My friend and brilliant copywriter, Chris Maddock, frequently exhorts his writing students to “Just say the thing.”  This advice is based upon Chris’s extensive experience in what’s working right now for radio ads – and just as importantly,  what’s no longer working for any type of copywriting.

Google and the Internet have trained us to ruthlessly sort for relevance, and we now demand messaging formatted for, and adapted to, rapid sorting.  If visitors can’t get on your website, perform a 7-second scan and immediately see exactly:

• what it is you do,
• what your offering, and
• why they should care,

those visitors will leave.   Basically, you’ve gotta “just say the thing”  (after which of course you still need to go on to close the loopholes, substantiate your claims, provide rich content, etc).  And these web preferences have spilled out onto our demands for traditional media as well.

Great creative enhances the clarity and power of your message…

…But often times, the finished product won’t necessarily “feel” creative.  Non-copywriters will tell you it’s too plain.  No one will be impressed.  Even visitors might not be impressed- yet they’ll convert!

Here’s a perfect example of that:

So first a caveat: this Kodak landing page isn’t perfect.  As an incentive for already established Kodak Gallery members, it’s a strong offer.  But Kodak has left themselves an out/loophole by reserving the right to end the free shipping beta program.  And this kills its ability to draw new members.

Frankly, I don’t want to upload all my photos to their gallery based on the promise of free shipping, only to then have the free shipping yanked away from me.  How much better would it be if they had a free shipping Opt-In program for new and existing members, a program you automatically join with any $12 or higher purchase from their gallery, and a guarantee from Kodak to continue to honor free shipping privileges for all existing members of the program even if they end the program.

Nevertheless, the thing to concentrate on here is how simply they just laid out the deal right in the headline.  The copy just says “the thing” and it’s straight-up about their intentions.  Also, notice how stunningly clear the comparison chart is.  Not fancy, just brilliantly clear in conveying shipping savings available through Kodak Gallery.

And even though no one will remark on what brilliant writing Kodak’s copywriter cranked out, or on how freaking cool the graphic designers chart is, both the copy and the chart are remarkably effective.

The trick is to not let the “plain” style fool you.  Just test it against copy with more snap, crackle and pop.  Test it against a prettier graphic, or against whatever “feels” right to you.  Over time, when clarity consistently wins out in your A/B tests, what “feels” right to you will change – and you’ll start writing much more effective copy.

[Editors Note:  The author of this article is now blogging at jeffsextonwrites.com]

I asked the question: did Fastmac.com bury this information on its site to increase conversion? Well, the folks at Fastmac.com read my story and sent me their official response.

Hi Bryan,

I saw your recent post and wanted to let you know that I’ve updated our site to make it clear that the item is currently sold out.

It was not our intention to mislead anyone.

If you have any other feedback just let us know…we do listen.

The change they made is clearly a step in the right direction. Take a look.

When they finally made the change, it looked good and it will serve Fastmac.com better than its previous version of this page. On the back end, in the account order status section, Fastmac.com could use “back order” as an additional status instead of the “in-process” status that I got.

Fastmac.com could have done worse. We’ve all had much more unsavory buying experiences.

It also could have done much better.

In showing the follow-up e-mail around the office, some of my colleagues were more angry about Fastmac.com’s short and almost defensive response. At the least, Fastmac.com should have tried to save the sale, with some sort of offer to put a battery on hold for me until after they were in stock, or even offer a small discount if I came back. (Keep in mind, I’d still do business with Fastmac and continue to recommend the site to others. It’s just that I would like to share lessons learned from this one hiccup.)

Readers also felt Fastmac.com should have done more on its site and in its response to the situation. Readers (many of them retailers) shared an assortment of opinions; most agreed that Fastmac.com should have done more and that I wasn’t asking too much.

Here’s a spattering of the responses:

I agree completely that the information about it being out of stock should be next to the add to cart button or in the shopping cart. However even if that information is presented, not all customers read it anyway. We put stock info right above the add to cart button, in the shopping cart, and give them an estimated ship date in the shopping cart and on the checkout confirmation page and the purchase receipt. In this situation you described it definitely should have been more clearly labeled, that is just misleading. — Keith Winter

While their placement is certainly not choice, they did provide you with this information before you plunked down your $99. You simply chose not to read the whole page of info, so the burden really rests on you in this case in my opinion. — Rick Dendy

