What can your brand steal from AOC’s viral speeches?

Before I even get into this post, I want to apologise: this is a fairly long one.

As Mark Twain would have said: “I didn’t have time to write a short post, so I wrote a long one instead.”

(It’s been a crazy week…)

Did you happen to see Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s speech about campaign finance reform last week? 

If you missed it, check it out. In just three minutes, she deconstructs US campaign finance and political corruption…

Now, full disclosure: I’m a sucker for a good speech.

After I watched the West Wing for the first time at uni, I was dead-set on becoming a political speechwriter.

(A stint working on a general election campaign quickly put a stop to that. Aaron Sorkin it ain’t.)

But why am I writing about a political speech when this is supposed to be about copy and branding?

Good question. Well, the two aren’t so different, really. They’re both trying to convince us to buy their thing (their products/ideas) and part with something (our money/vote).

And language plays a HUGE role in both.

And there’s so much we can learn from AOC’s speech and apply to marketing, branding and copywriting– namely, the importance of keeping things really clear and simple without dumbing them down.

As you’ve probably heard me bang on about already, there’s this trend of writing everything to sound as verbose, impressive and grandiose as possible. B2B is awful for it and some B2C is preeeeetty bad too.

Perhaps it’s because markets are oversaturated and people think more=better or maybe it’s because brands think that intentionally obfuscated verbiage makes them appear clever.

(As you can see, it definitely doesn’t.)

Whatever it is, brands can’t just sell shoes any more, they have to sell orthopedically-enhanced, dynamically-moulded, insole-friendly metatarsal supports.

(That’s an exaggeration, of course, but you see my point: brands are really bad for overcomplicating their language.)

In fact, here’s an interesting little nugget of information for you.

Did you know that the average reading age in the UK is 13.5, or roughly the equivalent of The Sun newspaper?

The Financial Times, which boils down crazy complex issues surrounding stocks and finance and business, aims for a reading age of 16.1.

A few years ago, a study was done that looked at brand’s websites and calculated the reading age of the copy on their sites.

The result? 17.5.

That’s right.

To brands, their value proposition is more complicated to explain to their customers than the ins-and-outs of our economy and the stock market.

Suddenly, metatarsal supports doesn’t seem so ridiculous, eh?

Which brings us nicely back to AOC and her speech…

Look at what she’s discussing — laws, campaign finance reform and political corruption — conversations that are usually shrouded in mind-numbing legalese, stats and numbers.

Yet AOC breaks it down into super simple terms that everybody can understand and grasp.

And that doesn’t just make her point clearer, it makes it more compelling too.

So how does she do that? And what can you steal from her to use for your business or brand?

Technique #1: She makes a big, impersonal issue small and human

AOC takes a huge issue and makes it about one person because she knows it’s much easier to care about (and understand) something happening to one person.

As humans, we’re crap at understanding the scale of things. In fact, Joseph Stalin allegedly once said:

“One death is a tragedy, a million is a statistic.” 

We find numbers, statistics and hard-to-understand laws super boring and unengaging in isolation, but when we can picture those things happening to or affecting a person, we suddenly give a shit.

How can you use this? Write to one person and make sure you show how your product improves their life.

No generalisms: talk specifics. Talk about problems affecting their life (not lives) and how your product service solves that.

This is known as the Problem Agitate Solution formula and it’s really good for writing killer copy.

Technique #2: She uses easy to understand language

AOC’s speech has no legal jargon, no complicated words and a very conversational tone.

That’s because good business/political/marketing writing isn’t like literature. Readers aren’t going to pore over your every word and analyse what you meant.

They’re going to do one of three things: understand you, misunderstand you or just stop reading.

It’s your job to make sure they understand you and carry on reading.

Or, as Dave Trott, a renowned copywriter/creative/ad person, once said:

How can you use this?

Communicate with your one person in easy to understand terms. Don’t patronise them or talk down to them, but meet them at their level.

Speak their language.

Be clear.

And don’t make them reach for a dictionary or have to put effort into working out what the hell you mean. (Because, odds are, they won’t.)

Technique #3: She uses questions carefully and precisely

Questions are insanely persuasive tools to have in your copywriting kit, but you have to use them with caution.

Can you imagine if AOC asked one of her questions and the panel answered with something that didn’t agree with her argument? It would have derailed the whole thing.

Instead, she uses questions she already knows the answer to and that build her argument for her.

You can do this too, by using questions based in in-depth customer research or an innate understanding of your customer.

Don’t ask general questions like: “do you want to change your life?” or used car salesman questions like “do you want the opportunity of a lifetime?” but get really specific.

When you know your audience like the back of your hand, you can ask things like “Isn’t it time you got the service you deserve?” or “Doesn’t it suck when your coffee machine runs out of beans 5 minutes before you sit down to write a blog post?”.

(Guess where the inspiration for that last example came from. 😧)

Rhetorical questions are incredibly effective tools to have in your arsenal, but they’re only effective when they’re specific and demonstrate a deep understanding of your customer.

And finally, Technique #4: She boils an issue down to its simplest form

This debate could have got bogged down in esoteric talk of subsections and legal waffle, but AOC saw that the real issue at hand was the simple one: corruption, abuse of power and the need for reform.

And by making that issue easy to understand, she gets buy-in from the listener.

And the next time she needs to talk specifics, you bet they’ll be fully invested.

How can you use this?

Think of this like your sales funnel: simple messages at the beginning, more specific, detail-orientated messages as you get closer to the sale.

In fact, I often like to think of customers a little like this awesome series from Wired on YouTube: 

(The connectome is really interesting. Grab a coffee.)

In this series, experts explain complicated topics to different people, from small children to almost experts.

Aside from learning something new, I love these videos because you get to see how experts adapt their language and their approach according to each level of understanding.

And next time you write to your audience, think about their level of understanding of your product and your industry.

(This is sometimes called Market Sophistication. This article does a really good job of breaking it down!)

Before you start writing copy for somebody at Stage 5, you need to make sure your audience understands your brand/offering/message at stage 1 and 2 and 3 and 4.

Otherwise, your message is going to fall flat on its face before it even has a chance to be effective.

Do this — and apply some of the techniques we saw AOC nail — and your copy will be 10x better in no time.