Improve your marcom by becoming mindful of messages that hit you in the gut!

One of the most powerful pieces of communication I have ever laid my eyes upon was not the brainchild of the hot, new Madison Avenue agency... nor the creative genius of an underground, esoteric Parisian artist. It was the creation of a couple of public school teachers and their students. It sat on display in the entry hall of their school in Harlem.

There in the display case was a can of a Coca Cola and three Chips Ahoy cookies. Right next to the can of coke was a mountain of pure white sugar. The Chips Ahoy cookies were accompanied by a similar-sized mountain of sugar in addition to a large cube of butter.

The sign above the display read, "Ever wonder how much sugar is in that can of coke you're drinking?"

Needless to say, the hills of sugar and the butter represented the exact amounts of sugar and fat in the respective items on display. It was powerful communication. It scored a knockout blow.

The goal behind any communication is quite simple. Get people to notice it. Get people to "give it the time of day". Get people to be moved or motivated by it.

Whenever I come across something or someone that communicates powerfully, I stop and ask myself, "Why? What was it about this that made it past my 'filter' and touched me in some way?" Whatever answers I come up with, I try to boil down to more generalized themes that I can apply in some capacity to my own marketing efforts. As a marketer, this is an important habit to develop, and one that has helped me immeasurably throughout my career.

Going back to the school display in Harlem, the communication was effective with me for two primary reasons, each interrelated:

1. It was unexpected & surprising.
2. It made the abstract concrete.

While I knew a can of coke had 'lots of sugar' in it, the 'lots' remained an abstract concept that was hard for me to interpret - and one that I likely preferred not to think about. Translating this abstract concept into a visually compelling mound of sugar brought it to life, and made it easily comparable. How could I help but notice that the mound of sugar was 1/2 the height of the can of coke! It was a perverse, shocking image, with a powerful, long-lasting impact.

While my example of the coke can highlighted a couple common success drivers of powerful communications - surprise & tangibility - there are several other such drivers that have relative degrees of importance given the context of the communication. While understanding these drivers is helpful, it's even more important to become mindful of those communications that "get to you" - and to ask yourself, "why?" The nuances you will learn through your self reflection about what make communications powerful is where the real insight lies.