There’s nothing quite like a verb! Verbs represent action and movement; they are about doing. Even more important, they allow you to see yourself doing.We’ve talked extensively about how you must connect your customers to an emotional reality in which they can see themselves enjoying the benefits of what you have to offer, and in which they can see themselves taking the action you want them to take.

None of us takes action until we can grab on to a mental image of the consequences of taking that action. The fastest verbal way to tap into the emotional, imaginative abilities of our right brains is through verbs. No doubt about it … verbs can be your most powerful persuasive allies.

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When Pavlov trained his lab dogs to salivate on command of a ringing bell, he inadvertently set the stage for over a century’s worth of conditioning-based consumer messaging. In the early decades of the 20th century, characters such as J. B. Watson and Edward Bernays “proved” that when businesses rang the right bell the right number of times, they could conjure desire and action in their audience through branding alone.Even fifty years ago, media outlets were inherently limited by geography and scope. Because consumers lacked broad exposure to alternative experiences, need-based behavioral marketing held sway. Indeed, response in the baby boom-era – folks really did buy the most heavily marketed goods and services – seemed to prove that customers could be conditioned to salivate on command.

Yet the close of the 20th century has been a boiling point for media fragmentation. The advent of the Internet and wireless technologies gave everyone access to information anytime and anywhere. The blossoming of media placed an unprecedented amount of information in the hands of customers, rendering geographic barriers moot. Most importantly, this sea change empowered customers to focus on what’s relevant to them and ignore the rest.

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