Gratuitous sorcery and incantations from actual Wizards.

With the rise of digital media and a greater focus on uninspired factual ads, people rarely observe false advertising. Every consumer today is all about the truth. After all, a good bit of Google research can tell much about the truth in advertising. As such, sensible consumers can smell false ads that aim to deceive them from a mile away.

We can never contend the importance of truth in advertising. That's not up for debate.

However, the truth is not necessarily believable, interesting, or relevant simply because they are true. You must always wrap the truth in advertising under a compelling narrative. The strength of fact-based ads depends on how stimulating and persuasive you craft your advertisements. 

Come to think of it. Why do advertisers use testimonials? Even when some of them are not entirely true, testimonials can sway the hearts of listeners. Which, in some way, adds more heft compared to bombarding consumers with dry statistics and data.

To uphold your truth in advertising, you must work with storytelling professionals who can effectively convey your story. This requires someone with fundamental knowledge of narratives and antenarratives. Lucky for you, we're the experts at it, and we'll give you a comprehensive guide in this article.

If you're interested to learn more about it, keep reading.

The Three Different People

Dean Rotbart, author and host of Monday Morning Radio, described people as having three personas:

• The first is the person you see whenever you look in the mirror. According to him, this is the person you believe yourself to be.
• The second persona is the person others perceive when they look at you. This is the person that others believe you to be.
• The third person is the real, genuine and unadulterated you. It is the rough average of what you see personally and what others see in you.

Here's the caveat: all of these things represent the truth.

What you believe yourself to be is your version of reality. Similarly, others see you as the person they believe you to be. However, given the nuances and differences in perceptual reality, neither persona captures the entire truth.

Now, how is this information relevant?

Here's the catch: everyone is deceived by their delusions. But there's a way to twist people's perceptual reality in your favor. The secret? Stories— the interesting ones.

“Know something, sugar? Stories only happen to people who can tell them.” —Allan Gurganus

The truth happens to everyone, but only storytellers can transform truth into stories. Whatever rhythm, style, prose or narration storytellers use becomes attached to the truth. In the same way, the truth in advertising takes its conversion strength from the narrative behind it.

All businesses possess a set of truths that form the foundation of their business. This same truth reflects in their story— the brand image, public communication and advertising. However, even staggering statistics and incredible facts lose their value when paired with poor storytelling. In other words, the truth and how you deliver them influence their overall impact.

If you want your ads to supercharge your truth in advertising, give it a good story. Or better yet, trust us to write those compelling truth-driven narratives for you. Book a call to learn more about how we can help tell your truth— in the most compelling way possible.

Antenarrative vs. Narrative

Talking about the three personas sets a precedent for fully understanding storytelling and the truth in advertising.

Everyone has heard of the term "narrative" before. It is typically used to refer to a coherent story with a beginning, middle and end. We often see narratives in movies, books, and other forms of media. A storyteller creates them in retrospect, arranging the scenes artfully and integrating them into an appropriate setting.

On the other hand, antenarratives may be a new concept to many readers and business owners. Antenarratives are people's unedited, incoherent, logic-lacking, chaotic and disconnected lived experiences. They are the unadulterated puzzle pieces that serve as building blocks before a story can happen. In other words, they are the way things happen.

A skillful arrangement of antenarratives, paired with perfect execution, results in a story that sparkles with fairy dust. Conversely, if the storyteller organizes predictably, the story will reek of a dog's breakfast. Punchlines are funny because they are strategically placed antenarratives that break a story's monotony and chronology.

"Antenarrative happens to everyone. But stories only happen to people who can tell them." —Roy H. Williams

Quentin Tarantino is one of the best storytellers and movie directors. His movies are composed of scattered bits and pieces of open-ended antenarratives that stand alone. However, he always finds a way to sew each scene together to create one cohesive piece. As such, it's impossible to predict the conclusion of his films, and they leave audiences wowing at the end.

The main keyword behind the strength of a narrative is retrospect. Specifically, a retrospective few of all antenarratives happened during those lived experiences. Through a retrospective view, people can recall past events and eliminate irrelevant antenarratives that do not support the story.

Like people, businesses go through their own lived experiences. The sum of all these antenarratives creates the truth of the brand. As a result, they reflect on a company's core values, guiding principles, company culture and even advertising.

However, not all antenarratives become part of that truth. When it comes to truth in advertising, you want to keep the best antenarratives that make your company look good. You won't create ads that deliberately incriminate your business, making audiences second-guess working with your company.

Pulitzer Winning Books and their Narratives and Antenarratives

Narratives are polished and varnished versions of antenarratives. Think of a research paper that's undergone many revisions before being the perfect rendition, ready for publication. However, some finely crafted fiction yet rough-hewn antenarratives make it to the big leagues.

Below, we'll look at two Pulitzer-awarded books that perfectly represent the use of narratives and antenarratives.

The Old Man and the Sea

"The Old Man and the Sea" is a classic novel by Ernest Hemingway. It features the epic struggle between about an aging fisherman and the greatest catch of his life. For 84 days, the Cuban fisherman called Santiago sets out to sea only to return empty-handed. Conspicuously unlucky, even his most trusted apprentice, Manolin, left his boat for others.

However, the intensity of the narrative began rising on the 85th day. Santiago went beyond the island's coast, trying his luck against the aggressive gulf stream. Finally, his bait catches a big fish that he knew was a marlin. The man tries to hook the fish back but struggles and the fish begins pulling the boat instead.

The majority of the narrative revolved around this push-pull dynamic. But during these moments, we explored countless antennaratives beyond Santiago's lived experiences.

For instance, Hemingway detailed Santiago's physical suffering and exhaustion. We also had the chance to enter Santiago's perceptual reality and existential thoughts. Finally killing the marlin, we are greeted with Santiago's battle against mako sharks and losing fish's meat to the predators.

The story takes an odd turn when an exhausted, empty-handed Santiago returns and goes into a deep sleep. During this, tourists and fishermen gathered to adore the carcass of the biggest fish they'd ever seen. Finally, the story closes with Manolin bringing Santiago coffee and talking about baseball.

Did you notice the roller coaster ride of antenarratives throughout the story? Despite these seemingly bizarre and disconnected details, Hemingway managed to piece them together into a perfect narrative. This complete narrative is now Santiago's story, and with Hemingway's perfect delivery, it also became everyone's truth.

The truth in advertising follows the same principle. How people view your brand's truth depends on how you effectively piece your antenarratives together. Some antenarratives will never make it in the final cut of your advertisements, and that's okay.

Why?

Because ad writers never let the truth stand in the way of a good story.

Let's look at another antenarrative-powered publication.

Founding Brothers

"Founding Brothers" is the brainchild of award-winning author Joseph Ellis wherein he explored the people that built America. In his landmark history work, he explored how deeply flawed individuals confronted the challenges to set the nation's course.

Ask anyone outside the US, and they'll describe America as the land of the free. Others may even add that success and wealth are achievable through hard work and determination. Despite the country still being rife with inequality and bureaucracy, to some degree, foreign people's perceptions have some merit.

However, that was never always the case.

The United States of America was more a fragile hope than a reality in the 18th century. While we view the founding fathers as great people, as we should, they are not free from flaws. History books tell the tale of their bravery in breaking free from Britain's grasp. But books will only delve into important antenarratives like their clashing personalities, troubles among the ranks and character flaws.

Hamilton, Burr, Jefferson, Franklin, Washington, Adams and Madison were never perfect. And these shortcomings would have cost this landmass to remain an extension of England. But despite these challenges, America rose from the ashes of a shattered dream. "Founding Brothers" brings reveals the vital issues and personalities of America's Founding Fathers.

Here's the thing: they never thought after three centuries, people would refer to them as the Founding Fathers. 

These antenarratives are omitted from history books and class lectures because they give America a bad name. The course of time could have gone differently considering their demeanors, dispositions and differences.

What matters is they signed the Declaration of Independence, right? That seems to be the problem.

