Stop apologizing in your marketing

It's literally driving me nuts

Hello Gobbledeers,

How’s it going? I have been completely obsessed with the pricing on the secondary market for Knicks tickets here in NYC, and I admit I’m going to be a little sad when it’s over. I can’t imagine what other event in my lifetime will have tickets starting at $11,000 that does not involve either a political dinner or prostitutes. Or both.

Anyway, today we’ve got:

• Literally the most annoying word

• I’m sorry

• Maybe just keep it simple

And frankly even if you skip this week, at least watch the video at the end. It’s incredible.

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A San Francisco Treat

From a Business Insider article about the ridiculous San Francisco housing market:

To quote Father John Misty: It’s literally not that.

(Here’s the thing: this is the type of stupid quote I would send to a couple of my friends who, I’m sure, do not care at all that someone is quoted saying “literally” when they definitely mean exactly the opposite. But I’ll be goddamned if I’m not going to send Gobbledy readers this quote - which, by the way, an editor (or AI or AIditor (tm) or whatever) at Business Insider approved either because they don’t care or because they were allowing Paul Hwang, San Francisco real estate agent, to be hung by his own petard, which is yet another reason you should never speak to the press, because while you’re thinking to yourself that this reporter is talking to you because you are brilliant - which you may be! - they are just as likely talking to you hoping you will say that a Ferrari is literally an apartment in Miami and then they will quote that verbatim, and you (Paul Hwang, San Francisco real estate agent), the same person who was not aware that “literally” means, y’know, “literally” and not, um, literally the opposite, will forward the article to friends (and real estate prospects) and say, “I, Paul Hwang, San Francisco real estate agent” have been featured in the prestigious Business Insider publication where they have highlighted my commentary on the housing market,” and the friends and prospects who have received this missive will be split between people who forward it to their own friends saying, “Paul is is certainly taking a liberty with his language” and people who say, “this Paul guy sure seems to understand the San Francisco real estate market and also I want a Ferrari apartment and I’m going to give him a call,” though I should mention that that first group - the recipients of the “Paul is is taking a liberty” email will also be split between those who “ha ha ha, literally” and those who don’t understand why they are being told this person is a dumbass, as they also want their Ferrari apartment, and if we do the math on that, 75% of people now think Paul Hwang, San Francisco real estate agent, is a genius observer of the market, so perhaps I am literally the dumbass for suggesting he should not have spoken with the press.)

Whew.

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It does seem to be the hardest word (to stop using)

You know what’s a difficult job? Advertising copywriter. It’s always been challenging, certainly. But when I watch episodes of Mad Men (right after my wife asks me why I keep watching old episodes of Mad Men when there are so many new shows and can’t we just watch one of those shows, I will ask “what show?”

And she responds “I have to check my list”

And I say “the list of what?”

And she says “the list of shows people tell me to watch so I know what to watch”

And I ask what those shows are

And she says a bunch of things: “Betrayal. Fecund Mountain. Um, Julie liked Plastered. I think it was Julie. I forgot to write it down. The Boys in the Yard. Regret.”

(And it’s here that I’ll admit I just made those titles up because there are so many shows nowadays and I don’t know any of them,)

And I respond by asking “Where can watch any of those shows?

And she says “I don’t know, I hoped you would figure it out”

And generally I just respond by saying, “We don’t subscribe to Fulp or Queg or Skeezbox or Sculpty+ and so we can’t watch and I’ll just go back to these episodes of Mad Men.”

Anyhoo, Where was I? Oh yes, when I watch the episodes of Mad Men I’m reminded of just how much less there was to write back then. Nobody at Sterling Cooper had to write dozens and dozens and dozens of variations of headlines for social ads. And dozens.

The volume of copy you have to write as an advertising copywriter nowadays is quite incredible, so I want to be sure I’m being clear up front that I’m aware of how difficult this job is.

Now that I’ve been clear, I’d like to call out 1 weird copywriting trick that needs to stop:

(This last one really pissed me off because they could’ve gone with “We’re So Sorry We Cut Off Your Nuts” and then the copy is how they cut 40% off the price. What a missed opportunity.)

Yes, the fake apology ad is the absolute worst, and I understand if you’re a copywriter and someone made you do it. I get it - we’re all just trying to get paychecks to keep the lights on.

But I’m starting to think that maybe this isn’t a copywriting thing. Are AI tools suggesting this as a campaign strategy? Because this invasive kudzu of slop is everywhere:

And so forth.

It has to be AI suggesting it, no? How else would every one of these companies have literally (yes, literally) the exact same ad?

I’m sorry - We’re all better than this.

(Thanks to Gobbledy reader and former roommate Dan B. for sending me a couple of those and then forcing me down the sorry rabbit hole.)

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Crunchy Granola Suite.AI

I don’t want to leave us with such a bad taste in our collective mouths (ew), so I thought it would be good to share an example of a website I thought did a really good job with messaging (no small feat).

Presenting, the website for AI notetaker Granola.ai.

You may remember from the seminal (heh) Gobbledy column “4 Ways to Fix Your Homepage Headline,” that if your homepage headline is lacking clarity, you can use the “We are an X thing for Y people” template. This forces you to announce your category and your target market. Granola does that quite nicely:

The AI notetaking space is - to say the least - crowded like a public bus in Delhi. Everyone coming to the site is looking for an AI notepad (because why else would they be on the site?). They just want to know if Granola will work for them.

But first, you want to assure the visitor that they are the type of person who would benefit from the product. They could say “it’s the AI tool for busy people,” but lots of different types of people are busy. The specificity of “people in back-to-back meetings” is great.

In the next block, they call out the primary features that differentiate Granola from other, similar products. I often see homepages that are a giant list of product features, but Granola focuses, instead, on the 3 that are most important:

Then in the blocks below this, they add a bit more detail around some of those features and their benefits.

Obviously, Granola is not a wildly complex, enterprise-changing, transformational platform. So if you work for a company that is a wildly complex, enterprise-changing, transformational platform, perhaps you might get pushback if you were to suggest you change your homepage to “we are an X thing for Y people” followed by 3 ways you’re different from the competition.

Except - the homepage exists to get your visitor to want to know more. It does not need to answer every question, it just needs to make the visitor know that they are in the right place and to want to continue to learn more.

Despite the zillion conversations I’ve had where people who work at wildly complex, enterprise-changing, transformational platforms tell me that I don’t understand and their buyers want a mishmosh of gobbledy to wade through to figure out what the technology can do, I am certain that you will convert more visitors if you were to take this template and apply it to your site.

In fact, I’ll add it to my list of fun (“fun”) activities for your team to do when you have your next virtual (?) offsite: copy the Granola model for your site, and see if it doesn’t make your website 50% more clear.

And if not, I’m sorry.

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As always, thanks for reading to the end - it’s the best part.

P.S. - I always say that, but truly today it is the best part. Because this 1970s British cabaret version of The Who’s Pinball Wizard is, and I mean this, the best most terrible and amazing thing I’ve ever seen. You might think you should only watch a little of it, but then you’ll miss the tap dancing.

(Again, thanks to Gobbledy reader and former roommate Dan B. for ruining my life with that. Also thanks to whoever commented on the video “Every once in a while, somebody does a cover of a song that is better than the original. This is not one of those times.”)