I realize companies would still prefer to take the order even if it’s out of stock but why not make it clearer and add alternatives. Change the call to action language to “backorder” and add options to reserve without purchase or be notified when back in stock. This would probably save many of the sales they would have lost through being more transparent and, more importantly, it would not risk the brands reputation. — Brian Bond

Though I would consider having availability status clearly posted a best practice, what bothers me most about your experience isn’t the lack of clear out of stock posting but the bad customer service. In a situation like this an email stating out of stock and estimated delivery time could have saved you waiting the week out in vain. — Karen Daniels

Sure you can get a few conversions here and there from less than stellar service, but in the long run you lose. — MobyMom

I was a little underwhelmed with the dry response you received from the customer service representative. It may as well have been written by an android. — Molly Martinez

And finally Pat, an online retailer, shared what his company does and why:

We’ve set up all product pages to show either the quantity in inventory or the ‘product is out of stock’ message right next to the add to cart button. If a customer tries to add the items to cart, they get an out of stock message. We don’t allow backorders but we are working on adding functionality to ‘email me when this item is back in stock’.

I feel kinda strongly about this after placing an order last holiday season — it was for items that had to be personalized so the order took me forever to complete. Not once did the Web site mention that the items were all on back order. I happened to see an ‘estimated shipping date’ on the emailed invoice and called to find out about the backorder.

That was sleazy.

The interesting thing about Pat’s story is what motivated him to make this a policy on his product pages — his own experience and ability to empathize for those in a similar situation on his own site. It’s a wonderful place to start optimizing. Think of the worst things you’ve experienced on other sites, and then make absolutely sure you aren’t committing the same crime on yours.

I’ll wrap up with more of reader Molly Martinez’s comment:

Transparency is definitely a quality customers appreciate. And if companies don’t catch on to that, they are bound to lose customers in droves at a time.

Can I get an amen?

“790 Leftover Ulsters At A Big Discount!Dear Sir:In the rush and excitement of selling, in the past two months, of 21,000 “Keep Warm” Winter Ulsters – there was no time to pay attention to exactly how sizes and colors were running.The result is that now, with the season near its end, we find ourselves with 790 coats left over – in all sizes – BUT WITHOUT A COMPLETE RANGE OF SIZES IN ANY ONE COLOR!There are dark grays and blues and beautiful brown heather-mixtures, in Greatcoats that we sold in the past all the way up to $47.00 – really handsome colors, all of them – but we can’t be sure of having your exact size in the color you specify.” 

And for a modern update on that, check out Roy William’s brilliant bit of web copy for vactionlikekings.com:

“You’ve seen the condos in Myrtle Beach that overlook the ocean.Rich people own those. And when they’re not using them, we rent them out to nice families like yours for about the same prices you’ve been paying for hotel rooms.Put yourself in their shoes.The condo is paid for and empty.Why not let it generate a few bucks?Now put yourself in their condo.We’re Condotels. Our job is to welcome you upon your arrival in Myrtle Beach and hand you the keys to your luxury condo. It’s as easy as staying in a hotel. But better. A lot better. VacationLikeKings.com” 

What you’ll find in both excerpts is a skillful use of transparency. The copy very quickly tells the reader WHY the company is able to offer them such a good deal. It’s not enough just to say what’s in it for the reader, because compelling offers will inevitably raise the questions: “Yeah, but how can they do that? What’s in it for them?”


Notice how the first letter also does a fabulous job of raising the downside as a means of lending credibility to the upside. The very fact that not all colors are available in all sizes lends legitimacy to the “left over stock” explanation.*People are rightfully cynical. They want to know all the angles. Provide that to them through a transparent explanation. Once they believe your explanation, they’ll have gained a world of confidence in your offer.


3. Specificity


Specifics force themselves into the reader’s imagination while generalities remain handcuffed to the hard-nosed intellect. Engaging the imagination more easily creates emotions, like confidence. This is called the vividness effect and it’s why specifics are more believable then generalities.


Dan and Chip Heath provide an excellent, specific example of this in their book, Made to Stick. They cite psychological research wherein two groups of jurors where presented with eight arguments fore and against a mother accused of parental neglect.The difference between the two groups was the level of detail in those arguments. One group, heard supporting arguments with vivid detail and arguments against the mother’s fitness that were unadorned with any extra details. The other group heard the opposite combination.


