What's the # 1 messaging mistake tech companies make? There's a hands-down winner: failing to explain complicated material simply to non-technical publics like the press.
Why is it so difficult for tech companies to dumb-it-down? Three decades in this industry taught me six reasons:
Reason # 1: Most tech companies are, well, techy.
Engineers typically dominate technology company cultures. They naturally assume everyone is on their wavelength and can follow along. Many are not even aware they are the way they are. Help them see the light when speaking with reporters or editing marketing content: less is more, simple is better, analogies and metaphors are fabulous learning techniques.
Reason # 2: Ego.
For some people, it's a trip knowing subject matter no one else can possibly fathom. Keeping it complicated = self preservation. This approach gives them an advantage over the simple folk who struggle to comprehend. Patiently teach these people why they need to take one for the team.
Reason # 3: Assuming everyone is technical.
Most reporters aren't technical. When an editor visits a Web site, reads a news release or has a conversation, she wants to easily understand what your company does, where it fits within a market, what makes it different, who benefits from your products and why readers should care. Build bridges of comprehension to get more positive visibility.
Reason # 4: Myopia.
While your tech execs spend most of their waking business time thinking about their company, reporters don't, unless of course your company is an industry gorilla. Enlighten your spokespersons. Tell them why they need to frame discussions, acknowledge the larger ecosystem surrounding their company and take the time to simply explain.
Reason # 5: Simplicity = inaccuracy.
Some tech executives believe dumbing it down leads to misinterpretation, inaccuracy and selling short. Educate them that the objective of communicating with the press isn't to cross every "t" and dot every "i" in a pattern of boring thoroughness. It's to make certain the reporter finds your company helpful, credible and newsworthy in a way that makes him/her want to write about it favorably.
Reason # 6: Just not caring.
Some people are arrogant and/or impatient. They want to say what they want to say the way they want to say it. They haven't read Dale Carnegie's "How to Win Friends & Influence People." They figure, if some people don't follow along, well hey, it's their loss. Help them understand this self-serving attitude yields significant missed opportunity for their company.
How to dumb it down
Here are a few examples of dumbing it down for the average reporter:
- Instead of saying, "This new LED is available in a multitude of sizes ranging from a diminutive 280 µm to 350 µm," say "These new LEDs are smaller than a grain of sand."
- Instead of saying, "Implement IEEE 802.15.4 2.4 GHz radio frequency wireless ZigBee sensor networks to enable devices to interface with each other," say "Easily cast wireless sensory networks around structures like an invisible tactile spider web."
- Instead of saying, "A software system identified by a URI, whose public interfaces and bindings are defined and described using XML and whose definition can be discovered by other software systems that may interact with the Web service in a manner prescribed by its definition, using XML based messages conveyed by Internet protocols," say "Web service."
- Instead of saying, "Nanotechnology is research and technology development at the atomic, molecular or macromolecular levels, in the length scale of approximately 1 - 100 nanometer range," say, "Nanotechnology relates to things 70,000 times smaller than a human hair is wide."
- Instead of saying, "A complete platform application-specific integrated circuit (ASIC)," say "System on a chip."
- Instead of saying, "Public domain, symmetric encryption algorithm using variable length hex encoding," say "A digital key."
- Andy Beaupre