"But you and I live under the curse of post facto knowledge." —Roy H. Williams

Antenarratives are the building blocks that form the truth— the story. However, our post facto or after-the-fact knowledge urges us to challenge the very foundations of the story— the antenarratives. That's why businesses integrate as many facts, statistics, data and truth in advertising. But that's where problems occur.

Post facto knowledge is always troublesome, especially when crafting ads, and Roy H. Williams has a comprehensive explanation as to why:

• Facts are not necessarily believable just because they are true.
• Facts are not necessarily interesting just because they are true.
• Facts are not necessarily relevant just because they are true.

You can't just throw in antenarratives and expect people to chew them up like a well seasoned, medium-rare steak. Wrapping those facts in a compelling narrative upsurge the impact and relevance of your ads.

Let me repeat what I said earlier: never let the truth stand in the way of a good story.

Ad Writers and the Truth Within Stories

Even the most popular brands use crafty narratives to convey their truth in advertising. Let's look at the antenarratives of some famous brands:

Harley Davidson's "American by Birth. Rebel by Choice" slogan

Japanese manufacturers have always taken the lead in motorcycle and car technologies for many years. Harley Davidson's marketing slogan is built around the central idea of giving American customers a sense of freedom. It is a freeing statement that breaks motorcycle enthusiasts from the shackles of superior Japanese engineering.

Harley-Davidson is an American brand, hence, American by Birth. Harley has also been associated with a rebellious spirit and a strong sense of independence throughout its history. Whether riding their iconic motorcycles or rocking the brand's famous logo, people always embody this bold, unyielding attitude. 

Their target is people who value the prestige of owning one of Harley's badass gas-guzzling bikes. Millennials who firmly stand against vehicles for their environmental impact will never understand the art of riding Harleys. That's why Harley riders are rebels by choice.

Willie G. Davidson once said, "motorcycles have always been dramatic. They are not for everybody and never will be. This is a product that people can take to an extreme as a means of self-expression."

Capturing this essence in marketing messages has allowed Harley to remain one of the most recognizable brands in America.

Volkswagen's "Think Small" advertising campaign

Volkswagen was not too popular post the second world war. After Hitler's fiasco, redeeming Germany from shame and economic downfall was far from easy. At the time, the United States became the world's consumer superpower. The car industry was also growing in their favor, where muscle cars and sedans began booming.

Fifteen years after world war II, Volkswagen found itself in a bubble. They developed a two-door, odd-looking, rear-engine mini economy car called the Beetle. It was unique, but the looks didn't match consumer preferences at the time. Not to mention, VW manufactured the Beetle in a plant that the Nazis built in Wolfsburg, Germany.

However, Volkswagen's Think Small ad campaign turned Beetle into a global sensation.

How? Simple. Volkswagen conveyed the truth in advertising, but only the truth that mattered.

Allow me to retort.

Their Think Small campaign centered on a series of antenarratives that explained the advantages of owning a Beetle. Paired with great graphic design, Ad Age ranked the ad series as the best ad campaign of the 20th century. Here are some examples:

• They wrote "Think small" on a page featuring a plain white background and a small image of the Volkswagen Beetle.
• "And if you run out of gas, it's easy to push."
• "It makes your house look bigger."
• "We do ours. You do yours." They showcased a factory-produced Beetle on the right pane and a colorfully painted Beetle on the left. This ad ushered in a new wave of marketing called the "creative revolution."
• "They said it couldn't be done. It couldn't." In this campaign, we see the legendary basketball center Wilt Chamberlain beside the small Beetle. Volkswagen said the Beetle is not for the 7'1" but can fit up to 6'7" people with generous headspace.

In their ad campaign, Volkswagen shared many facts, a.k.a. antenarratives,, which brought the Beetle its well-deserved glory. However, they omitted some antenarratives that would have cost them their game. Some people would feel sore knowing it was manufactured in a Nazi-built plant in Germany. So they did the right thing, omitting a fact and highlighting other facts that make their brand look good.

Don't mistake me. It's not about deception, false advertising or lying to your target audience about defects or product flaws. That is plain wrong. After all, Harley-Davidson and Volkswagen never lied in their ads.

You're simply focusing on the antenarratives that perfect the narrative of your advertisements. In other words, you're telling a TRUE story that best serves your clients while also serving your business.

That is how you use truth in advertising.

Again, never let the truth stand in the way of a good story.

At Wizard of Ads® for Essential Services, we're all about conveying the truths that matter. If you want people to know your brand's truth, we can do it for you in the most compelling way possible.

Book a call with Wizard Ryan Chute, and let's reveal your truth in advertising.

A Small Business Survival Guide

The front page of Google search. Ah, Digital Nirvana. Remember those good old days? Only two roads got you there.

The first road was SEO.

It was hard and slow. You got there through your own merit as recognized by Google. Create great content that a lot of people seemed to want, and Google would help the world find you – eventually.

It was all about patience and consistency.

The second road was PPC.

It was fast and expensive.

Didn’t want to wait for Google to recognize your authority? Fine. You could just use bribes. In fairness, Google didn’t call it a “bribe”; they called it “Pay Per Click.”

As anyone who’s shelled out for PPC knows, it costs more and more to show up less and less on Google’s front page. Just like a bribe.

That was then. This is now.

Today, even when you do make Google’s front page, fewer and fewer people ever see you.

Why?

Because AI is reshaping how buyers search and find you.

• ChatGPT has gutted the SEO game.
• Claude has clobbered Search Engine specialists.
• Grok has gummed up the keyword works.

Every day, more and more people use AI to search for answers instead of Google.

Meet the New Boss, Same as the Old Boss ¹

So how do you – Mister or Missus Small Business Owner – respond to this switch from Google to AI? How do you adapt your digital marketing game so you can win?

Well, the bad news is obvious.

AI doesn’t offer PPC – yet. (But you can bet that’s coming.) You can’t pay any amount of money to show up in an AI search.

It’s kind of ironic. A whole generation of people devoted decades to learning how to please Google’s search algorithm instead of learning how to please customers. Yet in just a few months’ time, the entire career category known as “SEO Specialist” has been rendered obsolete.

(OK, perhaps I exaggerate. But not much.)

Every Little Thing Gonna Be Alright ²

On the other hand, the good news is actually old news.

Back in olden times, back before they got addicted to the crack pipe of PPC money, Google valued relevant, helpful, unique content.

Guess what kind of content Artificial Intelligence values today?

That’s right – relevant, helpful, and – above all – unique content.

Turn and Face the Strange ³

Don’t be deceived. Your website still needs great, original content. None of this boilerplate stuff, please. Boilerplate makes you even more invisible, and more obnoxious.

Most websites only answer the questions that all the other businesses in their industry answer. Don’t be that business.

When you do what everyone else does, you get lost in the noise.

Set yourself apart. Make it your mission to answer every single question that prospective customers ask.

Not just the questions you can answer “for free.” Answer the questions that save buyers time, money and aggravation. Answer the questions that reveal those special insider “industry secrets.” Above all, answer the questions everyone else is afraid to answer publicly.

By far, the best source of guidance on how to create useful, authoritative content is Marcus Sheridan’s terrific little book, They Ask, You Answer. (I wish he was a Wizard of Ads partner, but he isn’t. Oh well. His book is still great.)

A New Religion That’ll Bring Ya to Your Knees ⁴

Here’s an amazing little technique that can work wonders for your website. We liken it to Salome’s infamous Dance of the Seven Veils. I asked Grok to explain the origin of that term.

The Dance of the Seven Veils is the name of a famous dance performed by a woman named Salome. In the story, Salome dances for King Herod, while she wears seven thin, see-through veils. As she dances, she takes off one veil at a time, moving gracefully to music. Each veil dropping builds suspense and keeps everyone watching, wondering what’s next. It’s not just a random dance; it’s tied to a big moment in the story where Salome asks for something shocking after she finishes—the head of John the Baptist. The dance is about the power of mystery and drama to influence behavior.

Like Salome dropping one veil after another, each question you answer increases engagement from your audience and builds your credibility. This is what strengthens your website’s authority with AI.

Make it a point of pride to answer every question your customers and prospects ask. Craft your answers like Salome and her veils – each answer you give should link to the next questions.

