Clichés are easy to throw around. They are common language. We default to them in our professional silos because we’ve heard them so frequently it feels like the air we breathe. They are comfortable like the threadbare socks we wear because they hug our feet so nice. Comfort.
The trouble is that those clichés put dead people to sleep, they make you sound just like any other community, and consumers can get downright angry when the effort looks lazy. “Sales” has to work hard to amuse, educate, elevate, and inspire. It’s not bed-time reading. When the point is to stand out from the crowd, cliché is like a Lawrence Welk band-member (apologies to those who loved the blue suits and combed down and to the left hairstyles).
Let’s run through a few clichés that municipalities use:
World class – the Banff Springs Hotel is world class. Your sand green golf course with three knee-high-to-a-grasshopper trees on it is not.
Diverse – is a throwaway term like Dynamic, Vibrant, or Thriving that means nothing if it’s not defined. That Calgary speaks 120 languages means diverse. Be specific.
Live Work Play – gives you only one remaining life choice; to die. So stop putting it on websites and brochures and extolling the virtues of a community you are trying to sell as full service. If you want to live work play and die as your community tag – well then at least you are having a bit of fun with it.
Explore – we’re not Magellan. Just like “Discover” or “Experience,” stop asking us to work hard to figure out what your community is and why we should care. We are lazy and simple people at heart. The remote control, the garage door opener, the bidet – there’s a world of stuff that is helping us not push or wipe. So give us the handful of experiences that makes you compelling – the reason to explore your community.
Heart of – is at least an attempt to be emotive, but a cliché can be a matter of over-use and everyone and their dog has tried this one.
Open for Business – means you are open for business…when you are not closed. Everyone with a heartbeat is open for business. It’s what makes the capitalist economy go around. How are you making it easier to start a business? Have some facts and figures on your recent business community growth? Are there some business success stories you are profiling? Ahhhhh…that’s better.
Stunning – is how you describe the feeling of being hit over the head with a fish bat. Just like “breath-taking,” really dig deep to think about times in your life when you couldn’t catch your breath because the event left you so in awe. Winston Churchill once said “there’s nothing so invigorating in life as to be shot at and missed.” Now that’s breath-taking. Not much else is.
Charming – is a real estate phrase for tiny and a tear down for its antiquated creepiness.
Truly – is an over the top superlative that doesn’t help us like things better. “Brutal” murder seems like a bit of overkill – pardon the bad pun. Really (hint: that’s a superlative too).
Something for everyone – describes toilet paper and little else. And even toilet paper has one ply vs two ply vs soft vs gravel options. You are not something for everyone. If you were, your value proposition would be that you are panacea for all our wants and needs. Not everyone will love you. Get over it. Be something to someone, and be liberated by it to discuss why your community matters to certain people, and what it’s working toward.
Small town charm with big city amenities – yeah yeah…you’re cute and you have an opera and an international airport in your community of 4,000 people. Everyone uses this – so stop using it. Describe your small town values, your handful of cool things, and little vignettes of small town life lived perhaps more deeply or meaningfully. Now you’re tugging me awake from my couch-induced nap and making me think I should do more than watch Family Guy reruns.
Hidden Gem and Best Kept Secret – these “almost famous” taglines mean either your product sucks or your marketing sucks.
Here’s some advice on how to freshen the language:
- Toss anyone advising you what “professional” is supposed to sound like. Word choice is about making connection with people more quickly, and more deeply, to motivate an action you want them to take.
- Keep it simple. Take your final document, and edit out another 30%.
- Use visuals. A brilliantly chosen picture or illustration can leave your need for words sparse.
- Default to emotive. People aren’t robots; they are human.
- Think of a different way to say the same word. Same but different can make words uniquely yours.
People are smart. They see through lazy, throw-away language that sounds like the poor tasteless mild cheddar in the cheese deli of life. Put a little jalapeno in your curds and whey.