As an example of the kind of vivid details included or left out of the arguments, the book provides the following:

“…An argument against Mrs. Johnson was: ‘The child went to school with a badly scraped arm which Mrs. Johnson had not cleaned or attended to. The school nurse had to clean the scrape.’ The vivid form added the detail that, as the nurse was cleaning the scrape, she spilled Mercurochrome on herself, staining the uniform red.The researchers carefully tested the arguments with and without vivid details to ensure that they had the same perceived importance – the details were designed to be irrelevant to the judgment of Mrs. Johnson’s worthiness. It mattered that Mrs. Johnson didn’t attend to the scraped arm; it didn’t matter that the nurse’s uniform got stained in the process.” 

And the results? On average 1.5 more jurors (out of 10) voted for the arguments with the irrelevant details than the arguments without them. We’re talking about a 15% increase in “conversion” – just from the inclusion of a few irrelevant specifics. Now imagine the impact of relevant, specific details to your copy’s credibility.


4. Proof


Proof overlaps a bit with Transparency and Specifics, but it’s an all-important aspect of confidence-building. In fact, it’s so important, I wrote a series of posts on how to transform un-substantiate claims into confidence-inspiring proof.Here’s a quick summary:

• You say you’re the best ______ on the net – says who? And by what criteria? How are you measuring it? How can I test these claims myself?
• Answer the previous question with fact-based and falsifiable statements.
• When possible, show me through a demonstration. Dramatize the benefit.

5. Readability


We do indeed come from a “fragmented MTV rap video culture,” causing us to flee the mere prospect of having to read dense blocks of text. And that goes double for overly complex or jargon-filled text. This makes the readability of your landing pages crucial. And I’d break that down into two aspects:

• Formatting. Use short paragraphs not to exceed 5 stacked lines. Use headlines, sub-heads, bullets, and bolding. Make sure your page is skimmable and scanable and that your key or trigger words are featured within your headlines, bolded text, and hyperlinks.
• Speaking your customer’s language. Avoid we-we language. Speak about “you,” and in terms of customer’s desired benefits rather than product features. Don’t assume your readers are familiar with your industry’s jargon and technical terms. Don’t use more than one buzz-word per sentence. Keep things as conversational as you can get away with.

So there you have it. Cover those 5 bases and you’ll effectively transfer your confidence to your landing page’s readers – and be able to measure the difference in both your conversion rate and your wallet.


* Of course, the company may not have been truly transparent (they may have had plenty of colors in all sizes and just been itching to sell coats off-season), but the simulation of a full disclosure was enough to inspire confidence. That said, in today’s world of hyper-connectivity, I’d suggest you stick with genuine (vs. simulated) transparency. Editor’s Note: For more tips on increasing your landing page trust and credibility, sign up for our free webinar later today at 12pm EST.

“Consumers fundamentally misunderstand the rules of the marketplace,” said Chris Hoofnagle, senior staff attorney at the Samuelson Clinic at UC-Berkley’s Boalt School of Law, addressing a perceived apathy toward the subject. He cites studies in which up to 75% of consumers think as long as a site has a privacy policy it means it won’t share data with third parties. “They equate the presence of the policy with substantive privacy rules.”

How does this apply to your business? First of all, make your privacy statement clear and concise, e.g., “We value your privacy,” “We will not share your personal information — ever.” It’s also important that the trustmarks you use actually mean something to the customer (Bryan recently showed BizRate as an example).

Still, the need for brands to inspire confidence online is as vital as ever. (You may have noticed we’ve been covering trust issues quite a bit lately.) The latest evidence: McAfee’s plan to acquire ScanAlert for $51 million in cash.

Thank you for a very valuable information on the “About Us” page, good examples.

How about new companies or companies that are being created? Customers are skeptical to engage with new companies. What would be your advice in terms of what is the best content to put in it, what to highlight, if you do not have history and you are staring from the “garage” location?

What do you do as a start-up? What do you do if you don’t have a laundry list of credentials and an extensive track record?

Continue reading my column on ClickZ…

BusinessWeek’s Burt Helm noticed this gem of a Facebook comment:

“do people realize WHY prices are so low at Wal-Mart? cause THEY DO NO PAY LIVING WAGES to employees in America and THEIR CHINESE FACTORIES ARE BASICALLY SLAVERY.

WAL-MART IS HATEFUL AND IS A BLIGHT ON AMERICA.

Facebook should CUT ALL ITS TIES to Wal-Mart. GET WALMART OFF FACEBOOK!”

To which Helm adds:

I actually think it’s a good call on Wal-Mart’s part not to censor the page or take it down. This discussion is inevitable. And looking at the feed of comments now, it has actually spurred a pretty healthy bull session on Wal-Mart’s role in the U.S., with several students coming out in favor of the retailing giant. I think it’s smart PR for Wal-Mart to host this discussion, even it was totally inadvertent.

