Episode #32: Marketing Words: Overused or Still Relevant?
In this episode, Julia & Kelly talk about the most overused words in marketing and vote on which words are still relevant and which ones need to go. All marketing professionals have words and phrases that grate on them from the marketing funnel and flywheel to integrated and multi-channel marketing to digital.
Marketing Words: Overused or Still Relevant? Episode Recap
In this episode of the Two Marketing Moms Podcast, Kelly and Julia engage in a light-hearted discussion about popular marketing buzzwords. They ponder whether these terms are still relevant or have become overused. Let’s dive into some of the buzzwords they tackle:
- Marketing Funnel: While it remains an essential concept in the industry, Kelly shares her experience with a new term, “Flywheel,” emphasizing the continuous engagement needed to keep customers.
- Integrated Marketing: The hosts question the need for agencies to promote themselves as “integrated” since digital marketing is now standard for all full-service agencies.
- Alignment: While Julia loves this word for its value in coordinating efforts, Kelly jokes that it should be reserved for chiropractic purposes.
- Synergy: Both hosts agree that this term has lost its luster, becoming psychobabble that should be avoided.
- Pivot: Julia believes this word has been overused since the pandemic began, and it’s time to move on to a more adaptable and changing environment.
- New Normal: Another victim of overuse during the pandemic, this term has lost its significance as the world keeps evolving.
- Award-winning: Both moms emphasize the word’s lack of differentiating power for agencies and encourage using other credibility-building strategies.
- Thinking Outside the Box: Kelly points out the importance of defining the box’s parameters before claiming to think outside it.
- Pain Point and Sweet Spot: While pain points can lead to productive discussions, sweet spot might be more appropriate for casual conversations.
- Impactful: As a popular term in the nonprofit space, its significance remains but should be used thoughtfully to avoid dilution.
Choose marketing words wisely and ensure they resonate with both clients and their audience. The hosts advocate for precise language that reflects meaningful strategies and aligns with the constantly evolving marketing landscape. Kelly and Julia emphasize the importance of using buzzwords thoughtfully and with care. Some words can still effectively convey the intended message, while others may have lost their impact due to overuse. By finding more descriptive options and staying mindful of context, marketers can create compelling messaging that resonates with audiences. So, next time you’re tempted to use a buzzword, think outside the box and choose words that truly align with your message and goals.
Episode Transcript:
Julia
Welcome to the Two Marketing Moms Podcast. Today, we have a fun conversation that Kelly and I are just going to riff about marketing words. Are they buzzy? Or are they duds? Are they overused? Are they still relevant? And so there you go, that’s what we’re going to talk about today. I think the reason why I wanted to talk about this is because I think it’s, it’s, it’s a fun topic. And in the marketing world words are our gold, you know, words are so important and the wrong word can throw you way off. And so, I was thinking, what are words that I use that even annoy me, or I think I overuse? And I think what it comes down to is like, a good word is something that someone can take meaning from, who they understand immediately what you’re trying to say. And then maybe overused, maybe like bad or even inappropriate sometimes, or just things that like, are, it has too much fluff around it, like we’ve taken the icing on the cake, and we’ve just added layers, like let’s just get down to the real meaning.
Kelly
Well, what I’m a little anxious about is we have not prepped for this at all, and you have not told me what any of your words are. So, I guarantee I probably use 95% of them in a proposal at one point. So, I’m afraid so
Julia
I’m pretty sure that I’ve used all of these right. And I don’t think that they’re bad. I think that we could make an argument that all of these have a place in marketing. But I do think that sometimes marketers just like they glom on to one word, and they just use it, use it, use it for every type of application. And I think what we’re trying to say is like, really think about the Specify the specific situation where you’re using the word,
Kelly
Well bring it on, so I know what you’re talking about. Here’s my favorite one.
Julia
You told me that you didn’t like this. You didn’t like me putting this on the list originally? Oh, no. Was marketing funnel?
Kelly
I love the funnel.
Julia
I think we all love the funnel, right? Because it’s something that we all understand the industry, right? But do our clients truly understand it? Does it make sense to them when we’re like, and here is the marketing funnel, and we will bring people to the top of the funnel and push them all the way down to the bottom. Do they stand that?
