Each quarter I post a review of a leadership/motivational book I recommend to colleagues and friends. Some may be old favorites, others are hot off the press. I am always open to suggestions for books to review. If you have a favorite you'd like to share with others, please contact me.

POP!
Create the Perfect Pitch, Title, and Tagline for Everything
by Sam Horn

Projects and products have two tough phases: creation and marketing. How many of us have spent far too much time trying to think of a jazzy, snazzy tagline or name for our work? At a recent writer’s conference, a man turned to me in frustration and said “Writing the book was easy compared to this marketing stuff!” OK…he didn’t say “stuff”.

It’s true. Coming up with teasing taglines, snappy slogans, or powerful names that make people want to get on board/buy/talk about takes a lot of work. POP! is the latest release from Sam Horn, author of Tongue Fu and Take the Bully By the Horns. In POP! Horn takes the reader from concept to commercial and from plodding to perfect when it comes to creating titles, taglines, and pitches.

Ever watch a compelling commercial but not remember what it was selling? POP! makes sure the product is remembered as well as the words selling it. The book provides 224 pages of examples, exercises, and instructions on how to take a product or project from “one of the crowd” to something people remember and want to know more about or buy.

POP stands for purposeful, original, and pithy. Being purposeful begins with “filling out your W9”. Horn provides a worksheet on which you answer nine questions. Here is a sample: (you’ll have to buy the book to get the rest)

• What am I offering?
• What problem does it solve?
• Who is my target audience?
• How am I different from my competitors?

The goal here is to help clarify your purpose and to generate what will become Core Words to be used in later exercises. DON’T skip this part. Identifying Core Words will give you a jump-start on the fascinating exercises to come.

Original comes into play when asking why should your audience choose you over your competitors? Maybe what you offer is not one-of-a-kind. What then? Horn cites the example of Nexium. In ingredients and result, this prescription heartburn medication was not different from the competition. The only thing different was the color. Are you thinking of its tagline? That’s right…”the purple pill”. Can you recall the taglines for the other heartburn medications as quickly? Easy to remember, easy to ask for.

Another way to look at original is to go counterintuitive. This is one of the ideas I took from POP! There are most likely few foundational differences between what I offer clients and what large consulting firms offer. How do I distinguish myself? When people ask me what I do, I now respond “I help people look forward to going to work.” Not only does that bring a smile to the other person’s face, it always gets: “How do you do that?” My introduction is unexpected, they want to know more and I am happy to fill them in.

In the chapters on being original, Horn introduces a number of techniques to give your message spark and “rememberability” (my word).

When you tell people your business name or slogan, can they see it? People often say no to the unfamiliar, but are intrigued when the unusual sounds familiar. For example, Aflac. Do you know what it means? No…but we can all see the duck crying out the name. Names and slogans that evoke images help increase name recognition. Here are two more examples:  Snuba and Diabesity. Any ideas of what these are? If you said diving without heavy tanks but supported by air hoses for “snuba” you’d be right. Isn’t “snuba” more intriguing and less cumbersome than its definition? And “diabesity?  It is a pithy way to highlight the connection between obesity and the onset of diabetes in children.

Combining two common words into a new one is only one way something familiar can be reframed. Jazzing up our communications by riffing off something familiar can make even the dullest topic sound inviting. Horn introduces what she calls the Valley Girl technique. This technique is a great way to create a memorable introduction. This is accomplished by describing something unfamiliar by giving it a framework. For example: “I’m a manager at Dave & Buster’s. D&B is like Chucky Cheese for adults.” Now most people have a picture and know that Dave & Buster’s is very different from Barnes & Noble.

This kind of riffing can be done with movie titles, songs, and books. The idea is to help your audience/customers/clients see the unfamiliar in a familiar light. One fun example Horn shares is the example of titling a presentation about urban sprawl. How in the world do you make that catchy? Using what Horn calls the alphabet technique, the presenter took the Core Word “sprawl” and ran it through the alphabet (ball, call, fall…) eventually he got to “small”. Using a song he titled his presentation “It’s a Sprawl, Sprawl World”. More interesting? You bet. Possibilities are endless when you know your Core Words.

POP! also suggests using rhymes, rhythms, and alliteration as additional ways to make your words memorable and pithy. Who doesn’t remember, “If it doesn’t fit, you must acquit”? That turning point statement had both rhyme and rhythm. Things that roll easily off the tongue find a place in the brain. We grew up learning by rhythms: the ABCs, the multiplication tables. These same techniques can work for your business communication.

Alliteration gives our “mind a hook to hang a memory on” says Horn. It makes language resonate. And it works, as we are surrounded with alliterative names: Dunkin’ Donuts, Bed, Bath & Beyond, Weight Watchers and Wonder Woman to name a few.

This review has just touched on a few of the creative ideas explored in POP! In addition to the plethora of ideas, Horn provides websites for quotes, clichés, and other resources the reader can use in crafting memorable taglines and titles.

The goal, she says in summary, is to get people to remember and take action, whether that is to vote, buy your product, read your book, or remember your name. Yes, it takes time to create clever names and slogans and Horn urges readers to take the long view—time spend now could help your business for years to come.

I found this book not only a delight to read, but also a treasure of ideas. When I began using the line “I help people look forward to going to work” I was amazed at the response I got. Thank you, Ms Horn.

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