You may think Betty Crocker is a little "old school." Think twice. Betty was created 88 years ago “to respond to customer inquiries in a more personal manner” She was, by the way, invented by a small company to talk about a commodity product, baking flour.
Betty and her mission came to mind the other day as I looked at a friend’s website. I shall
call my friend Tim and fudge some of his business details to protect what has always been a cordial relationsip.
Tim is
smart, honest, and focused. He sells quality things. Shake his
hand and you know he’s a person you want to do business with. Like most companies, what’s
unique about Tim’s isn’t what’s on the shelves. It’s his values, policies, and people that set Tim’s company apart.
Unfortunately his website does not convey this competitive advantage.
The site lacks what I call humanility - that combination of humanity and
personality that elevates communication beyond features and benefits and into
the realm of the intangibles that differentiate one business from
another.
There’s
no recipe that applies unconditionally to every business - but Tim’s website
could be a lot better if he followed what I think of as Betty’s recipe.
Be personal - Speak as though you were sitting next to your audience on a sofa. Don't Shout. Let the facts do the sellling in place of adjectives. Talk like a person not a corporation. Think of a 'pick-up' line to start the conversation. Be an expert, but when you use terms of art be sure to explain them.
Be authentic - Imagine that your firm is being interviewed for a job and answer the questions you think you might be asked. Share your history. How long have you been around? Who are your leaders, your directors, your banker, your lawyer? Let co-workers help tell your story.
Be visual - Our species is programmed for pattern recognition, which means that when you’re trying to communicate, pictures trump words. You and I get 80% of our information every day non-verbally. Use pictures, charts, graphs, and typography to headline your story and help convey humanity and personality.
Be original - Find a new way to tell your story. Look for a different angle. Become an authority on your category - the first person a journalist might call to get more information or a sound byte.
Be
transparent - Encourage feedback. Make yourself easy to reach by email,
snail mail, fax, phone, social media, and carrier pigeon if necessary. Be
very, very available. Remember, too that an organization is defined by
its trials as its well as its successes. Tylenol's handling of its big scare (1982) created more trust in that brand than an ad
campaign ever could.
Keep it
simple. It’s tempting to dump the whole story onto the first page of a
website. Don’t even try. The most successful landing page of all
time, Google.com, contains just 18 words. Simplicity helps people conquer
threshold resistance and click into your site.
Forget selling. Be helpful. Most people who show up at your site got there via a search. They’re looking for something and you’ve been recommended. They don’t want a sales pitch. They want help. Companies like Amazon, Zappos, LLBean, and others, prosper because they to out-help the competition.
It may
not always be possible to combine all the ingredients of humanility in an ad or website. But as Leo Burnett famously said “When you reach for
the stars, you may not quite get one, but you won’t end up with a hand full of
mud either.”