
Music, by design, is meant to make an immediate, deeply personal connection to the listener.
If a listener can screw up something like the message and meaning of music, even when he really likes said music, how safe is a B2B brand message from a similar fate?
Look, we know business is always personal.
That means we need to connect personally to our audience (customers, prospects, employees, partners, board members, shareholders).
But B2B brands have a high bar in making that happen because they solve complex problems.
And that complexity reflects back on the Brand Voice making it difficult to create messaging that the audience can easily understand, much less be personally relatable.
Unfortunately, complexity isn’t the only obstacle. There are 2 other reasons why the bar is so high.
1) Tradition.
Although our audience is biologically wired to value their personal WHYs, they have no more insight on how to construct brand messaging in a way that resonates for them around their personal WHYs than anyone else.
But they know it when they see it. We all do.
Not to put too fine a point on it, Henry Ford had an interesting take on this topic,
“If I had asked people what they wanted, they would have said faster horses.”
Most brands and the people who represent them (including your audience) are hamstrung by Tradition. Traditional brand messaging, and even current adaptations of brand storytelling, too often produce a brand brag roll.
Intentional or not, most brand messaging features the brand WHAT (products and services), HOW (processes), WHO (internal team), and maybe even the brand WHY…
…all through the lens of the brand rather than the audience. Again, brag roll.
Although widely accepted as best practice, traditional brand messaging actually creates obstacles to earning trust.
Anyone here want to have a conversation with the bragger at the party?
This is not to suggest the WHAT, HOW, and WHO are not important. But there’s a right way to prioritize and message the information.
In the traditional way, audiences have to work too hard to wade through the brand stuff to create their own personal connection to their WHYs.
Interestingly, this “look-at-me” approach is rampant in the brand and marketing agency space.
And I hate it…and love it. This truth was a big part of why I started Lumotiv.
Yes, so I could help people make a better way for their brands. But also so I could have an edge in competing…and winning.
Hire us. Seriously. You will get exponential value. (You gotta through out a hook once in a while!)
But first, let’s land the plane on this who tradition thing, because there’s another troubling layer.
It’s easy to get wooed into thinking the Brand Voice is effective by falling victim to the lure of two things: attractive design and professional tone.
Attractive design and professional tone are good things…as long as they are supporting the right Brand Voice (AudienceLens).
But too often they create the Matrix effect.
You think your company is in this sublime life. But it’s all an illusion. The reality is that you’re just an unconscious human battery in a pod of goo managed by machines.
2) Brands Over People.
One easily correctable thing is the promotion of brands over people.
Let’s think specifically about case studies and customer stories.
Too often brands place emphasis on the brand of the customer, that is the company and/or their product.
Why?
Well, from a practical usability perspective, brands are easier to maintain and use in marketing. Ok, but that doesn’t equal effective.
Also, connecting our brands to certain bigger, more recognizable name brands (i.e. Google, Microsoft, etc.), is a widely accepted practice used to create credibility.
But that kind of appeal rarely triggers the decision-making part of our minds. (If you want evidence on this conclusion, I’m happy to take a call.)
Furthermore, bigger is not always better. Big brands are often polarizing. It’s unnecessary, and frankly, unnecessarily dangerous for your brand.
The smarter play is to feature the person(s) within the brand.
In the B2B space, people buy from people. And they want to relate to other people and their stories. Our brains are literally wired for this kind of engagement.
Ok. So what do we do to overcome these obstacles (complexity, tradition, and brands over people)?
First, test to see if you have a problem.Since you’ve made it this far, there’s a good chance one of these obstacles is negatively effecting the Brand Voice and making it harder than it has to be to…
attract and retain talent,
attract and nurture prospects and customers.
Here’s a simple self-test:
Visit your website.
Are the people featured (primarily customers, then employees)?
Do you get a feel that their voice is prominent?
Is it really their voice or the brand’s voice speaking for them?
Does the messaging feature their results, and does it feel inviting?
If your self-test reveals concerns, share your concerns and consider exploring a way to defeat them…so you and your company can become better at…
attracting and retaining talent,
attracting and nurturing customers and prospects.
Keep in mind, our websites represent the message of our Brand Voice. And our voice comes from our mind. Any real change must FIRST occur in the six inches between our ears.
Here’s to better thinking, as better thinking comes before better doing.
Best,
Peter
Peter A Snell
Founder and CEO