Dana VanDen Heuvel links to a Business Week article titled: Five Words to Never Use in an Ad. Hmm, interesting…what are those words?
- Quality
- Value
- Service
- Caring
- Integrity
(I already wrote about the problem with the word quality earlier this year.)
Why not use them?
The author of the article, Steve McKee, says “Using common words that have become empty cliches is a shortcut to nowhere. Just because you sell it doesn’t mean people will buy it.” Dana says they are okay to use if they are backed up with specifics.
B2Blog says:
I think these words are actually buckets that the prospect needs to fill up with answers and information before they buy from you. In that sense they ARE powerful words. Dana’s right that you need to give them specifics to put in the bucket. And Steve is right that just mentioning the words only reminds prospects that the bucket is empty–you can’t fill the bucket with the word ‘best’.
So go ahead and use these bucket-words in planning your marketing, but I’d go with Steve’s recommendation and not actually use them.