What is the one word description of your business?
The classic advice has been to define the essence of your marketing or business in a short, pithy description that could be literally given in an elevator ride. Today, “elevator pitches” are predictable, passé and boring. The age of Twitter requires 140 characters or less. The very best strip down to bare bones and can communicate the essence of their brand in a word. That’s right, a single word … what’s yours?
Crafting a “Dumbwaiter Pitch” – Owning just one word
Over the last couple of decades, I have been a part of crafting “pitches” too numerous to count! The strategy for crafting an “elevator pitch” is to net out the basic premise into a simple statement … one that you can literally explain to anyone on an elevator ride of 60 seconds or less.
In a recent blog post for HBR (Harvard Business Review), Umair Haque makes the case that elevator pitches have become too canned, predictable and ineffective. He argues that we now need a “Dumbwaiter Pitch” – literally a single word description that captures the essence of your idea, business and brand. Haque asserts:
“In simplicity lie the seeds of explosively powerful propositions … In complexity, only confusion, incoherence and [lack of] competitiveness.”
The “dumbwaiter pitch” of owning a single word is powerful, because it cuts through obfuscation beloved by so many boardrooms and managers. Getting to a single word cuts to the chase and defines the “essence” … the real value proposition in consumer terms.
Defining and “owning” a Word is NOT easy!
What is the single word that defines “Coke”? It used to be “Real Thing” … ok that’s two words, but it evolved to “Real”. Being real was certainly better than the current “Open Happiness” that replaced it. The latest rumor is that Coke’s slogan has regressed to: “Twist the Cap to Refreshness”. Is “refreshness” even a word? My spell checker doesn’t think so! How many consumers like you think of Coke as “refreshness”? If it requires a pitch to explain the “word,” which is confusing, muddled or nonexistent, that is NOT a good place to start or be top of mind.
Foursquare has been getting some press recently. What is Foursquare in a word? If Foursquare’s word is “connecting”, there are already many social networks associated with the business of connecting friends, business, etc. Foursquare’s website uses “check-in with friends”, but that sounds more like the essence of Facebook. To become successful, Foursquare needs a word that both defines what they are, and why consumers should care (need/value).
It’s not the “slogan” … you must EARN the word association
Forget the campaign or advertising slogans. Ad agencies are in the business of frequently changing them to justify their existence! Ad agencies and marketers would probably in fact argue that a single word is too simplistic, restrictive or unrealistic.
In contrast, Haque argues that the successful, breakthrough and sustainable companies have earned a powerful association with a single word that their core consumers highly value:
Google à search
Facebook à network (or social)
Twitter à alerts
Lego à creativity
Apple à design (or innovation)
In contrast the examples above, what “word” has Microsoft earned to own in the eyes of consumers?
Microsoft might claim “Software”, but that is ubiquitous and can be claimed by many. “Platform” might be claimed on the corporate side, but that is not a word from the eyes of the consumer. “Search” – Bing has made some in-roads, but Google still owns it for most. Right, wrong, or indifferent, the one word that Microsoft clearly owns with consumers is “Windows”. Microsoft would do well to leverage what “windows” can mean as a metaphor for consumer potential value, versus defining a core product’s features.
OK … What is our word?
We have been working on our word for the past 27 years. Our “words” are reflected in the name of this blog – Results Count. But, if we had to choose just one, it would be RESULTS.
The bottom line is not what we choose … our essence and brand is defined by whether we have earned the right with our clients to be remembered in association with producing Results that count.
Weird sidebar … “Grease is the Word”
As I was writing this post, I couldn’t help but hum the tune to the song “Grease is the Word”. But, I defy any of you to remember the words beyond the title of the song. It was driving me nuts, so I had to go look up the refrain:
Grease is the word.
Grease is the word, is the word that you heard.
It’s got groove, it’s got meaning.
Grease is the time, is the place is the motion.
Grease is the way we are feeling.
I never understood why “Grease” was the word … but the refrain of the song certainly captures the essence of one word marketing “mystique”. In the eyes of the consumer, Apple, Facebook, Google, Twitter own the word(s) that have “got groove … got meaning … and capture the way consumers are feeling”.
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