Kelly
Well? It’s funny because I recently did this with a client and it’s actually no longer the funnel Julia. It’s the flywheel. The flywheel flywheel because you’re, you don’t just bring them into the funnel and acquire the customer, you have to continuously, you know, engage them to keep them as a customer. And so what I did with the client is I did the funnel flywheel. Let me explain. I can even show graphic if I wanted to. But the funnel for this particular client is how are we getting them in through all of our acquisition tactics? And then, obviously, ultimately, how are we converting them and acquiring them? But then once they have the customer experience, that’s when they go in the flywheel? How are they making an appointment? How is that experience going? How does the follow up go? How does? How do they get them to come back? All those sorts of things are part of the flywheel aspect. And that’s operations within an organization. Advertising and Marketing brings them in through the funnel, but operations does the flywheel. Well, my client seemed to really get this and I was quite good. They did. They did. And we actually created objectives for each part of the funnel, and then each part of the flywheel for different aspects of people. So again, if you if you Google it, they’ll say that the funnel is dead, and it’s now the flywheel. I like both. I think it’s the funnel plus the plus the flywheel and because to me, I’m visual, and I can understand that better. And it’s everyone understands what the funnel means in terms of how are you bringing people in and at the top anyway?
Julia
Yes, I love the TOFU. And the BOFU.
Kelly
Yeah, never remember what those mean, you refer to that once and I actually had to google it. I’m like, oh, yeah, top of the funnel, bottom of the funnel, okay, now. I don’t think everyone remembers those.
Julia
I think the biggest takeaway for this word is that it’s still alive in many shapes and sizes. And I think the most important thing that you just said is like your client did understand what you were talking about? Because you put it in other terms of what are the objectives here? What? What is the journey? Right? You can put journey into that bucket people overuse the journey, right? Yes. but really, what does it come down to? It comes down to? How are we getting people from stranger to friend and customer? Essentially, right. So, like, it’s up to us to put it into terms that our clients will understand and that they can get behind?
Kelly
Yes. And I think the reason why I did it that way, ultimately, because this client wanted to explain how it’s not just about marketing, the entire organization has to be a part of keeping and engaging that customer. And there are different ones, the handoff happens for marketing, that experience is a different department and division and linking the two together is important. And so anyway, funnel flywheel.
Julia
You and I both working on nonprofits, and a lot of the times fundraising departments are really worried or really working on their own marketing funnel, right, bringing, bringing a prospect in and getting them to that donation phase. But there are a lot of other steps that have to either happen in between or after to keep them engaged. And thinking through that is That process is why I think we talk a lot about the journey and the marketing funnel, right. So don’t just plug and play marketing funnel, customize it to your actual usage. Correct. There you go.
Kelly
Oh, that one still lives to a certain extent.
Julia
That one still lives. We love to hate it. Okay, how about this one? Integrated Marketing? I feel like this one is just like so old, like who the bleep is not practicing integrated marketing? Well,
Kelly
The other thing that that really digs at me is some agencies position themselves as we’re an integrated marketing agency.
Julia
And are they made up of people that are nearing their retirement? Because I don’t think anybody under the age of let’s say, 40.
Kelly
Well, let me pile on and add on digital marketers. We’re all digital. And if we’re not all digital, cool, where are you living? Yeah. Name an agency that doesn’t do digital. That’s a full-service agency, we all do digital. So frankly, there’s no shouldn’t necessarily be special agencies that are just digital. And what we just talked about is integrated. So, don’t you want to integrate both? Because there is both so it makes no sense to me,
Julia
you could make you could make the argument that if you were positioning yourself for that very senior kind of old school, maybe a little stodgy like clients that you would want to use integrated or digital because the that is the type of like, they came up in their career during that time when digital was this separate thing?
You know, it was a lot of print and so to have integrated was, you know, a cool thing. But I mean, I mean, I think in general, this is like, that is just, well stop.
Kelly
Let’s just bring in multi-channel.
Julia
Yeah, what is multi-channel? I mean, that’s famous integrated, is it not? If you’re only using one channel these days, then you really must really know your audience very well. Yes, because that just seems silly to me. Okay, here’s the next one. I use this. This is one of my power words.
Alignment.
And every time I say it, sometimes I feel a little silly, but like, I love that word. I love the fact that like, we can align things and put them on the same page. Instead of, hey, let’s do a piece of marketing over here. at a different time and another thing over here, and I tend to encounter situations where people are doing that. So, then I say, let us align.
Kelly
I think that word should only be used with my chiropractor.
Julia
Well, here’s another word that could be the same as alignment is synergy. Oh, yes. I don’t use that one too much. But maybe I do sometimes. I don’t know. I think like, is that salesy? What’s your opinion? Kelly?