DISCLAIMER: There is no guarantee that AI will drive people to your website. For the present though, most AI responses do reference the websites used for their answers.

Time Will Show You the Way ⁵

So, is SEO defunct? Is PPC dead? Should you just quit this digital marketing stuff?

Absolutely not.

Yes, digital marketing has changed. And PPC still matters, just not in the way it used to. The content of your website still matters.

It’s still all about patience and consistency.

Your digital marketing specialist can be an invaluable part of your team, but only if he knows which digital analytics matter, and which ones don’t. (HINT: the analytics that matter have changed as well.)

In this new age of Artificial Intelligence, is it really worth the time, patience and effort necessary to add great content to your website?

Absolutely.

Combine your AI-savvy digital presence with an equally potent offline mass media campaign, and you can build a powerhouse business honored by AI, feared by your competition and beloved by your customers.

¹ Won’t Get Fooled Again – The Who, 1971
² Three Little Birds – Bob Marley, 1977³ Changes – David Bowie, 1971⁴ Black Velvet – Alannah Myles, 1989⁵ Echoes of Love – The Doobie Brothers, 1977

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Informative advertising is one of two most popular types of advertising. The other type is persuasive advertising, and both can be effective at affecting consumer behavior. Which one you turn to depends on your goals and the situation you find yourself in. So before we go any further, let me first ask…What is it that you most want to make — money, a name or a difference? Almost everyone seeks all three. But there’s always one priority, so you’ll need to be honest with yourself. What’s your priority with your business? What end should your advertising decisions be in pursuit of? The answer is going to make a difference in how you allocate your resources. If you’re not able to decide which of the three goals you seek most, then read on. By the end of this article, you’ll have a clearer answer regarding your goals and how to achieve them.

What Is Informative Advertising?

Let’s start by defining informative advertising: a facts-and-figures based method of convincing your audience they need your product or service. With statistics and numbers, you can demonstrate your product’s relevancy and value. It’s essential to only cite true information from trustworthy sources, though, or you’ll ruin your credibility. And a company with no credibility can’t market effectively, especially not with informative advertising methodology. In theory, once your audience is made aware of key information, they’ll be convinced to make a purchase. The question is, what information would lead them to the conclusion that they simply have to buy your product? Think about what facts really set you apart from your competitors. Are there any areas where you know you’re stronger than the rest? If so, that’s where you’re going to want to focus people’s attention. At the very least, the information you provide should pique their interest to learn more. That way you can offer them more information down the road that will hopefully lead to sales.

Informative Advertising vs. Persuasive Advertising

In contrast to informative advertising, there’s persuasive advertising. Persuasive advertising relies on the emotional side of an audience’s decision making process. By appealing to emotions, these persuasive ads aim to make their audience feel a certain way. And then that feeling leads to the decision of purchasing the product. For example, a persuasive ad for sneakers might try to make you feel lazy for sitting around on your rear all day instead of getting out for a walk or run. In simplest terms, informative advertising relies on logic while persuasive advertising relies on emotion. Which appeal will make a bigger impact on your target audience?

What Is the Main Purpose of Informative Advertising?

Any advertisement aims to sell a product or service. The only difference is how they try to make that sale. With informative advertising, the marketing method centers on offering education that convinces a potential buyer to make a purchase. This type of advertising works best when a product is superior to its competition in a measurable way. Are facts and figures on your side because of your product’s high-quality? If so, informative advertising can be extremely effective. Identify what you’re most proud of in your product, and then use whatever metrics you have to prove it. Another benefit of informative advertising is that prospective customers are more likely to feel that they made their own choice. With persuasive advertising, if it’s done too heavy-handedly, then you risk your audience feeling manipulated. Remember: advertising is as much of an art as it is a science, so it requires a delicate and nuanced approach. But if you aren’t very well-practiced with these two types of advertising, you don’t need to get all wound up. We’re here to help. We have the experience to help you set and follow your marketing strategy to best meet your goals. Contact us at Wizard of Ads® for Essential Services today!

Examples of Informative Advertising

Now that we’ve covered the theory behind informative advertising, let’s go over some real-life examples. Seeing what other companies do in their ads is a great way to study marketing methods. Use those ads to jumpstart your efforts. When you find an ad that you think works well, try to figure out what exactly works and why it does. That way, you can apply the same ideas to bolster your own strategy. We’ll help you get started with the following ads.

The Surfrider Foundation

In this ad, The Surfrider Foundation is using the informative advertising method. The ad reads, “What Goes in the Ocean Goes in You. Recent studies estimate that fish off the West Coast ingest over 12,000 tons of plastic a year. Find out how you can help turn the tide on plastic pollution at www.surfrider.org/rap.”The goal is to educate the audience on the extent of pollution in the ocean. More specifically, it highlights the exact amount of plastic that fish eat in The Pacific Ocean. Lastly, they tie that figure to human seafood consumption: if you eat fish, you’re eating plastic. People generally don’t want to eat plastic, so this ad is going to grab the attention of its readers. The Surfrider Foundation is hoping that people’s actions are driven by a lack of knowledge or awareness, and that if they just really knew, they’d change. They’d want to reduce their harmful contribution to ocean plastic pollution, and they’d turn to the foundation for more information. For informative advertising, keep in mind that your information has to be reputable. By citing real and high-quality research, this type of marketing is much more effective. Otherwise, it’ll work against you.

Front App

One situation in which informative advertising tends to be effective is a product launch. How can consumers choose your product if they don’t know about it? Some basic information can go a long way with initial advertising efforts. Front App teamed up with a blog in their industry to launch their product. By choosing TechCrunch, a reputable site, Front App is offering their target audience information. That information on their product is meant to help them gain a following. By educating readers on how their product works and benefits them, Front App can establish their audience base to further grow. Establishing a base can help build momentum down the road. This article acts as a full run-down of the relevant information about Front App, including what the product is and who can benefit from it. General informative advertisements aren’t always a good idea, though. If you’ve already established a customer base, you’re going to want to hone in on some more specific information. Since your audience would already know about you if you’re an established brand, they won’t be interested in basic information. Instead, focus on something more unique that your audience hasn’t heard before.

Miller Lite

Bud Light created an ad campaign that pointed out some information about Miller Lite. Miller Lite’s ingredient list includes corn syrup, and the implication behind the information is that Miller Lite is more unhealthy than Bud Light. As a response, Miller Lite clapped right back with their own advertisement. They did so in the form of a counter-campaign, again based on informative advertising principles. They compared the calories and carbs in both beers to show that Miller Lite has fewer calories and carbs. This information is meant to imply that despite the corn syrup, Miller Lite is still a better option than Bud Light for health. Then, the information is also used to back up their central claim, which is that Miller Lite has more taste. Another example is what happened here with another of Miller Lite competitors, Michelob Ultra. Michelob’s advertising pointed out that they had fewer calories than their competitors, including Miller Lite. So, Miller Lite ran an ad that pointed out that the difference was exactly one calorie. In the commercial, a person goes to check out at a liquor store with Michelob Ultra. The cashier looks at the Michelob Ultra beer and says, “You know Miller Lite only has one more calorie, right?” The customer immediately goes back and chooses Miller Lite instead. This commercial implies that if users knew that the difference was so small, they’d always choose the superior-tasting Miller Lite instead. After all, what beer drinker cares about one measly calorie? This ad definitely shifts toward persuasive methods at the end. When that tone shifts and the customer goes back to choose Miller, it serves as an example of how you can blend both philosophies.

Often, it’s effective to start with a factual presentation then move on to its emotional impact. Regardless of your marketing, advertising, or sales needs, we’re here for you. If you need a push in the right direction, then Wizard of Ads® for Essential Services is happy to provide you with our expertise. Contact us today to get started!

Step aside, Professor. Your marketing plan isn’t a TED Talk.

In this episode of Advertising in America, we put the kibosh on one of the most persistent myths in business: that your ad should "educate the consumer."

Spoiler alert: If your audience walks away from your ad knowing more about your product but still doesn’t want it, you’ve failed, sweetheart.

