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Words that we don't need
January 8, 2008
Lake Supierior State University has published its 2008 list of Banished Words. The list includes words or phrases such as "Organic" and "Perfect Storm" that we should forget about. I'd like to add or modify a few to fit the electronics business.
Disruptive technology. The Internet, electronic mail, and the Web have been described as disruptive technologies. They sure are. Every e-mail, especially unwanted ones, disprupts your day. We are constantly disrupting out work to browse the web, right?
Leading. Did you ever notice how every company is a "leading" company. What are they leading? Are they leading their customers to spend money unecessarily? Are they leading themselves to the poorhouse?
Organic (as in "Organic Growth"). I hear companies talk about organic grwoth, meaning that they company grows by developing its own new products as opposed to growing by buying othat companies. This is totally inappropriate and just plain wrong. I suggest the markets, analysts, and others say, "growth by innovation" instead of "orgamic growth.
Revolutionary. This one has been around for years and should have ceased use in this country around 1787, when the revolution ended.
Solution. Everybody is selling a solution. Before you can have a solution (unless you'r talking about the chemical kind), you must have a problem. So many marketers talk solutions without mentioning problems. It seels that in marketing, problems are bad and must not be mentioned, but solutions are good, even if there is no problem.
Here's an example from a press release that just came in. "[Company X] announces the company's first [product X],
which provides a highly flexible solution for a wide range of [blank] applications." I didn't know that applications needed solutions unless the application creates a problem.
Here's another.
[Company A] today announced that it expanded its [product removed} test solution...
I'll add to this list as I think of others. In the meantime, feel free to add your own by posting a comment.
Posted by Martin Rowe on January 8, 2008 | Comments (0)
