My father use to say ‘figures don’t lie, but liars can figure’. When crafting a message it is important to remember that phrase. In this age of easily disseminated information through social media, it is easy for others to mislead, misinterpret or outright lie about what you are trying to say. The message must be simple and unequivocal.
And making it more difficult is that we are a society of headline readers, content to not delve into a subject but base opinions on sound bites and catch phrases. David Ogilvy once said ‘ On the average, five times as many people read the headline as read the body copy. When you have written your headline, you have spent 80 cents out of your dollar’. As I tell my kids, as consumers of information, we need to scratch below the surface to get the full story.
A perfect example of a difficult message susceptible to misinterpretation and misrepresentation is the Trudeau government’s carbon tax. Although many economists say taxes are the most effective method to change behaviour, I am not so sure. Added gasoline taxes are not going to have much effect on my driving habits. I need to get to work and public transit is not an option.
But there is a twist to Turdeau’s carbon tax: we are entitled to a grant each year. If we reduce our carbon footprint to the point that we pay less in tax than what we receive as a grant, we come out financially ahead. Those that don’t reduce their carbon emissions end up paying more tax than the grant they receive.
But getting the message out has been flawed. I am surprised that many people don’t know about the grant. It is a two part message and the second part – you can come out ahead – has been lost. And to distort the message further, opponents like the Ontario government actively campaign against it as a simple tax grab, failing to mention of the potential to actually gain with the grant. The Fed’s repeated mantra that pollution is not free only reinforces the perception that it is simply a tax grab.
Regardless of whether the program is effective in combating climate change, many people will not understand how the program is supposed to work, We are just hearing the headlines – ‘Tax Grab’ and ‘Pollution Isn’t Free’. The Trudeau government has failed to communicate the program effectively and opponents have jumped on that. The result is there is no logical debate.
Facebook provides many examples of people reacting to headlines and not ‘scratching below the surface’. It’s not a secret that much of what is posted on Facebook is hardly reliable information. A case in point is a post by a right leaning group of an article indicating George Soros (the Liberal bogeyman) was advertising to hire participants for the 2017 Women’s March in Washington. When I clicked on the article, the only ad I found was recruiting people to sell merchandise to the protesters. There was no indication in the article that George Soros was recruiting and paying protesters. Yet people were commenting and sharing the group’s post claiming it was proof of a Soros inspired Liberal conspiracy.
It is true that many of the groups that sponsored the march and provided logistical support have received funding from Soros’ foundation. But it has been refuted that his foundation directly provided funds to the march or hired marchers. Yet if I had not actually read the article and just believed what this group said in the post, I would have believed that protesters were recruited and paid.
Medicine is one where one story or headline, if not researched fully, can lead us down the wrong path.
Science is a collaborative and iterative process . Studies can be flawed. Results must be reviewed and replicated by other researchers until a consensus or better understanding is formed. It is not a simple process. Yet too often we hear about one doctor or researcher that makes a ground breaking discovery – that has not been corroborated. The anti-vaccine movement is a perfect example – although the study that ignited the movement (lead by a Hollywood star, not a doctor or scientist) has been disproven and the researcher discredited, many still hold strong anti-vaccination views, putting children at risk.
Similarly, a report that the higher frequencies of 5G mobile technology will cause an increased incidence in brain cancer received a great deal of press and influenced school board decisions on installing WiFi. The researcher showed that brain tissue will absorb more radiation at the higher 5G frequencies, causing cancer. What the researcher did not account for is higher frequencies are less able to penetrate skin and bone. Apparently those frequencies have trouble passing through buildings and leaves. In other words, the radiation can not get to the brain tissue.
In Marketing we must be very careful in how we construct and deliver a message. Complex messages can easily become ineffective through misunderstanding and misrepresentation. And as consumers we must be wary of where we get our information. A single inaccurate story can gain traction and be accepted as fact. We need to ‘scratch below the surface’ to get all the facts and a complete understanding of the issue.
Ken Jure - Copywriter 