The retail giant seems happy to stay on the sidelines for now. Jami Arms, a spokesperson from Wal-Mart told Reuters:

“We recognize that we are facilitating a live conversation, and we know that in any conversation, especially one happening online, there will be both supporters and detractors” [...]

Still, PodTech’s Jeremiah Owyang thinks they should be more proactive:

[...] I highly recommend that Wal-Mart consider trying a community strategy using a transparent and authentic blog or video blog series that addresses the very brand issues that they are getting slammed on. I took at look online for a “Walmart blog” and didn’t see any from the company, why is this? It’s going to be very difficult to try a community marketing strategy with eCommerce hooks without first addressing the brand detractors.

Now I’m confused. How exactly could a blog be more transparent than this Frontline documentary on Wal-Mart? Could any company’s self-reflecting stab at “citizen journalism” be more transparent than that of objective, professional journalists?

Linking to our recent discussion on transparency, Copyblogger’s Brian Clark wonders if we really want authenticity in the first place:

[...] Some so-called business blogging experts think “keeping it real” is rule number one, even when it’s completely inappropriate.

The secret to effective marketing is to focus on the needs of others, rather than our own egocentric need to “authentically” express whatever we’re feeling at the moment. We teach that to our children, and yet we’re to believe it doesn’t apply to social media?

Where do we draw the line with transparency and authenticity when what people really want is a story that adds value to their lives? What if no one likes the real you?

It’s a good question. Wal-Mart brings a welcome dose of transparency in terms of product reviews, but the documentary finds their executives coming off as rigid ideologues who readily justify an NSA-style employee spying program, its contribution to America’s vast trade deficit with China, reports of bullying manufacturers, and a creative definition of the phrase “living wage” in terms of the company’s commitment to saving consumers money and increasing “shareholder value”.

Fortunately for Wal-Mart, its loudest critics don’t seem to shop there. It’s a good thing they can take the heat; they’ll need that attitude in order to stay on Facebook.

Has the brand people love to hate finally learned when to stay quiet? What do you think? Should they stay or should they go?

A few of my favorite revelations:

BBC censors excerpt from BBC-commissioned report criticizing the BBC’s tendency to self-censor. There may be some irony here.

Nortel – Accounting scandal, what accounting scandal?? This sweeping rewrite of Nortel’s page removes all mention of the 2000-2004 accounting scandal that resulted in investigations from the RCMP and the Attorney General, the CEO being fired for cause, numerous directors being shown the door, etc.

Ronald McDonald orders deletion of McDonald’s criticisms. They replaced the critical and best-selling book “Fast Food Nation” with the more friendly book “McDonald’s: Behind the Arches”. They also removed a link to anti-McDonald’s site “McSpotlight”.

Don’t be a Web 2.0 lemming!

Sure, Wikipedia is directionally helpful. For instance, I learned that lemmings aren’t suicidal, they’re just stupid. As you may know, the rumors of these rodents jumping off cliffs en masse are overstated. If you’re looking for myth coverage, Wikipedia’s the place to be. Meanwhile, MSN’s Encarta tells us that lemmings “…swim lakes and rivers, cross mountains, and eat all vegetation in their path. Eventually, some reach the sea; attempting to swim it as if it were a river, they are drowned.”

Reminds us of the a few corporations, does it not?

It’s not surprising that governments and corporations are being outed for their Wikipedia spin-jobs; what’s surprising is that it didn’t happen sooner. How is it that Wikipedia couldn’t have done this themselves long ago?

Unfortunately, there’s no Wikipdeia entry for “wikiality,” one of Stephen Colbert’s invented words. Still, this video can illustrate the true PR costs of “wikilobbying”.

Recently, Mattel (MAT) has had two product recalls; one for toys with lead paint, and another for toys with powerful small magnets.

Mattel chose the usual large company route: Have your CEO do a public apology, looking serious and sincere, outlining the problem and emphasizing the steps you’re taking to deal with it.

Has this approach ever worked? I’m not being cynical here, I really want to know.

Here’s why, in this case, I don’t think it worked.

It’s obviously a highly rehearsed and planned speech from CEO Robert Eckert, in a suit, sitting in a fake environment. Everything about this video screams planned, rehearsed, fake — right down to his choreographed hand movements. Maybe it’s just me, but when he says, “I’m just as upset and disappointed as anyone,” I cringe.

