The concentration and clarity of your messaging should always be a priority when developing a brand. Whatever you say needs to be straightforward, comprehensible, and memorable because people typically pay little attention to communications and advertisements. Additionally, it must be linked to your brand, creating lasting memory structures.
That’s a simple process for some categories. Do you have the same thing that everyone else does, but with a different twist? That’s fantastic. Let others fill in the blanks by explaining the difference to everyone! Memory structures exist for familiar categories that allow marketers to emphasize their unique selling point.
However, the requirement to simplify can frequently result in dumbing down the message to an easily replicated or disregarded level for complicated and inventive products, the type often found in university spin-outs or arising from research problems.
These organizations may be attempting to draw in investors who lack the time to thoroughly research every new product they come across. Or they need to attract bigger audiences because the early adopters have been reached. Whatever the cause, they reach a point where their communication barriers are caused by their complexity. At this point, they decide to simplify the innovation’s precise elements since they believe they are too intricate to attract attention.
So many creative brands opted for the former, laddering up to clichéd platitudes that, although potentially applicable to their products, don’t set them apart from their rivals.
Consider the Dutch company Smart Photonics, which makes the intricate microchips required for things like (I believe) quantum computers. Do they place a high priority on what makes them unique and sets them apart from rivals? Bringing your innovation to life, you say. the top integrated photonics foundry, producing cutting-edge goods that enhance people’s lives.
Sifted states that Anjarium Biosciences is “developing DNA-based gene therapies to treat genetic diseases that are more predictable and inclusionary than current methods.” That’s great. They’ll employ it since inclusivity is a significant problem in bioscience. Leading the way in non-viral gene therapy’s next generation. Doh!
I don’t mean to pick on Anjarium Biosciences or Smart Photonics; they both do intelligent things extremely well. They simply had the unfortunate distinction of being the first two deeptech businesses I came across when searching. The issues are specific to the group.
It’s not just a business issue though. Researchers discovered that academic scientists “write unclearly in part because they forget that they know more about their research than readers” in the article Marketing Ideas: How to Write Research Articles that Readers Understand and Cite. They explain the “curse of knowledge,” according to which a subject’s in-depth experience makes communicators more likely to be abstract, technical, and write passively. It’s not surprising that the issue affects the corporate world given that many new items are created by spin-offs from universities.
These creators must keep in mind that compelling tales form the foundation of outstanding brands. Brands created around complex products and services should look for fascinating features and dramatize them rather than simplifying the entire offering. But when you’re immersed in the specifics, it might be difficult to understand what makes your company unique. To help you keep straightforward and intriguing, here are three prompts.
Pay attention to the category.
Everyone is affected by dumbing down, and you can frequently identify common simplifications to avoid among your rivals. A simple approach is to copy and paste the website copy from your competitor’s website onto a blank document, delete the brand names, and ask someone who is not very familiar with the category to read the paper and underline the terms that are repeated. If you don’t have any pals to persuade you to do this, BingAI is also brilliant at identifying the similarities.
Discover the distinctions and driving forces
As you analyze and describe your objectives, product, and competition, develop into a product and brand investigator. Break down your results into clusters that are pertinent to your category, and keep going until you discover an original distinction, no matter how slight. It merely needs to serve as the foundation of an engaging story; it need not be a crucial component of your technology. What a friend refers to as the “chocolate in the chili” (since the flavor of chili con carne is enhanced by the addition of chocolate).
Increase the contrast in relation to audience demands.
Once you’ve identified the distinction, vividly and compellingly illustrate it. Illustrate the difference and how your audience’s world will change as a result—it doesn’t have to be a novel.
I’ll give you a quick example of a company that is succeeding in this. PsiQuantum works in the field of quantum computing, where despite each company having its own method of construction, no one has yet been able to scale up production. Competitors typically concentrate on their unique approach to producing quantum bits. But this is how PsiQuantum makes its introduction: Building the first practical quantum computer: PsiQuantum. Focusing on the audience’s needs while boldly challenging the reader to consider why their product is valuable when others aren’t. Six words to describe what they do and why.
By putting these straightforward suggestions into action, we should be able to get to a point where complicated items receive the attention they merit, without dumbing it down or dramatizing the specifics.