Subscribe in a readerAre you doing the one thing that destroys more opportunities than anything else does?? It's a big problem for highly technical companies selling complex solutions, it seems the more knowledge it takes to deliver a service the more you'll face this. Fortunately, you can easily over come this obstacle when you know why it's such a problem.William Butler Yeats. "Think like a wise man but communicate in the language of the people." [Motivational Quotes of the Day]
The problem that whittles away hard-earned profits in all areas of your business is overly complicating communications by speaking in a language customers don't understand. This isn't about speaking Chinese when your audience speaks English, while that's a challenge; it's a problem when what you say doesn't automatically have meaning to your intended audience.
Often professionals use language - including terms, expressions, and acronyms - that has one meaning inside their industry but have little or no meaning to their customer. To address this disconnect help the customer understand your language through education, translation, or by simplifying your message.
Educating your customers about how you describe certain aspects of your solution may help them understand what they are purchasing, but this method takes the most time and effort on your part. It could take months to make customers experts in your industry, or to have a limited understanding of different concepts related to your complex solution. Do you have this kind of time?
Other problems occur when you translate internal language into terms that customers readily understand. You may not convey the full meaning of your message or the complete the value of your solution without repeat interactions. Even then, a certain level of knowledge is required on a customer's part to put your message in a useful context.
While simplifying your message is an option, messages are often dumb down to almost meaningless babble that makes customers feel stupid.
Unfortunately, some companies feel this makes them look more intelligent and builds a dependence on them when customers remain uninformed. The opposite is true, customers will move along to another provider if they don't understand what you're doing for them.
It's important for customers to understand detailed aspects of your solution because it helps them:
To avoid losing relevant meaning, work more on creating a dialog with customers that increases listening while sharing information incrementally. Like a conversation, provide customer directed communications in small parts with intervals to listen for feedback that helps improve your message delivery.
Your language could actually be repelling opportunities to grow your business - how can you improve your marketing message and strategic communications to make it easier for customers to understand?
/ clearly-communicate | earning-trust /
By Justin Hitt at May 14, 2004 11:23 AM
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