I’m thinking, “Yeah, because of all the money you’re gonna lose.”

Let’s put ourselves in a parent’s shoes. More specifically, let’s put ourselves in a mother’s shoes. (Dads are just as concerned but, in my marketing to women research, I’ve learned a whole lot about moms, so I’m going to focus on them.) She’s thinking, “My child may have been exposed to something that could possibly harm him. I’m not ‘disappointed’. I’m scared. I’m angry. I am downright pissed.”

“Upset”. Good word. “Disappointed”. Not so much. The word “disappointed” may work for the lawyers, but not for moms.

What’s the purpose of this video? Is it designed for shareholders and investors? Mattel is taking out ads in the Wall Street Journal, New York Times, and USA Today. This choice of WSJ and NY Times makes me wonder if this PR effort is indeed aimed at investors. If so, I would give the video higher grades.

But if this video is aimed at parents/mothers — “consumers” in corporate speak — then it could be greatly improved. Here’s how:

1. Lose the suit. The CEO looks too formal. Who are you trying to impress? Do you feel more powerful in a suit? Come down to a more believable level. Come down to my level. (I understand that for investors the CEO needs to look serious and businesslike, and that they might take offense if he were wearing anything less than a suit. But for moms it only ads to the perception that “he’s not one of us”.)
2. Get rid of the fake background. It’s too sterile. You look like a talking head on a set, not a real person.
3. Use words that parents are using, not corporate double-speak. You build rapport by making people feel you’re like them; by speaking in their language. Almost nothing about this performance — and it does come across as a performance — makes me think this CEO is like me. Sure, he opens with “I’m a parent of 4,” but he looks and sounds like a CEO, not a parent. How much more effective would it be if he said, “I’m a dad with 4 kids.” And for another example, look at this phrase: “Nothing is more important than the safety and wellbeing of children.” How much more powerful would this be if he had said “your children” or “our children” or even “our kids.”

Moms have particularly strong B.S. detectors. I’m not saying this CEO is insincere, but if he wants consumers or moms to believe in his company, they first must believe in him. I’ll let moms and dads speak for themselves as to whether this video achieved that goal.

What do you think? Can Mattel withstand transparency?

In a mass market world, it’s easy to hide behind corporate spin because, hey, everyone’s doing it. In a world driven by interactive media and niche markets, though, not everyone can withstand transparency.

The Buzz Bin’s Geoff Livingston wrote a piece called “Astroturfing on the Dark Side of the Moon,” highlighting a few cases of corporate blogging-gone-wrong and the ongoing debate over what should be considered “astroturfing” (define). The article shows how the lines of corporate transparency are now gossamer-thin.

But why? Have business ethics become blurry and situational?

Whether they like it or not, companies are being thrown into a world of transparency. Perhaps what we’re witnessing in these cases of so-called “astroturfing” isn’t so much a lack of personal ethics as it is the systemic floundering of those whose product, business model, policies and/or public relations channels can’t withstand transparency.

I asked a few of our favorite blogging, PR, and word-of-mouth experts to share some thoughts on transparency*. David Meerman Scott, author of The New Rules of Marketing and PR, was first to respond…

I think it is much better for organizations to establish policies about all communications (including verbal communication, e-mail, participation in chat rooms, and the like) rather than to focus on a new medium (blogs). I feel strongly that a company can and should set policy about sexual harassment, disparaging the competition, and revealing company secrets, but there’s no reason to have different policies for different media, such as blogs.

All sorts of unethical practices go on in the blogosphere, and you must be certain to hold yourself and your organization accountable for your actions as a blogger. Some organizations have gotten caught using unethical practices on their blogs and have done great harm to their corporate reputations. Some things I feel strongly about:

Transparency — You should never pretend to be someone you are not. For example, don’t use another name to submit a comment on any blog (your own or somebody else’s), and don’t create a blog that talks about your company without disclosing that someone from your company is behind it.

Privacy — Unless you’ve been given permission, don’t blog about something that was disclosed to you. For example, don’t post material from an e-mail someone sent you unless you have permission.

Disclosure — It is important to disclose anything that people might consider a conflict of interest in a blog post. For example, if I write in my blog about a product from a company that is one of my consulting clients, I put a sentence at the end disclosing my relationship with the company.

Truthfulness — Don’t lie. For example, never make up a customer story just because it makes good blog content.