Kelly
Yeah, it’s psychobabble. Okay.
Julia
So, we should stay away from Oh, synergy is all about or synergy ship
Kelly
Are we vibing? Do we have the same? We understand each other?
Julia
Or it could be like the synergy between marketing? materials or messaging?
Kelly
I’m sure I’ve used it. Let’s just say.
Julia
Okay, here’s the one that I think we can totally put to bed. Okay. His pivot? Ah, I love pivoting.
Kelly
I love pivoting. But you’re right.
Julia
We’re, I don’t think you loved pivoting in like May of 2020.
Kelly
I didn’t love pivoting in 2020. No, but I love the word at the moment because it meant so much. It doesn’t mean anything. Because we’re all about a whole world is all about the pivot change happens every day.
Julia
I think we will be forever. Right. And so therefore, I think, um, people will shy away from using this word, because we did overuse it. And then it will slowly creep back into our vocabulary. Because that is that’s the new world.
Kelly
Yeah, I mean, again, it’s all about can you handle change? And can you handle all the changes? Media habit changes, I mean, my goodness, think about the last two years, not just with COVID and the war in Ukraine. And I mean, there’s like so many different things that are impacting us in so many different ways that are also impacting our clients. So adapting to change is just part of our job. But yeah, pivots probably got to go to bed.
Julia
And, I think this word has absolutely been already put to bed. But I absolutely hated it. But yet used it was new normal. Like we’re over it, we are fully over the new normal, we’re into a whole new normal, and the normal will change.
Kelly
Yeah, exactly. As soon as you declare a new normal, it’s, it’s changed already.
Julia
Yes. Okay. Here is a very controversial one.
Award winning.
And normally, this is, you know, this is like agency speak when we try to market ourselves. But I absolutely, if I had a bucket here, I would throw award winning in it, and pour gasoline and throw in a match. Because I encounter agency partners, so often, through my work, and every one of their freakin websites says that they are award winning. So, what does that mean?
Kelly
Well, and the truth of it is, is that you have to pay to win. You don’t just get them because your creatives good, you got to submit them, and you’ve got to pay to submit them. And so, it’s out of those people that actually paid to submit. So, anyone can win an award technically as long as you submit. Now, that’s a qualification. Clients want award winning, but it’s not a differentiator,
Julia
right. If it’s the first word on your site, like we are an award-winning agency, yeah, you got you’ve got to go back to the drawing board. Because anybody could say that, that is not that is not should never be part of your USP. Agreed. And it turns me off so much. Obviously, I’m not a client, but I just think that there are better ways to differentiate yourself, build credibility, and show that you’re awesome. Agreed. Okay. Oh, I think we’ve talked about this one before Kelly. Think outside the box.
Kelly
I like that one. I don’t know. I like that one.
Julia
I try to stay away from it. Honestly, I think I’ve done a pretty good job of eradicating it from My,
my vocab?
Kelly
Well, again, that’s why you hire agencies. That’s what we’re supposed to do.
Julia
Right?
Kelly
So sometimes clients will come and say, let’s think outside the box. So, what does that mean? Okay, not just TV, not just radio, does that mean experiential? And it’s kind of good to hear that because that means that they’re open to new and interesting ideas. If it comes from a client.
Julia
Yes. And if you’re talking about thinking outside of the box in terms of messaging and tone, that’s a, or creative. Like, that’s a far scarier place for a client to be because you’re really probably going to be taking a huge chance, which might be uncomfortable. Yeah, and how much? Are they into thinking outside of the box? Also? What’s in the box? Like, could you define it? I think we talk a lot about like, let’s think outside the box, but like, do we ever define what the parameters of the box are? What are the lines that we’re tired of being in? Has anyone ever done that? Or do we just use it as like a phrase like, to seem like we’re going to live on the edge? We’re going to think outside the box,
Kelly
or when an agent, we’re an agency that that thinks outside the box? Oh,
Julia
gosh, put that in the same category as award-winning, that should not be part of your use?
Kelly
Exactly. Or integrated?
Julia
Yes. Okay. Yes. Well,
Kelly
It’s multi-channel. So now we’re going to have to go back and look at my website to see what’s in there.
Julia
We are an award winning integrated digital marketing agency that thinks outside the box when working on the marketing funnel. Did that mean that what does that even mean? Yes, that’s a good one. Oh, okay. All right. Here’s the one that’s so crazy. I never even thought about this. But I think we use them I use them maybe occasionally. pain point, or sweet spot? Do you feel like those are words for the bedroom? Are they appropriate for work?