Ryan, Mick, and Chris roll up their sleeves and take the scalpel to feature-heavy, fact-laden ads that bore instead of sell. You’ll hear stories from Porsche to pork chops, gemology to body spray—and why the only education your ad should deliver is why the customer should give a damn.

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Episode Highlights:

• Why "telling me about x-factor" is useless unless I care about y-factor
• How selling benefits still misses the mark if you don't know what I really want
• When to use education (and when to shut up and entertain)
• The difference between marketing, advertising (and a masterclass on Retinol-9)
  
  

If your ads sound like Charlie Brown’s teacher, it’s time to grab a seat, take some notes, and learn how to say something that sticks.

🎧 Hit play. Then stop teaching, start enticing, and for the love of Madison Avenue, talk to the heart, not the hard drive.

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Educating the consumer is not the advertiser’s job. We should educate the consumer in our advertising. Now this one should have come with a trigger warning. This one takes me back to when I was a cub writer. Speak to me about what I care about. And if you're so deep in your business that you don't know what drives regular people, then for goodness' sake, find a copywriter who can meet the customer where they're at.

When I worked on Porsche, we never started our body copy with, “Do you have a $100K to spend on a car that you drive only in the summer?” No, we made people yearn for the experience of taking an exquisite piece of German engineering out onto the racetrack. If we could get one of those people into the dealership, take a test drive, it was up to you to figure out how they could pay for it. Closing the deal is your job. 

Dude, that exchange worked great between those two people. Yeah, but it doesn't necessarily continue what motivated you, which was stuff that is not motivating the consumer. The only person who matters is the consumer. It's not you.

Ryan Chute: On today's episode of Advertising in America, we ask, should good ads educate? Would we get more action off our ads if we just told them the problems we solve, the deals they get, and the standup folks that they're dealing with? Here to poke that bear, Mick Torbay, everyone. 

Mick Torbay: We should educate the consumer in our advertising; this one should have come with a trigger warning. This one takes me back to when I was a cub writer. I was doing a first meeting with a jewelry store client, typical situation, family, business. The owner had been in the jewelry business since Nixon was in office, and I'm a punk kid who thinks he can write ads.

Client pulls me aside and says, “You know what our advertising really needs to do is educate the consumer about Gemology because you see, if people knew more about Gemology, they would make better decisions in the jewelry store.” 

Now, he wasn't wrong. If we all knew more about gemology, we would make better decisions in the jewelry store. But as he was drawing, what he believed was a very profound conclusion, I couldn't help but notice a diploma on the wall from the Gemological Institute of America as a graduate Gemologist. He's passionate about gemology. You don't go to school for this stuff if you're not really into precious stones, and he wants to transfer his passion to the consumer, and that's where he got it wrong.

It's the curse of knowledge. He's forgotten that we can buy gemstones, and actually want to buy expensive gemstones without knowing a damn thing about them. Why? Because sadly, the gemstones don't matter a bit. We're. Not buying a gemstone. What we're buying, what we're really buying, is the reaction of another person. We want the person we love to open up that box and say, “Oh my God, what have you done?” That's what we're buying. And the gemology, don't even enter into it. 

We don't need to be educated in anything in particular to want that and to go ahead and buy that and I would submit that this pretty much applies to everything else in the world that you buy. I don't need to know how an iPhone works to know I want the new one. Ditto for my air conditioner. If you try to educate me on stuff I don't care about, you'll be wasting my time. And consumers don't have warm, fuzzy feelings about people who waste their time. In fact, we tend to tune them out. We're really good at ignoring stuff we don't care about.

I know you're passionate about gemology. Good for you. Keep it to yourself and keep it the hell out of your advertising. Speak to me about what I care about, and if you're so deep in your business that you don't know what drives regular people, then for goodness' sake, find a copywriter who can meet the customer where they're at because you ain't it.

Ryan Chute: A Cub writer for inquiring minds, is a junior writer, typically lacking the life experiences of grizzly writers. Trust me, when I say Mick’s seen things, a lot of traumas are locked up in there. Chris, what can you teach us other than the juice on mixed, tumultuous past of course?

Chris Torbay: Educating the consumer is not the advertising's job. When I hear a client say they want their ads to educate the consumer, I equate that with wanting ads to pre-qualify their customers, which is not. The advertising's job when I worked on Porsche, we never started our body copy with, “Do you have a $100K to spend on a car that you drive only in the summer?”

No. We made people yearn for the experience of taking an exquisite piece of German engineering out onto the racetrack. If we could get one of those people into the dealership and take a test drive, it was up to you to figure out how they could pay for it. Closing the deal is your job. Same goes for ‘educating the consumer”.

Usually, clients want me to teach potential consumers how gosh darn complex their offering is so that when the consumer finds out how much it costs, the sales team doesn't have to work so hard on their end. No, I'll do my job. You do yours. The only thing I need to educate the consumer on is why they should choose you.

My job isn't to teach people how complex air conditioners are and what other expensive work might be required to install a new one in your home. My job is to inspire consumers on why they should pick you to do it. Advertising should entertain. It should be distinctive and memorable. And yes, it's not just about getting your name out there. It's about why I should remember that name and choose that brand when I need that thing. We need to educate people on that. 

When I was a kid, there was an automobile undercoating place called Ziebart Rust Proofing, and they had mounted their sign upside down on the roof of their building. The idea being people would come in and say, “Hey, your sign's upside down.” And he'd say, “Made you look.” And then he'd try to sell you on rust proofing for your car. 

So sure, educate the consumer on why Ziebart is better than any other idiot who sprays used motor oil under your car, enough to get me interested in coming in and learning more from the experts. But the experts are still the ones doing the educating part.

Educating is important if it will make me excited. Educating is important if it will make me see you as different. Educate me on what is unique about your brand and why it will make my life better. 

Old Spice advertising is weird and memorable, but it also tells me that my man can smell like Isaiah Mustafa. It doesn't educate me on the science of body chemistry and perspiration, and which chemicals are effective in clinical trials, or why the expensive chemicals are more effective than the cheap chemicals. So I should be prepared to spend more if I really want to smell like Isaiah Mustafa. They just tell me that this brand will make a difference in my life. I will be better for it. I'm more handsome, more sexy, and have an awesome six pack. When I'm on a horse, and that's way more compelling than a lecture about new scientifically formulated techno derma-ultra, now with Beta-carotene six. Educate the consumer on your time. Here ends the lesson.

Ryan Chute: Preach. Woo. I can just tell we're gonna have some fun discussion on this one, but before that, let's hear a word from our sponsors. 

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Remember that saying, only half your marketing is working. You just don't know which half. Let's help you with that. Book it free strategy session with wizard Ryan Chute today at wizardofads.services. Yes, that's a URL wizardofads.services. Now let's get back to the show. 

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Ryan Chute: There’s really a good and bad to everything, right? Whatever decisions that we make, there's an appeal to education as much as there is to entertainment, and there's also a consequence that comes with those things. With appeal, you have credibility, authority, you feed the ego a little bit.

What are some of the other things that we should be thinking about when it comes to what we're actually dealing with here? 

Mick Torbay: I think the idea of educating the consumer comes from an instinct that the client has; the client is almost always very educated within their own category, and so it's difficult for that client to imagine that somebody could have a valuable opinion if they don't know all the things the client knows.

And so the client just in their heart just says, “if you knew all the things that I knew, naturally, you would choose me”. And so that's it's an instinct thing that, but that doesn't actually necessarily translate to how to persuade a consumer. 

Chris Torbay: Yeah. One of the great sort of tenets of advertising strategy that I learned when I was working in London is a saying amongst planners, which is, “Don't tell me about your fertilizer. Tell me about my lawn.” And that comes right off of what Mick was saying, which is the guy who makes fertilizer would like to tell you that having phosphorus in there does this chemical reaction that does this instead. But having nitrogen there has this other thing, and then these other kinds of things respond, eh? And so there's a scientific thing, and that guy is entirely versed on it, and he would love to get that out into the consumer. The consumer just wants to know it's gonna be green and lush, and that his neighbors are gonna say, “Hey Dave, I don't know what you've been doing, but that is the best looking lawn on the street. Tell me about my lawn.”