Andy Sernovitz, author of Word of Mouth Marketing: How Smart Companies Get People Talking, kept it even simpler with this response via smartphone:

Word of mouth/blog ethics aren’t hard. It’s about:
1. Always being truthful
2. Common sense
3. Good taste

Blogger extraordinaire Chris Garrett concurs, insisting that:

If you keep your customer or audience needs in mind and have the best intentions, the rest ought to follow quite naturally. People mainly get into trouble when their intention is to hide or deceive.

Maybe the lines aren’t blurring because our ethics are becoming more situational; they only appear situational because we’re being forced to respond in the moment. In such an environment, the more PR “strategy” one has, the more phony they appear. People need to separate the argument about “what is ethical” from “what is stupid or ill-advised”.

There are no shades of transparency. Transparency cannot be opaque to any degree, regardless of how we spin it. Customers are simply too smart, and even the slow ones among us have the power of Google at their fingertips. (Try hiding from that!) Transparency isn’t about sharing trade secrets, it’s about engaging with people who have opinions about your brand. Treat your corporate blog like an infomercial and it will fail.

What those who quote Marshall McLuhan without having read him may not realize that “the medium is the message” was a play on words. It’s a few puns deep, actually.

First, McLuhan was insisting that the medium was the “mess-age”; that media, particularly new media, make a mess of the age in which they emerge. His secondary, lesser-known pun was that “the medium is the massage“; that emerging media, although poorly understood, have a massaging, drug-like affect on how we perceive, process, and collectively distort information. For McLuhan, television, the “new media” of his day, was the massage of the mass-age. Along with the message, the massage is explained in McLuhan’s concise book. The thing is, we no longer live in the mass age.

Just before he died, McLuhan looked beyond the mass age to what he called The Global Village. In this last book, he not only foreshadowed the likes of blogging and Facebook, but he assures us that we wouldn’t understand the “global village” once we arrived.

Meanwhile, back in today’s global “Web 2.0″ village, McLuhan remains best known for his cameo in Woody Allen’s Annie Hall. The good news for McLuhan, though, is that not only does the YouTube clip prove that the “global village” exists, it gives an example of someone who can’t withstand transparency.

[*Author's Note: I'll update this article as other bloggers respond. Stay tuned... ]

The New York Times (Reuters) has the scoop:

[...] Chief Marketing Officer Cathy Halligan said in an interview the retailer decided to launch the new feature quickly following a three-week testing phase in which it received more than twice the number of reviews it was expecting.

“It is the No. 1 customer-requested feature,” she said of reviews and ratings.

. . . “We are not planning any specific sales acceleration as a result of launching this feature,” Halligan said. “But one could expect that providing our customers with the No. 1 requested feature and something that connects 130 million people to each other has got to accrue benefits.”

For more on the benefits to both business and customer, Andy Sernovitz’s blog has an appropriately biased — and spot-on — account of why this is a great day for Word-of-Mouth.

(Congratulations to Bazaarvoice on liberating the world’s largest retailer for its customers!)

Debbie didn’t do anything wrong. She was trying to help out GlaxoSmithKline (GSK), her client, by emailing some colleagues and encouraging them to comment on their alliConnect blog. I personally think Glaxo’s moderated blog about an over-the-counter diet drug doesn’t deserve any attention. It would be a dreadful challenge to use these good ideas on how to promote the blog using word-of-mouth alone.

Who makes up these blogging rules?

Earlier this week, we heard from the ready-to-make-rules about anything he personally dislikes “Uncle” Jakob Nielsen, and now we hear whining from all those former hall monitors about how Debbie Weil helps her clients.

Let’s encourage transparency across the board — but, please, let’s not make up a bunch of stupid rules. Let’s allow people to decide with their RSS (define) readers and browsers if they’re interested in what a blog has to say.

A company’s reputation for being able to deliver growth, attract top talent, and avoid ethical mishaps can account for much of the 30%-to-70% gap between the book value of most companies and their market capitalizations. Reputation is a big reason Johnson & Johnson (JNJ ) trades at a much higher price-earnings ratio than Pfizer (PFE ), Procter & Gamble (PG ) than Unilever (UN ), and Exxon Mobil (XOM ) than Royal Dutch Shell (RDS ). And while the value of a reputation is vastly less tangible than property, revenue, or cash, more experts are arguing it is possible not only to quantify it but even to predict how image changes in specific areas will harm or hurt the share price.

The article illustrates the value of telling your brand’s story clearly and often. Too many companies keep this information hidden.

How effectively are you telling your stories in this era of transparency? Do you know when you’re telling the right story, from the right angle?

