The Science of Marketing

Joe arrives at the family holiday gathering with a new girl on his arm. (Stop me if you’ve heard this one.) He introduces her to his brothers as his "friend". He later introduces her to his sisters as his "girlfriend" and just plain "Susan" to his parents. By using three different terms, each with its own very different meaning, Joe is setting his family up for confusion, not to mention quite a bit of gossip later on around the eggnog. Maybe Joe needs to exercise more care in choosing the words he uses to characterize his relationships. Perhaps Joe should develop a relationship lexicon.

The high tech industry is not unlike the situation with Joe. A company often enters a market with a new product and wants to earn recognition for the innovative company it is and the game changing solution it has developed. But, without consistently using the right words and phrases, the company risks general market confusion about who it is and what it does. These words and phrases go beyond the standard, accepted industry nomenclature found in a company’s glossary, and include only those key expressions that help solidify a company’s brand. Together, these strategic words and their meanings represent a company’s marketing lexicon.

A marketing lexicon is not intended to define every word, term or phrase a company uses for external audiences. After all, that’s what a glossary is for. Instead, a marketing lexicon is an internal tool that is developed as part of a company’s verbal identity and consists of a few strategic terms that best articulate its category, market position, industry vision and/or competitive differentiation. Where a glossary provides the generally accepted meaning of a word, a lexicon defines why a term is specifically meaningful to the company, and outlines how it should be used to garner mind share.

The purpose of a marketing lexicon is to establish a common vocabulary that properly characterizes a company and its solutions in the marketplace. These words should be used continually and consistently by all corporate stakeholders and infused in all company materials and programs. Developing and implementing a lexicon helps ensure that the words you use to embody your company and solution work to send the right impression when you make your big entrance.

You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.