Is there room for a little bit of education to try to get me to pick your fertilizer versus the next guy? Sure, but I'm not, but don't tell me about the fertilizer at the expense of telling me what it's going to achieve for me emotionally, personally. 

Mick Torbay: Probably the best example of that was an ad campaign from the eighties that people will still remember today. I used to write the ads for a chain of tire stores. And what makes a tire different is tread pattern and rubber compound. Those are the only two things. If you change the tread pattern, change the rubber compound that will make a tire different one from the other. And so naturally, a tire store wants to talk about tread patterns and rubber compounds 'cause that's actually the only thing that matters. One tire to the other. And Michelin took a baby, put it in a tire, took a picture of it and said, “There you go. That's everything you need to know.” And people were like, “Dammit, I need to buy the expensive tires 'cause that's my family in that car.”

They absolutely figured out, and I'm sure it wasn't Michelin's idea, I'm sure it was, their brilliant ad agency, who said, “You guys gotta stop talking about the shit that matters to you, and start talking about the shit that matters to the consumer.” That's the only thing that matters. 

Chris Torbay: And the interesting thing to your point at the setup, is there room for it? There's a hundred percent room for it. When you get to the tire store, that's where the guy at the tire store should start talking about rubber compounds and tread patterns. And then you can have a discussion. You can maybe upsell the guy to a better tire because you can educate him. Give him that little bit of information. 

Mick uses the example of the jewelry store. If you we've all been through this, when you're ready to propose to your significant other and you're out there to buy that diamond ring. There's a bunch of guys at that age who suddenly know all the things there are to know about cut and clarity and inclusions and all that sort of stuff. And they quickly spruce up on that knowledge, and until they make their purchase decision and they dump it outta their brain 10 years ago, they lie, they can't figure it out anymore.

So there is that period of time where you need to be educated, but it's the salesperson that does that. It's the client that does that. Don't ask the advertising to do that, so that you have this customer who walks in like a robot and goes, “I know everything and I just want you to sell it to me.”

That is an unreasonable ask. You still need to do your part of the job, and you can't offload that to advertising.

Ryan Chute: And I appreciate that we're talking about advertising here right now. We're not talking about marketing as a whole because marketing has many layers, and advertising at the very top of the funnel is about first and always foremost, establishing our empathetic position. Are we somebody as a brand or as an individual that is safe to operate around and near, and with? And then credibility comes in as the second layer. The data has always proven that you always have to lead with empathy, and that's going to be the laugh, cry, make them angry. It's going to be the thing that, as you stand for something and stand against something else, and education is what happens next, and it can actually happen in quite clever ways, where we can tuck it in, like mom, spaghetti sauce, jamming a little bit of that broccoli without us ever knowing as kids.

Chris Torbay: And that's where you get stuff like, an iPhone. We'll say we've gone from a 12 megapixel camera to a 24 megapixel camera, and they'll do a quick piece of animation or a quick shot of some sort of chip or something like that and say, and but then they've quickly turned the corner to, which means that your selfies are now even more crisp or even better in low light or even something like that.

It's a tiny bit of education. Just enough to say that way it is better for you in this personally relevant way, right? And then move on. We don't delve into how difficult it was for us to invent that chip. And therefore, that's why we're gonna charge even more. Hey, we gotta back off of that stuff. Gimme just enough information right to go, “I think that phone's the better choice.” Make the education steer directly to why you. 

Ryan Chute: I think you just touched on something, that micro storytelling of transformation, the before, after the, it used to look like this, now looks like that kind of transformative storytelling is a part of the story. And we really do get often wrapped up in, as salespeople do, features, benefits.

One of the biggest misnomers I've ever heard of in the marketing industry, which should have been in the sales industry, but it was given up by a marketer, which is probably why it's so messed up, is that it's not the one inch hole that a person goes into Home Depot to buy the drill bit for. It's not the one-inch drill bit that they want. It's the one-inch hole. 

Mick Torbay: Or do they, in fact, want the picture on the wall? 

Ryan Chute: Thank you. 

Mick Torbay: And that's how far away do you have to get from the drill bit to find out what they're actually looking for? 

Ryan Chute: And that's my argument: they're not looking for the feature. They're also not looking for the benefit. They're looking for the advantage that comes from that. The picture on the wall, the transformation. The hole in the door so that they can lock and close their door. They're looking for security. They're looking for functionality.

Mick Torbay: But the hard thing for the business owner is that they, I think, sometimes have to go against what their instinct is, and this is a very difficult thing to do when you sort of feel in your heart, this is what I have to do, and then make a conscious decision to say, and yet I'm not going to do it. 

I'm a pilot, and so I'm very passionate about airplanes and aviation. I know a lot about aviation 'cause I have to, 'cause I'm a pilot, but you don't need to know a lot about aviation to buy a ticket to Vegas. United Airlines is very good about letting people know, “Hey, we are passionate about aviation, but what we know you wanna buy is you want to go to Vegas today.”

So you need to ask yourself as a business owner, are you selling airplanes? Or, are you selling aviation, or are you in fact selling a trip to Vegas? Because the messaging for those two things is very different. 

Ryan Chute: Very disproportionately different. And no one cares how many seats they have left and all that other stuff there. 

There's also issues with education. There's the likelihood that you're going to pull low engagement on that ad. There's not a whole lot of excitement around that. There's incredibly low recall. People don't remember the words that we. That we say they remember how you made them feel. And people are fundamentally buying things for a couple of reasons. 

Now, it all fundamentally leads back to identity and what they're showing the world who they are as a person, be it a smart buyer for those transactional or grudge purchase type things, to where I rank in the world as a person. Now the world includes my internal world, how I value myself, how my immediate peers see me, the ones that I love and the greater tribes that I'm a part of, be it my office or my community, my church or whatever. All of these things tell the world who I am as a person and where I rank from a good decision maker on through.

Chris Torbay: And sometimes, clients will use education in order to justify that this is the superior product. The new iPhone will have the M3 chip in it, so that you can say, “Oh, you see I got the new one 'cause it's got the M3 chip in it”. But the interesting thing about a lot of these brands is you can stop there with the education. The education has to, it doesn't have to go too far into why the M3 chip is better than the M2 or even the Intel from way back. And that's what I made fun of this, now with Betacarotene six, like how many dermatologists, how many skin cream ads have we seen in the past where they say,  “Now with Retinol nine…”

Oh good. That's all the education I need. I'm gonna buy that one. It's got Retinol nine. What is Retinol nine, and how is it better than Retinol eight? I don't even know what Retinol means. Yeah, but you have this much education. You have just enough to make you think this is the good one. This is going to, this is gonna be the one that shows that I'm at that station in life. It's vitamin X. But you don't have to, you don't have to dive in. You don't actually have to, I don't need a biochemistry lesson. 

Mick Torbay: And I think the challenge is that if we say nobody cares about the differences between products, people will catch you on that and say that's not true, 

Chris Torbay: 'cause they do. Yes. 

Mick Torbay: Because they do care about it. And specifically, the people who care about the different things are in fact the ones making this decision. 

Here's what I'm getting at. Let's say you're in the air conditioning business, and so you might think to yourself I sell air conditioners. Okay, cool. You sell air conditioners. So then the first question we're gonna say is, “Do you sell air conditioners or do you sell, I have a perfectly cool, comfortable home, even though I live in Florida and it's July?”

Easy to make that point. But do you know who buys Air Conditioners? So the consumer doesn't buy air conditioners. Who does buy air conditioners? Guys who own HVAC companies, they care about features and benefits 'cause they understand them. So there, there is somebody who's selling air conditioners, we call them HVAC equipment wholesalers. That's those people sell air conditioners, and the people who buy them own companies that install that equipment.

So when you understand it, and that's how you buy air conditioners, you think that you need to transfer that to the consumer. It’s like, No, dude, 

Chris Torbay: That exchange worked great between those two people. But it doesn't necessarily continue.

Mick Torbay: What motivated you, which was stuff that is not motivating the consumer? The only person who matters is the consumer. It's not you. And that's a very difficult thing to say, it's like what motivates me is not what motivates the end user. 

