Mark Hurst fills my email inbox each week with a lesson on customer experience. He’s been echoing the same message for over a decade. For people who have followed him that entire time, it may seem like old hat. But every day, there’s a new person out there who’s just discovering the notion of the customer experience and why it’s important and what they can do about it.
Thomas Friedman keeps has written column after column (and a book) about the need for a “Green Revolution.” Are some readers tired of it? Sure. But others are just coming to the message now.
Warren Buffett doesn’t worry about delivering shiny, new, exciting ideas in his annual letters to shareholders. He just keeps hammering away at the same themes that have guided him throughout his investment life.
Reaching the new class
In REWORK, we talk about how you need to be willing to let your customers outgrow you. There are more people who are not using your product than people who are; You need to make sure you make it easy for these people to get on board. That’s where your continued growth potential lies.
It’s the same for your marketing message. There may be .0001% who have read everything you’ve ever written and who want you to deliver something brand new. Follow their wishes and you’ll wind up with a tiny audience of experts while excluding the 99.9999% of people who have no idea who you are or what you think.
There’s a new batch of freshmen every year. Every day, there’s a new person discovering you for the first time. If your message is simple and accessible, they can become fans. If it’s geared exclusively to PhD candidates, these freshmen will never latch onto you.
A drop in the bucket
It’s also wise to keep in mind that it takes multiple mentions for an idea to really sink in. For most of those who follow you, your ideas are just a drop in the information overload bucket. That’s why you need to keep plugging away.
Marketing something is akin to being Andy Dufresne in The Shawshank Redemption chipping away at his cell wall. Like Andy, you’re not gonna dig a tunnel overnight. It’s going to take years. You need to hammer away at the same point in the wall to get anywhere. If you keep changing spots every week, you’re never going to break out.
Honing your message
Plus, you keep getting better at making your point(s). You can’t just expect to say it perfectly out of the gate and then never have to repeat it again. The first time you say something, you get to guage its impact. If you hit on something, you can start refining it. It’ll keep getting better. A blog post can lead to a conference presentation which can lead to an interview which can lead to a magazine article which can lead to a book. And each step of the way, the message will get tighter and clearer.
Your foundation is your foundation
Doubling down on a message is how you take a stand. Of course, you don’t want to sound like a broken record. You should find new angles and new ways to present those ideas. But remember it’s ok to keep plugging away at the same themes when you really believe them because, well, they’re what you really believe. The way you get to be the Buffett of your message is by sticking to it.
Sean McCambridge
on 09 Jun 10Awesome post. I’ve noticed it works for you guys.
Carin Galletta
on 09 Jun 10This is a great reminder for entrepreneurs and marketing pros as it can get boring to keep hammering away month after month, year after year on a consistent theme, but so critical to success.
Thanks for the post.
Cheers,
Carin
Noam
on 09 Jun 10Awesome post. Thanks!
Scott Miller
on 09 Jun 10Great message. Its been my experience that it’s much tougher for the startup to “stay on message”. There is the inherent insecurity of wondering if the message will resonate. It takes willpower to stick with the original message while waiting for feedback.
Living this as we speak!
Martin Edic
on 09 Jun 10As a writer and marketing person I could not agree more. The only thing I’d change would be to replace ‘PhD candidates’ with ‘MBAs’.
Leonel
on 09 Jun 10Repetition is the mother of retention
Jake B
on 09 Jun 10Geeks just do not get this – myself included! Thanks for putting it so simply.
Isaac Priestley
on 09 Jun 10Friedman was also remarkably consistent about the need to stay in Iraq “6 more months”.
He said that for years on end!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Friedman_(unit)
Funny, he wasn’t so consistent about how important it was for Iraqis to “Suck. On. This.”: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HOF6ZeUvgXs
If I had made such a public, shameful fool of myself as Friedman consistently has, I probably wouldn’t want to hammer that message home either.
Nathan Kontny
on 09 Jun 10Totally. I’ve brought you guys up a few times as a great example of doing this and just recently blogged about it. A couple other examples you might dig are looking at this way of teaching from Richard Feynman.
Some people need the same message but different ways. So staying on message but exploring new ways of saying it podcast, blogging, conference, video, analogies, etc. is a good way of even teaching the current audience who just isn’t getting it yet.
And on the point “It’s also wise to keep in mind that it takes multiple mentions for an idea to really sink in.” You might dig this study Nielsen did on Facebook. Awareness about a brand jumped from 13% to 28% when someone was exposed to a message 10 or more times on Facebook. Just another piece of evidence that people need to hear something sometimes very often before they start to remember it or it has an impact.
Ken
on 09 Jun 10Saying the same thing in different ways, not only through different media, is another way to consistently approach this. There’s also a point where you can incrementally build on a concept by adding a little bit more with each repetition. It’s old and yet there’s also something fresh about it. Finally, consistency and repetition only work well when there’s also clarity. Personally, I think the movie producers kept Andy Dufresne in the same prison cell just to keep a rein on the production location costs. He could have chipped to freedom way sooner had he realy wanted to. :>)
Mark Hurst
on 15 Jun 10It’s a rare privilege to be mentioned alongside Thomas Friedman & Warren Buffett – by 37signals, no less! And yes, I’ll keep hammering away at the message. Thanks for your encouragement.
This discussion is closed.