Kelly
Ah, gosh, that’s a good one. And sweet spot maybe it’s work? I agree, a pain points. It is overused.
Julia
It’s, I agree, like, this is one of those words that is maybe jargony. But also, I think spurs a lot of good conversation. Like when you talk about the pain points of your customer and what you’re trying to solve, you really can dive deep into good solutions, like, what should we say? Or what kind of creative would really speak to that person? Because they are feeling that pain?
Kelly
Well, again, it’s got to be research backed. I mean, it can’t a lot of times agencies are like, well, we think these are our pain, their pain points, based on our perceptions. But we have no idea because the clients never done any research. And we’ve never done any research. So, if those are research backs, then they make sense. And then you have a solution to reach that pain point. I think that one’s still viable, you can take sweet spot and
Julia
Kelly will never use that again. I ruined it for her.
Kelly
I just visualized the sweet spot, the concentric three circles, where you have the thing in the center, that’s the sweet spot.
in a presentation,
Julia
right? If you have that type of relationship with your client, go for the sweet spot. On Okay, here’s one that I mean, is probably out of all of these words, the most overused word in the nonprofit and cause space, which is the word impactful. Yeah. Or just impact?
Julia
Yeah, the word impact.
I don’t know how to get away from it, though.
Kelly
I feel like it’s the I feel like that’s a keeper. I feel like it’s the only way that you can explain what is the impact that this nonprofit has on its constituents on you know, whoever it’s supporting. Because you do have to get clients to think about that because the impact is the ultimate thing that we’re driving for in nonprofits. So, there’s no other better word
Julia
than I’m going to start a LinkedIn poll on my personal LinkedIn page to ask people, what their alternatives are to Word impact. Obviously, if you’re storytelling, you don’t want to use the word impact. You want to let the story
Kelly
know it’s a marketing word. It’s not something we use to the it’s an internal, creative, brief word. It’s not so does it use?
Julia
Does it have a place in your digital marketing? In your social marketing? What do you think?
Kelly
Well, of course, if you’re integrated in multi-channel, you can demonstrate impact in any sort of media, right? It’s a matter of how you do it. Yes. And then that leads to the other. How are you demonstrating impact? So, are using stats and numbers? Are you using emotion? You know, there’s many different ways to do that.
Julia
I think if you’re in other industries, you could probably find other words very similar to impact that are overused that that are just so industry specific like this. This is for nonprofits, for sure. Yes. Okay. How about the word value add?
Kelly
Media Buyers have been using that since the 60s. I know, but it doesn’t even have a place today, in the year 2022.
Kelly
It does. And I’ll tell you why. Because when we well, of course, I go into sales mode, right? When we develop a media plan or anyone develops a media plan, you want to get value add for your clients. So, you’re negotiating XYZ offer a card, right? And if you negotiate outbreak card, maybe that’s part of value add, but then there’s also Okay, well, you give us free impressions on your digital for buying print, that’s value add, so the clients like getting value added because it just demonstrates that
Julia
you’re giving them a deal. But is it too salesy?
Kelly
I’m keeping it.
Julia
Okay, so Kelly her bottom line is value add it’s salesy, but it works and clients like it. Clients like it. There you go. I am Judge Judy, the gavel on that one. Okay, how about this one? Branding?
Kelly
I love branding.
What do you mean?
Julia
I mean, do you think it’s an over word, overused buzzword for marketing? I mean, what is branding? The word branding could have like 150 definitions, right? And people talk about how branding is so valuable. And branding is, you know, what brings, you know, a client value over time, and I don’t know, his branding is just overused, or maybe not using the right way.
Kelly
I think it’s misunderstood. And I think it’s so misunderstood that I actually did an infographic on it recently, with our creative director Eva de and it’s on our website, Williams Whittle comm under our nonprofit marketing section, if you want to check it out, there’s a whole infographic on what is a brand? What is branding? And why is branding important? The reason why I did it is because I was asked in the last couple years, multiple times in a pitch situation to answer that question, what is branding? And the reason why is because board members frequently don’t really understand what it means. And a lot of times, you know, they’re trying to either rebrand or change their name or change the positioning, and they didn’t understand and that’s the other part of it is the difference between a rebrand and a brand refresh.
A lot of clients don’t really understand that. So, a refresh is a makeover, right? A rebrand is like a change of positioning, are you going to new markets, that sort of thing? So, I think it’s misunderstood is what I think and not. And that’s why there’s some education that needs to happen.