Ryan Chute: But I think it's important that we put that into the appeal of education, is that we need to educate people just enough, and Apple does this, as you'd mentioned, with the chip.

You'll see what that means on their website, and it's really that little little circle with the question mark, and it means it's gonna be faster and you're gonna be able to do this, and this. And people go, “Oh, okay. That's why that thing's good. Like I don't need to know what those cores are all made out of, all that other stuff.”

But what you're fundamentally saying here is that ,it's a defensible position when questioned, again, coming back to identity. It's, I made a good decision here. I need to know enough about it. I need to be educated enough to say no, this is the best thing that you can do. 

Chris Torbay: And the interesting thing, just coming back to something you said earlier, a lot of that also comes from the marketing, not the advertising. So if you look at an Apple commercial, it’s one thing. Apple commercials famously it was just people dancing with iPods when they were the only ones with the white wires. It was just stuff like that. Even now, it's just like really cool things floating in space. Then you go to the website, now they'll tell you that this year's model is 10-core instead of eight-core. And it'll say that it's the new such and such trip whenever, so it's in the marketing, and that's how you justify to your boss. I want a new computer. And you justify to your boss. I had to get the new one 'cause this is the 10-core, not the eight-core. But you didn't get that from the advertising. You got that from the website. And by all means, many customers in many different places will like to geek out on some of this stuff and actually dig into it. But the advertising is not the place to do that.

The other channels, the other places, they can dig into it. Advertising should tease them and go, “Oh, is there a 10 core out there? Let me look into that, and let me read about it, and then I'll have all that information.” So by all means, it's gotta be in the process, but the advertising is not the place for the lecture.

Mick Torbay: That's it. Don't confuse making people want the thing to helping the people justify buying the thing. That's not the same thing. 

Ryan Chute: When it, to this goes right back to what Roy says as a first principle of advertising, specifically advertising, is that first, we have to reach the heart of the people. It's the heart that we tickle and entice, to lead to the mind. 

The mind will follow where the heart is. 

Chris Torbay: They will justify that, and the mind will actually call up some information and do some digging to find a way to justify and cherry-pick the information that's out there, absolutely.

Mick Torbay: To justify the thing I decided to do a while ago, actually.

Ryan Chute: Because the heart said you're buying this. And the brain, the left side of the brain, had to go. I have to figure out how to justify this. 

Chris Torbay: Yeah, I want this guitar. And then, and when and now I have to look around for some information so that when my wife asked why I bought a fourth guitar, I have to inform, I have, 'cause this one's got a double hamburger on it.

Ryan Chute: And everyone needs hamburg. 

Mick Torbay: That's twice as hamburg right there, 

Ryan Chute: Probably the only humburg you're gonna get. You know what I'm saying? So now there's the appeal of entertainment. Entertainment has huge amounts of value in that stickiness. 

One of the things that we learned as we went through the Wizard of Academy and the process that we learned about stickiness, is the emotion, the chemical cocktail, the mortar of the bricks that we're putting in as impressions across all different brand elements or impressions of our brand in whatever way that might be. 

So what we're really looking for here on the entertainment side is something sticky, something that's actually gonna allow us to build something bigger than just a stack of bricks.

Chris Torbay: And so there has to be enough education because we've made the point that entertainment for entertainment's sake is not enough. It can't be a hundred percent be borrowed interest. You can't just do 26 seconds of comedy and then at the end, say, “brought to you by Dave's Air Conditioning.”

Like it cannot just be entertainment, and just try to make it ownable entertainment. There has to be a link through to something tangible. But that's not an education. That tangible thing is just a tangible thing. It's not an education. 

Ryan Chute: Absolutely. Tangibility and education live in two different worlds, but equally as much if we just lived in the world of entertainment for a moment, we have to recognize that the fundamental difference between cute and clever entertainment versus maintainable entertainment there is strategy behind one. There is a lack of weight behind the other. 

As you guys say, it's very often when we see somebody talking around the water cooler about the ad that they heard. But they can't recall the brand name. 

Chris Torbay: They've remembered the cute and clever, but they haven't remembered the most important thing that we write there to accomplish.

Ryan Chute: So it's all equal to that, as we go deeper into that, as the brand continues to embed in the customer's brain, is that trigger alignment. When we have an externally triggered product, when we have an internally triggered product, we're pulling it on different threads here, but we're doing the same thing when they feel like they need to have that thing.

Or if we can create a feeling around needing that thing on the internally driven stuff. Then we need to align our brand with that trigger externally, something has to break. 

Mick Torbay: And we're, whenever you're wondering why all ads sound the same, 'cause basically all ads sound the same regardless of category, regardless of situation, which is really good for us because half of our job is just not sounding like everybody else.

But when you look at most advertising, in most categories, and you look at what they're focusing on and nine times outta 10, it's quality and value. That's what it's all always gonna come down to: quality and value. And then you think to yourself, what does a retailer consider when they're purchasing their inventory? The quality of the merchandise and the value, what they're getting for the amount of money. So, using quality and value to make a purchase when you're a retailer is really smart. It's actually, in fact, the only thing you should be considering. If you're a contractor and you're buying water heaters, you should be focusing on the quality of the water heater and the value of how well it performs versus how much it costs.

And then we're all surprised when that same contractor who just bought 50 water heaters says to his ad guy, “Now you gotta tell people about the quality and the value of these water heaters, 'cause it's really excellent quality and the value is tremendous”. And then their ad guy says, yeah, “we're not talking about that”. It's whoa, that's very difficult for that person. 

So we have to understand that emotion doesn't just apply to the consumer, it also applies to the business owner. It's just that we have to remind the business owner that your emotions. Motivates you, but we're not talking about motivating you, we're talking about motivating the consumer. So you have to take your emotions, and you have to put that aside and say you made an emotional decision, too. Your emotions took you to make the right call, which was quality and value. Now you have to set that aside and say, we're not doing that when we talk to the consumer. 

Ryan Chute: That was one of the biggest lessons I had to learn as a sales guy coming into the Wizard of Ads was that marketing, top of funnel marketing in particular, doesn't directly correlate to the way I perceive sales. 

The education part and the seeking out and learning part and the diagnosis part, and then the solving of problems part all have a lot more nuance to it as far as the nuts and bolts. But far less in the way of entertainment, encouragement, hope, and all the other things that matter so much in branding for us to be able to pull the lever and to get a person to viscerally act upon our brand versus the alternatives, and that was a game changer. It really was. 

So, are you Charlie Brown's teacher in your ads, or are you getting people to know your brand in a likable and trusting way? When we come back, we'll wrap things up with three engaging ways that we can educate your prospects rather than just in your ads. 

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Hey listeners, Wizard, Ryan Chute here. Want to personalized strategy to instantly 4X the effectiveness of your marketing dollars?

Schedule a free call with me at wizardofads.services. We'll chat about your goals and how you can quickly dominate your marketplace. I have limited availability though, so don't delay. I guess you could delay it a bit, but not too much. That'd be like, like an over delay. So, maybe just, skip the delay part entirely and book your call, just as soon as you're ready to start making money. You certainly don't want to delay that, right? And now, pitter-patter. 

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Ryan Chute: There's a time and place to educate, but like great ads, it should be just as strategic; articles, YouTube videos, email campaigns, and during the sales process, while these are elements of marketing, they really aren't ads. 

Education can be effective further down the marketing funnel, but should fundamentally stay out of the advertising. Effective advertising shows, not tells your competence by being the story, not telling a story of a story. Savvy ads are memorable and aligned with buyer triggers. Until next time, thank you for tuning into Advertising in America. 

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Thank you for joining us on Advertising in America. We hope you enjoyed the show and captured a nugget of marketing magic. Wanna hear more? Subscribe, leave a review and share this podcast with your friends. Do you have questions or topics you want us to cover?

Join us on our socials @advertisinginamerica. Wanna spend your marketing budget better? Visit us at wizardofads.services to book your free strategy session with Wizard Ryan Chute today. Until next time, keep your ads enchanting and your audience captivated.

