“I can’t read cursive.”
That was the shamefaced confession spoken by a restaurant hostess when she couldn’t find our name on the reservation list.
Even looking at it upside down, I had no trouble spotting “Jillian” in the looping longhand of this poor young lady’s devilish co-host.
But we’re not here to talk about the lost art of penmanship.
Our brief encounter reminded me …
Something that might be crystal clear to you could be complete gibberish to someone else.
Maybe not in the literal unreadable sense. But if your message doesn’t resonate with your audience, you may as well have written it in hieroglyphics.
That’s why you should never release your marketing into the wild until it passes through a handful of people for their feedback.
Ideally, you want the early opinions of members of your target audience.
But if they’re not available or you’re pressed for time, have a few colleagues share their thoughts.
You’re not looking for compliments. You want to know things like: if your opening is bland, what seems confusing, where your reader gets bored, if the copy doesn’t flow smoothly, and if you’re making a promise … is it believable or not?
Their criticism, however harsh, will help you make a stronger impression out there where it counts. So, tell them to be ruthless.
That’s what Dan Kennedy does.
If you don’t know Dan, he’s one of the world’s most brilliant marketers.
Even without a fancy college degree, he gets paid between $50,000 and $2 million (plus royalties) for some of his campaigns.
If you’ve ever seen the infomercials for Proactiv® acne products, that’s Dan’s work.
As a part of his exhaustive research, Dan hired a dozen freelance readers from his three target audience groups—teens, parents of teens, and young women—to critique his copy.
Talking about his process in his book, The Ultimate Sales Letter, Dan tells us:
“Acquiring a deep understanding of the target customer should not be short-changed … It’s an investment of time and energy in crawling inside their psyche, tribal language, and daily experiences.”
As you can imagine, crawling inside someone’s psyche takes effort. And a big breakfast.
So, you might be thinking you can keep getting by without poking around in your prospect’s dome. And maybe you can.
After all, who among us can relate to the work habits of someone who makes $2 million for a single campaign? Plus royalties.
But maybe this will help. It’s my favorite passage from the Book of David.
“Be more ambitious. Try to hit the ball out of the park every time. Don’t bunt. Compete with the immortals. You won’t always succeed but reach for the stars anyway.”
– David Ogilvy
That’s gotta make you feel good.
Because if an Englishman who lived in a medieval French chateau can land two baseball references, there’s no telling what you can achieve when you just speak your customers’ language.
Batter up, buttercup.
Here’s a song to play you out >>>
See you next time. — Matt
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