Consider the source of the message; that’s the crux of that folksy, funny principle. As recipients of non-stop information flying at us, we must always wonder:<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n\n\n\n
I’m not suggesting one should filter all the world’s information through a jaded and cynical lens. Rather, a reasonable amount of critical thinking should always be our first defence, especially in today’s environment of pervasive alternative facts and misinformation.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n\n\n\n
In marketing, who<\/em> says what<\/em> matters.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n\n\n\n As marketers and content creators, we must also consider who we choose as couriers of our messages. For example, let’s say you’re making a video or putting on a webinar. Maybe you’ve got an intelligent, articulate salesperson at your disposal who looks like an Italian film star with a penchant for performance. You’re thinking, this guy’s going to pack ‘em in! Engagement galore, right? But guess what? He’s the barber! He’s the one making commission on what they buy, so it’s likely many of your listeners are discounting the message appropriately, or should be. Decades ago, at the dawn of the Internet age, a group of Silicon Valley ideologues (Doc Searls<\/a>, Rick Levine, Christopher Locke<\/a>, and David Weinberger<\/a>) wrote The Cluetrain Manifesto<\/a>, which described their vision of how the Internet would change marketing – for the better.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n\n\n\n One of the many ideas they posited was that marketing departments and public relations teams would no longer be able to guard the unfiltered knowledge that markets really want, nor could they withhold access to the smart, honest employees with whom the market really wanted to engage. They predicted that the omnipresent Internet would allow markets to bypass the “sterile happy talk that insults the intelligence of markets literally too smart to buy it,” and enjoy unfettered access to the truth (follow me, to freedom!).<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n\n\n\n I think the manifesto’s authors got that one wrong, for the most part. Even with the ubiquity of the Internet, marketers<\/em> still control the vast majority of product\/service information that hits the marketplace. There are leaks and slip ups, of course, but generally speaking, product\/service information is meticulously curated and delivered.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n\n\n\n
I’m not saying to never feature a slick salesperson or marketer in your content (there’s always a place for it), but you’ve got to have variety. Mix-in the self-effacing, bookish engineer, who helped design your differentiating technology, and is actually a rockstar. She might be less comfortable under the bright lights, and might require all of your persuasive skill to recruit, but her expertise is what your customers and prospects want to hear.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n\n\n\nThe Cluetrain Manifesto<\/h2>\n\n\n\n