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First is not all it’s cracked up to be. And that’s because ideas are living things.

Between the 1600’s and 1800’s half a dozen people had a hand in the discovery of electricity and its possibilities.

When Henry Ford invented the Model T, there were already hundreds of car companies in the world.

In 1827, Robert Stein patented a continuous operation still (patent still). I had the ability to increase whisky production by astronomical numbers compared to traditional pot stills. And they were first and own the edge that gave them.

But that lead only existed for 3 years.

Aeneas Coffey improved it with the column still in 1830. This was the beginning of the invention of grain whisky and blends as we know them today. Now it’s industry standard and dominates the volume of whisky produced in the world.

YouTube started streaming video in 2005, and Netflix started streaming in 2007. Amazon in 2006, and so on.

When an idea pops into your head, if it’s truly valuable and world-changing, you can guarantee you aren’t the only one that it appeared to. At that point you have two options. Do it first, or do it better.

There’s an undeniable benefit to being the first into the market. But you can’t rest on that laurel. You have to continue to improve and innovate.

Because the people who come after you will learn from your mistakes and benefit from the market you create. And they often have more money and more reach.

So what do we do with this as entrepreneurs?

When you have an idea, move on it.
Develop it.
Launch it.

As we say at Wizard Academy, “Anything worth doing is worth doing badly until you can get better.” Keep improving, keep learning, and keep growing. Understand that it will quickly be a crowded market if the idea is valuable. Find your community and spend effort on real connection with your customers and your community. They’ll look to you as a leader and an innovator.

Don’t be afraid when you find out others are jumping into the same stream. They only have hope and strategies. You have experience, community, and history.

Don’t be afraid to talk with them and build a network to help form the industry you want to work within.

If you’re not first, it’s not too late. You can be the one who learns from others and launches into the market with a fully developed idea that sweeps the room and becomes the industry leader.

Above all, pay attention. If the idea appears to you and you don’t give it breath and life, it will move on to someone else.

So let it be you.

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Dennis Collins:
Hello again, welcome back to Connect and Convert, the Sales Accelerator podcast where small business owners learn insider secrets about how to grow your sales faster than ever. I’m joined again, thankfully, by my right-hand woman, my partner.

Leah Bumphrey:
Hey, good to see you, Dennis.

Dennis Collins:
Hi, Leah.

Leah Bumphrey:
Hello, hello.

Dennis Collins:
Back again for another fun episode.

Leah Bumphrey:
We are here.

Dennis Collins:
We will have some fun today.  Did I hear some crickets or something? I heard something.

Leah Bumphrey:
They’re following me, they’re everywhere.

Dennis Collins:
Is producer Paul messing with us?

Leah Bumphrey:
I think he’s having fun with us.

Dennis Collins:
He’s having fun. We want him to have fun. But before we get into today’s topic, can we take a pause to announce our opportunity for our small business owners who are looking for their next step? Leah and Boomer and I have created our Connect and Convert Discovery Call.

Yes, that is a call that’s waiting for you as a small business owner, a person who wants to take a step back and take a look at your business and see what the difference is working with a group like us. We’re fun, but we also understand how to make things happen. So email us. We’ll send you a questionnaire. We’ll arrange a 60-minute, yes, a 60-minute virtual conversation. Let’s connect. Are you ready for it, Leah? Let’s connect.

Leah Bumphrey:
I am. It’s a great way to meet people and a great way to just get to the next level, isn’t it, Dennis?

Dennis Collins:
And our emails were just flashed up there on the screen, [email protected], [email protected].

So what are we going to talk about today? This sounds negative, and I don’t like to be negative, but don’t kill the messenger. Now, we’ve all heard that phrase. I don’t know. That’s been bandied about forever. Yep. But what exactly does that mean? So, Leah, always like your stories. You’re such a good storyteller.

Do you have a story about, was there a time when you had to face that about, do I kill this messenger, or do I let it lie?

Leah Bumphrey:
I actually have a really funny one, and I think a lot of our listeners, viewers, are going to be able to relate to this one.

It cracks me up. It’s not about me being afraid… I’m going to tell the story.

Dennis Collins:
Go ahead.

Leah Bumphrey:
So, we live central Saskatchewan. My husband’s mom and his stepdad are down in southern Alberta. Beautiful country. For years and years, that’s a big part of holidays, to take the kids to see grandma and grandpa. Now, they have a beautiful condo on a golf course. It’s just stunning, and the way their condo works, it’s a walkout basement, so whichever family is visiting gets the whole basement. Really nice and convenient, except for this one little part. They had a flood down in High River a few years ago, so they had to replace all their furniture.

So, in the guest room, they got this really beautiful looking futon, queen-size mattress on it, can make it into a bed. It was the most uncomfortable mattress you have ever slept on in your life. As a matter of fact, I couldn’t do it. Sean, you can have it. I’m on the floor. I will sleep on the floor before I sleep in there. The kids are on sponges. I don’t even need that. I am more than happy. It was terrible. Everyone in the family, every couple that went, hated that, but in the morning, you get up and you go upstairs and you have coffee, and how’d you sleep?

Oh, good, good. How’s the mattress? Great. Nobody wants to tell until finally, George, my father-in-law, his son, Soldier Mike, we called him. He’s in the military for years and years. He slept on that thing once. He went upstairs. He says, that is the worst.

He took them out that day. They went to the mattress shop. They bought a new mattress. Nobody can sleep on that. So, then the phone call started happening. So, how good is that mattress? Really? Yeah, but nobody wanted to say it. We were all afraid of hurting their feelings. The reality is, they really wanted us to enjoy being there. So, that story always cracks me up because I was, and I’m not a, you know me, I’m pretty point and shoot.

Dennis Collins:
You’re pretty direct.

Leah Bumphrey:
This was my mother-in-law. I’m not going to tell her that this mattress made me sleep on the floor.

Dennis Collins:
Was she the kind of mother-in-law that when you deliver a bad message, you had a chance of being killed as the messenger?

Leah Bumphrey:
No, she’s the sweetest woman in the world. George and I get along fantastically. You love the guy, but you just don’t do that. You don’t complain. You are not that person. So, anyways, that is a huge lesson and everybody think about that for a while. I hope it brings you a few giggles.

Dennis Collins:
You know, it really makes the point of our whole discussion today is that even when we have a message that needs to be said, we fear that we will be killed figuratively as the messenger.

So, I’ll tell my story real quick too. This was a business story. I was a pretty young sales manager. The guy that hired me, he was my boss, of course, but he was also my friend. We were pretty tight. And one day he asked me for a forecast for a critical fourth quarter sales forecast. It was going to be a tough fourth quarter and October being the first month of it, we really needed to do well. And I knew a lot was riding on it. We talked about a goal. I knew it would be impossible. It would be difficult to impossible, but he trusted me. He relied on me. He relied on the forecast and based his remarks to the corporate owner on my forecast, it didn’t happen to say the least. My friend was shocked and angry, and rightly so, in my effort to kind of shine up the bad news, right. I knew that it was not going to happen.

And I let him down. I was afraid of being the messenger. I didn’t want to disappoint this guy. I didn’t want to be the messenger with bad news. You know, we should have discussed it up front. At least two good things could have happened. We could have tried to mitigate it or we could prepare his bosses for a potential problem.

So it made no sense, but that’s how strong that kill the messenger concept is. You know, nerd alert, I got to go back and research all this stuff.

Leah Bumphrey:
You know, you have some science to back this up, Dennis.

Dennis Collins:
This is a nerd alert. Oops, sorry. There’s actually a name for this. I found the name for this thing. It’s the Persian Messenger Syndrome. Back in the day, you know, they didn’t have texts and cell phones and all this. They had to run. The messengers were runners from city to city. And sometimes the news they delivered wasn’t good news. So in the old days, the story goes, I can’t confirm all the details, but the story goes that some of these messengers were actually put to death when they brought bad news.

Now, I mean, were they, maybe not, but that was the days, right?

Leah Bumphrey:
Those were the days.

