The one thing your marketing MUST be

When it comes to marketing your business, there aren't a lot of rules.

• You can try to reach your audience by using Google ads...or email.

• You can offer short posts on Instagram...or hour-long webinars on Facebook.

• You can write your own website copy...or hire someone else to do it.

The one rule you can't afford to break? 

Be clear! Be clear! Be clear!

Clarity is everything because confusion lurks everywhere!

I had an exchange with a new client this week. (She sent me a text that said, “This is for TOM.” She meant "tomorrow." I thought she had me mistaken for someone named "Tom" ;-)

The very next day, working with another client on a newspaper column that he writes weekly to generate leads, I had to reach out and ask, "What exactly are you trying to say here?"

He began his column by talking about one thing. Then, without warning, he launched into a completely different subject. As a result, I was lost.

In marketing—really, in any business communication—clarity is vital. 

You don't have to be profound. You don't have to be pithy.

But you do have to be understood—which requires being clear.

As Donald Miller likes to say, "Confuse people and you'll lose people."

P. S. Here's what my column-writing client actually said:  

"It is good to have someone not in my head reading this stuff. In my head, it is perfectly clear. But if it is not perfectly clear to you, it is not perfectly clear."

Bingo!