In an upcoming post, I’ll share with you what’s involved in creating a great story. In the meantime, you can get started by developing some characters.

Testimonials work really well.

Testimonials don’t work at all.

No, I’m NOT suffering from some sort of personality disorder (though some might disagree). There are times when testimonials are incredibly powerful, and times when they might actually hurt you.

Testimonials hurt you when people don’t think they’re real. Anything that sounds vague or cliché can smack of insincerity.

Three traits of strong testimonials…

#1 – They’re Specific.

Vague testimonials don’t really tell the customer anything.

A vague testimonial reads like: “I was very satisfied with your hotel’s service.” “Your course was great. Thanks!” “I got great results.” “Quality tech support.” “I really enjoy your product.”

Specific testimonials say things like: “I was impressed by the 24-hour concierge service, especially when they found an all-night printer at 3 am. ” “I increased the number of sales leads from 2 per month to 10 per week.” “The section in your course about negotiating with stubborn sellers was invaluable.” “Tech support spoke to me in plain English and isolated the problem in 90 seconds.”Specific testimonials work for two reasons: First, they sound more credible. Second, they promote a specific benefit or address a question that may help persuade potential buyers.

#2 – They Overcome Objections.

That’s right. Use testimonials that talk about objections. Some companies are afraid of these kinds of testimonials, yet they can be the most powerful tool you have. Testimonials from skeptics stand out because they sound credible. And by addressing and voicing what many perspective customers may be feeling, these testimonials are powerful persuaders.

Testimonial that address objections sound like: “I’ve been in property investing for 7 years. I didn’t think there was anything in this course I didn’t already know. But, ultimately, I was surprised to learn valuable techniques I’d never considered before.” “Taking an online course felt really impersonal to me. I was afraid I’d miss the in-person interaction. What I found, though, was that the format was incredibly interactive. I’ve even made some friends in my study group. We phone and IM, which helps since we’re facing similar challenges. It’s great!”

#3 – They’re Well-Placed.

Make sure the testimonial subject matter is relevant to the information around it. If you have a landing page, or a homepage where many of your visitors are early in the buying process. So, be sure to have testimonials for people who may not be ready to bite. What questions are those perspective customers asking? How are you different from the competition? How can you fill my needs?

An early-buying-process testimonial sounds like this: “I’ve tried other other gyms, but your facility was the first where I didn’t feel intimidated because I am (or, rather, I ‘was’!) overweight. I was surrounded by other women like me; not just thin women in hundred-dollar aerobics outfits.”

Product pages, or other pages where your customers come later in the buying process, so provide testimonials relevant to their ready-to-buy questions. what happens if I don’t like it? Is it worth the money? What plan is right for me?

A late-stage, I’m-ready-to-buy testimonial sounds like this: “When I tried on the shoes, they were too narrow. So I simply filled out the return form, used the pre-printed shipping label, and sent them back. The new shoes arrived 3 days later. What a quick turnaround, and it didn’t cost me a cent!”

To recap:

- Be specific. Use testimonials that talk about specific benefits or personal situations. Avoid vague testimonials.

- Overcome objections. Use testimonials that bring up objections, where customers admit being skeptical. These are the most powerful testimonials out there.

- Context is everything. Make sure your testimonials address the questions your customers are asking at various stages of the buying process. (If your customer data’s unclear, just ask your sales/business development people. They can recite common questions in unison.)

Just remember, the only thing better than saying the right thing at the right time is when your customers do it for you–and better.

[Special thanks to Sean D'Souza at Psychotactics for his infinite wisdom on testimonials and all things persuasion, and to Marketing Experiments for their suggestions on testimonial placement.]

UPDATE: This post is a finalist in the 2008 SEMMY Awards. If you liked it, vote now!

Example one

Example two

Ok, example two is clearly the superior page for several reasons. But here is my question:

What if example one did nothing else but add the high quality customer reviews (yes even the negative ones) found on example two?

Do you think they would sell more shoes?

Not sure? Our friends at Bazaarvoice have more insight.

And now the most important question: Do you think I would look cute in those shoes?

Recently, he blogged about their all “GoDaddy Girl” page. After one particularly scathing comment, Parsons countered with genuine diplomacy, thanked the guy for his input, and asked a follow-up question. Rather than answering Bob, the lambaste got even more personal (and stupid). What did Bob do? He responded in the armchair critic’s own language. Well tended, sir.

