Is Verbal Pollution Taking Over Your World?

Sometimes when people talk to me in the biz or in the office, my eyes glaze over. My mind blocks all incoming communication and I fixate on one thing — a solitary word. Not because of boredom or my being uninterested in the topic at hand, but due to the word or words that were just spoken. Odd words. Words that normal folk don’t use. Words that are created within the four walls of an organization — business speak and corporate jargon. And even some that are created within subsets of a business that the rest of the company doesn’t understand. Really? This happens? Yes. I’ve seen it over and over again.

Focus on the message before the method

When I reflect on the time between my teenage years and now, I realize that I’ve used at least a dozen different tools to communicate with others – house phone, pager, snail mail, e-mail, chat room, instant messaging, cell phone, texting, tweeting, facebooking, video sharing, and blogging. While some of these tools have phased out, others are beginning to emerge and grow.

As on a personal level, there are several ways to communicate professionally. It is important to remember, however, that whichever method of communication is selected, your message must be clear and easy to understand. None of these tools are effective if you cannot convey your message correctly.

Please, speak in plain English!

Allow me to climb on a soapbox for just a minute. Here’s my beef: the people you market to? They’re just that — people. They communicate all day long in people words, words like “take out the trash” and “what time is dinner” and “hey, stay in your lane.” But for some reason, when it’s time to communicate a principle in business, we find it necessary to use some other language, language like:

“The foundation of Website conversion optimization is content that maps to your prospects’ needs in key buying cycle stages.”

Huh?