Buzz Off—Words that Say Nothing

Here’s an eye-opening thought—we dare you to find a company who’s marketing message doesn’t contain at least one of the buzzwords listed below (go ahead, we’ll wait!):

Award-winning, Growth, Competitive Advantage, Experts, Innovation, Integrated, Market-leader, Proprietary Process, Proven, Solution, Strategic, Sustainability, Value-added, Value Proposition Vision.

How many instances of these, now meaningless catch words did you dig up? Or worse yet, you’ve seen many of these dime-a-dozen idioms peeking sheepishly back at you in your own message. With millions of words in the English language, doesn’t it make you wonder why the same, tired verbiage keeps cropping up in just about every company you come across?

Like the proverbial fingernail on a chalkboard, this is our own list of “expressions ad nauseam.” At the risk of pointing out the elephant in the room, it can’t possibly benefit anyone if everyone sounds the same. If we’re all “innovative” and “experts” then how can anyone really be? If we’re all using the same lingo, aren’t we failing to distinguish our companies as unique? And if our companies aren’t distinctive, then they’re ordinary, so what on earth attracts new customers?

Big words aren’t the answer. And dredging up past management trends du jour isn’t either. We challenge you to resist the allure of the easy buzzword. If you have a noteworthy product or service to put forward, offer it in a memorable way, with meaningful language specific to your wares.

We pledge. You in?