Why’s this remarkable? Because Bob finds value where others might find only noise. He cares.

Last week, GrokDotCom critiqued GoDaddy’s Super Bowl ad. Although it wasn’t an attack, it was personal – as was the comment I left on his blog. Hot Points is moderated, but Bob kept my contentious post. He thought about it.

Here’s what Parsons has me pondering:

“Everybody wants to work in marketing.” That’s what the spokesman said after he closed the door to our fictional, out-of-control marketing department. It was a double entendre. In one sense he meant that the marketing department certainly is a fun place to work. But in another sense, he was talking to all those self-appointed “marketing experts” who year-after-year go out of their way to tell Go Daddy how to sell its products.

That’s reassuring. I hoped it was a double meaning for exactly that reason. But now it turns out I’m their target twice over: male, self-appointed marketing expert.

Bob knows I hate the commercial, even if I do love-to-hate it. But what works is what matters, and this is the second time I’ve blogged it in a week. See how transparency can disarm critics and yield profitable insights? Bob does.

With all the talk of ‘radical transparency,’ it’s good to see at least one CEO who isn’t afraid of it. (Nor does he fear bison, apparently.)

When will the online advertising industry actually deliver on its outstanding promise of the last decade to present the right ad to the right person at the right time? When will we finally deliver a consumer experience where the vast majority of ads that we deliver are meaningful, and not junk and clutter on Web pages?

The first part, as you can imagine, had behavioral targeting (BT) junkies abuzz. Dave Morgan, Tacoda Chairman (and also the pundit asked to answer Walt’s question), took the question on it’s merits and wrote a MediaPost piece, answering: soon, perhaps even by year end 2008.

Bold prediction, considering his evidence to support the claim was an increase in competition from marketers, an increase in adoption of the web from advertisers, better creative and, finally, as result of “so much focus now on the customer experience.”

Perhaps he’s right. Only time will tell, but the increase in competition and adoption exists currently, and has for awhile. The better creative line is a nice wish, but hoping for more talent shouldn’t exactly bring comfort to those planning a campaign. As for the “focus on customer experience,” I’d consider “lip-service” to be a more accurate description.

This part of the question isn’t what was so interesting, however. BT is a nice technology, but means nothing without the confidence that you’ve planned the right content, for the right type of customer (buying modality, not demographics), at the right stage of the buying process (content + persona + buying process = scenario). Personalization at the individual level is an unscalable myth. It’s the second part of his question–ads becoming meaningful–that keeps me up at night. That, and cleaning out my inbox.

We know people today have BS meters set to ‘hyper-sensitive.’ We know our customers know more about our products’ real strengths and weaknesses than we do. We know credibility is linked to authenticity. The smart ones out there also know how little control “we” hold over the consumer (or “people” but, please, stop saying users!).

The greater the transparency, the less the ads try to make someone do something and begin focusing on facilitating people doing what they already came to do (or want to do). The more seamless ads become, the more integrated into the experience they become and the more they add value; more value to us (consumers/people) and, for that matter, far more value to advertisers.

Planning integrated, transparent customer experiences gives advertisers more value because it forces them to satisfy the needs of actual humans. More so, that is, than any new technology designed to attract the right sets of eyeballs to self-focused “we-we”-spewing copy, rotating flash animations, or whatever interruption ploy du jour marketers and advertisers use to push messages at the masses.

Do you ever get annoyed when a business’s online communications are as poor, if not worse, than their offline customer service? One of the most sacred promises of the Internet is that we have the power to chat with total strangers, regardless of how fragmented the information or disproportionately strong the opinion, to piece together the bigger picture about a given experience anytime, anywhere. Access to third-party information is always a good thing for any current or would-be customer; it’s the quickest way of saving ourselves the time, money, and opportunity cost of a bad decision. Besides, most customers take information from peers with a grain of salt. So why should business be afraid of online transparency?

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He settles into a soap-box stance. “You know, I read that book on copywriting … you know, the one with the picture of you on the cover? It was pretty good.”

“Thanks, dude,” I nod. “I’ll convey your reactions to Bryan, Jeffrey and Lisa.”

“Yeah, but …”

Here it comes. I hate this. The moment when I’m going to have to justify something in the nicest way possible when what I really want to do is zap the guy with a lightening bolt (if only Martians could).

It seems my grocery store commentator really liked Persuasive Online Copywriting, so he decided to visit the Web site for this newsletter. It was there he determined that while we might understand the theory of writing persuasively, we were inept at putting it into practice for ourselves.

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