Julia
But what about branding when you’re when you’re looking at a piece of creative and you’re like, Is this similar branding style? Or when you’re thinking about a partnership and you’re like, is this good for our branding? Julia question. I feel like our listeners want like this is good to know.
Kelly
I love branding. Um, I think even you and I think about that about what works for Five Ones versus Williams Whittle versus Two Marketing Moms. We have three brands that we’re working with, right between us, and there’s synergies between them, but they’re three separate brands.
Julia
Synergy Did you just define the sweet spot?
Kelly
Okay, I’ll shut up. No, I’m done.
Julia
I think I think where this word becomes problematic is when the brand or the branding, you’re talking about is not defined, right? So, like, if you’re like, looking at a piece of creative and you’re and you’re thinking, is this in our branding style? Well, we define that go deeper, you know, like, when you’re if you’re presenting to a client, and they’re like, well, is this our branding? Make sure that you have the bullet points of yes, this, this, I’m about to say it, this aligns with our brand, because it’s has this tone, or it has this message or it has this visual component that is important for us,
Kelly
which is usually written generally out in a brand standards guide. Correct?
Julia
You would hope? Yeah. You would hope that everyone is on the same page about that.
Kelly
So misunderstood, I’m going to put that into misunderstood. misunderstood,
Julia
okay, branding is understood. Okay. How about this one?
bandwidth.
Julia
This is more of an internal word maybe not to use in marketing, but I think maybe marketing people use it a lot. Yeah, yeah. Cuz we like using words for multiple different purposes, right? I mean, I only say bandwidth when I’m trying to be in a hall. If I’m like, I really don’t have bandwidth for that. Oh, wow. I have no client ever hears this is literally up to it.
Kelly
It’s true. It’s absolutely true. It’s a word. It’s very descriptive word like synergy that it’s a nice way of pushing back. Like, I don’t have the time to do that right now.
Julia
And it’s jargon, right? It is totally,
Kelly
but it sounds great. I’m going to keep that one.
Julia
Right. It’s jargon, because we are trying to, it’s like a nice nasty. Yes. Right? Yes. Okay. All right. Well, you agree on that one. Okay. I got two more. This one is like a dual word. Innovative or cutting edge overused, or still relevant. I am going to it’s still relevant. But you’ve got to it is like, it’s like chili powder. You’ve got to use it with care. And not all the time. And I really want to encourage people to find more descriptive options.
Kelly
I feel like that. I mean, innovative is one thing cutting edge is I don’t know that I’ve rarely if ever used that because it’s hard to find something that’s cut it cutting edge, let alone call it cutting edge. It’s true. Innovative, is a little different than cutting edge. I wouldn’t necessarily put them in the same bucket. Oh, okay. All clients would love to be able to say that. Their marketing is innovative. Their product is innovative. That’s more nuanced marketing speak,
Julia
I guess. Ooh. So maybe is on the borderline of jargon.
Kelly
It is. And I think I still want to keep it. I still want to keep it but cutting edge. It’s really got to be Yeah, absolutely different. It’s got to have something behind it.
Julia
Yeah, you can’t be like the next new note pad and be cutting edge. What’s like be real with yourself? Yeah. Cutting Edge has a very specific use
Kelly
Uber was cutting edge at the time, right? ride sharing. Airbnb was cutting edge at the time. I mean, there’s a lot of things on Facebook.
Julia
So maybe you can only be cutting edge for a specific time period to
Kelly
that’s true, because obviously you get me to people. As soon as you launch.
Julia
Yep, totally. Okay, last word is oh, this goes right back to the marketing funnel. Top of Mind. And I say this a lot.
Julia
but I’m not going to give this one up. I use it a lot. I know it’s probably overused, but I mean, it goes a long way like it is an absolute tool to be able to use a market thing, whatever it is to keep your insert your product service cause whatever top of mind. I’m going
Kelly
to link it back to branding. Because frequently the customer’s first perception of a brand is what’s the words in the attributes that are top of mind? Yep. And that is part of a brand and branding. So yeah, let’s keep that one. We’re going to keep it.
Julia
Well, that was my list, Kelly. I’m sure if you Googled, you would find lists of hundreds of words that would fall into the marketing overused words. I think the biggest takeaway people should take or they should take away from this episode is just to think about what you were saying.
Or think outside the box.
Kelly
Thanks, that was fun.
Julia
All right. Bye, everyone.