Dennis Collins:
Yeah. And it could have happened. So the Persian Messenger Syndrome, whoever is the bearer of bad news is evil and they should be discarded. So that is still a deep feeling in our brains and our minds. So we don’t like being the bearer of bad news, even when we’re not responsible for the situation, you know, now in my case, I was totally responsible for that, but we just don’t like it.

And in your case, you just didn’t like it, even though you probably wouldn’t have had any consequences. Subconsciously, this is all in the non-conscious, subconscious brain. The messenger is linked with the negative news. So the aversion that we have to getting negative news can harm your business in many ways.

Can you say blind spots? So how does this hurt? You know, what if an employee of yours has some news that’s not favorable that you need as the boss to know, and yet they feel that the Persian messenger syndrome is in effect, that the bearer of the bad news is considered to be evil.

Are you going to get that news? Nope. And as a boss for three decades, four decades, really, I know that happened to me. Although I tried to be an approachable leader. But I know I was denied news that I needed until it became a problem. And then it was too late.

So what do we do about this? I quote Warren Buffett a lot, Warren Buffett, Berkshire Hathaway. I just think this guy is one of the geniuses of today’s modern business world. Let me tell you what he says when they hire a new person. Here’s a quote from Warren Buffett.

“We only give a couple of instructions to people when they come to work with us. Number one is think like an owner.” That makes sense. “The other tell us the bad news immediately because good news takes care of itself. We can take the bad news, but we don’t like it late.”

What do you think?

Leah Bumphrey:
Well, I think that is a perfect upfront contract. You have this with your employees. You’re telling them, I mean, he’s obviously telling them this is going to happen. There is bad news in real life. There are quarters we don’t make. So do this and it’s going to work out for you. Let us have a chance.

Dennis Collins:
But you said a key phrase there, Leah. And I wonder if our business owners do this. I hope they do. Make upfront contracts with your team. Make agreements. Don’t deal in fuzzy expectations.

I can’t tell you how many times I screwed up by not making an agreement and only having, well, Joe blow knows what to do. He’s a sales manager. Go ahead and do what you do. I expect Joe blow to do something that he has no idea what my expectations are. Craft specific agreements. What is your upfront contract? What is the upfront contract about delivering bad news? Say, take Mr. Buffett’s quote and steal it. We can take the bad news, but we don’t like it late. Wow. Later in my management career, I learned that lesson when I was the boss and I had sales managers reporting to me. And that’s the conversation I had with them. I don’t like bad news, but I can take it. And I don’t like it late.

The challenge really, you know, do your staff, do your team, do your employees feel safe in sharing bad news in the organization? Most small business owners says, but of course, we’re wide open. My door is open. I want to hear. Guess what I learned?

Just because your door is open, doesn’t mean you’re approachable.

Leah Bumphrey:
And this is where it’s important for small business owners to realize it’s not about what you say to your employees. It’s about what you show. It’s about what they see. And you like your science. I love my stories. If you tell stories to your staff about that time where someone came and told you this, and this was the result, sometimes it’s going to be a very negative result, but at least you knew it. Sometimes it’s a positive result because you’re telling them, “Hey, by knowing this, we were able to react.” Tell the stories, make it part of your culture. Culture is so important in this.

Dennis Collins:
I love what you just said. Make it part of your culture. How do you make it part of your culture?

Paul Boomer:
Yeah. No, you guys are spot on. And I’m going to, I’m going to take my comment about storytelling a little bit, a step further. And this is uncomfortable for most leaders, which is being vulnerable and yes, telling stories, but telling story stories of how you personally screwed up.

What that does is it builds trust and you have to have trust in able to have these upfront agreements and to be able to share these stories and be able to create wonderful and amazing cultures where you can discuss the oopses in the world. So sharing something where you screwed up with the team and don’t be, you know, humble about it.

And laugh at yourself and say, here’s how I screwed up. And Dennis, you did that today. And that was brilliant. That’s exactly what I’m talking about. Most leaders find that very challenging because they think they’re supposed to have all the answers. Let your team members have the answers. You as a leader, simply show them we’re going in this direction.

Dennis Collins:
As always Boomer. I mean, I want to track back to Warren Buffett again, because he teaches us a lot of lessons. And one of them is directly related to what you just said. You know, every year they put out a shareholder’s letter, you know, to all their shareholders.

And, you know, if you’ve ever read any letters from companies, they’re all glowing. We blew this number away. We did that wonderful thing and blah, blah, blah. You know, it’s full of positives as it should be. Those are accomplishments. But let me tell you what Warren Buffett does in his annual letter.

In every annual letter, he writes something that they screwed up. Something that didn’t go well. And let me say this to you, even in the years where they had an outstanding performance, which is almost every year, he writes something in the first few paragraphs.

Hey, in spite of our stupidity, and not quite these words, in spite of our stupidity and buying that shoe company that we bought three years ago, which we should have never bought. And we tanked it and it went bankrupt. In spite of that, we still had a good year.

He weaves that into every shareholder letter. Isn’t that amazing? Say something, be vulnerable. As good as they are, they still make mistakes.

Paul Boomer:
And as when you started to talk about Warren Buffett, just before that, my finger was on the mouse. I’m going to click. I’m going to jump. Oh, wait. He said, Warren Buffett. I’m going to back out. That’s exactly what I was going to say.

Dennis Collins:
Good on you, Paul, because that is a story that I tell often. Why? Because if it’s good enough for one of the highest financial geniuses in this world, it’s good enough for me.

If it works for him, why wouldn’t it work for me? And there’s a way to do it in another podcast. We’ve talked about this in previous podcasts, but I think Leah, another topic would be, how do you present vulnerability? How do you make yourself vulnerable without risking the farm? There’s a way to do it.

Leah Bumphrey:
We have our listeners, we’ll send emails in sometimes with questions, sometimes with comments. And one comment that was made to us over the last couple of weeks that I thought was fantastic. It’s an owner-operator down in the States. He owns a retail operation, men’s clothing store, and they have, do you remember the dreaded Monday morning meetings, Dennis?

I mean, back in the corporate land, we always have those meetings. But Joseph is using their Monday morning meetings. His sales meetings, he’s using our podcast as a launching pad. And as I’m listening to this, I’m visualizing and, hey, Joseph, hey, staff, we’re glad that you’re here. But listening to something like this, what a great discussion a team would be able to have afterwards of, oh, yeah, this worked and this didn’t. And I wish this would have happened this way.

Dennis Collins:
That’s a great point. That’s very nice. We’ll try to always give you plenty of good topics, Joseph, to talk about.

Leah Bumphrey:
Now, Dennis, I know you’ve been thinking about a breakout challenge.

Dennis Collins:
We always challenge our audience. And here it is. Let me recommend to you do this, how to do a five-point audit of your business. And again, you can get someone outside like us. We talked about that at the top of this podcast. We do stuff like that. But just you can do it yourself. Lead by example. Didn’t we already talk about this? It’s not what you say. It’s what you do. They watch how you handle the bad news. Number two, reward honesty. Make it okay to be transparent and honest, even when it’s bad news, just like the Buffett organization. Number three, actively listen. We talk to our sales clients about this all the time, but this is also for leadership.

Spend more time listening than talking. No interruptions, full attention. Do check-ins, regular check-ins with your team. Most managers do this. Most leaders do this. But what is in that check-in? Let’s talk about three things. Let’s have three things. What’s good? What’s going on that’s good? Number two, what’s not so good? What needs improvement? And number three, what fires do we need to deal with right now? What’s good? What’s not so good? What needs immediate attention? And last but not least, create stories about the value of early warnings. Have that as part of your culture.

Here’s what happened in the past when we got early warning about XYZ. We were able to do ABC to head it off. Stories are a business owner’s best friend, particularly stories about the value of getting an early warning.

Leah Bumphrey:
That’s very specific, and I’m hoping everybody was taking notes because I love what you detailed here.

Dennis Collins:
Good thing we’re not living back in ancient Persia, you know. Okay, kids, we’ve had enough fun for one day. We’re running a little later than we normally like to run, but that’s okay. We had fun. I hope you did. Please join us every week for the next episode of Connect and Convert. See you then.