Concepts can move between languages and cultures, but copy and specific executional elements can't. While the English-language original of "Vuele en cuero" meant "Fly [seated] on leather," the translation came out "Fly naked."

Probably not what the airline had in mind.

Of course it's not just the massive misunderstandings possible when translating an idiomatic expression (or inadvertently translating an apparently innocuous set of words into an unfortunate idiomatic expression) that make translations ineffective. Most translations are stilted or awkward.

When a BrainPosse principal was responsible for marketing communications for a group of multinational brands throughout a region with four principal languages and several significant sub-dialects, every single message was written by a writer (not a translator) fluent in the language and dialect in which the message was going to be used, targeted specifically to the linguistic idiosyncrasies of the target audience.

That often meant that one message was re-written half a dozen times or more. This seeming inefficiency of rewriting the same basic concept over and over again was necessary, because it was the only was to assure that the message was communicated effectively to each audience.

The impossibility of translating messages effectively between languages is mirrored in the difficulty in moving messages between media.

A website and a TV commercial are completely different, even when the language is the same. Newspapers aren't read in the same way as direct mail or in-store collateral material.

To complicate things still farther, different audiences experience media differently. A single mother who tunes in to the evening TV news while she prepares dinner perceives the broadcast and its commercials totally unlike the way a retiree sitting in front of the set does. 

By the time we have a complete communications matrix of all audiences and all the media, the picture is pretty complex. So although the message we intend the various target audiences to take away may be the same, many different versions of the communications are often needed to be effective at persuading all audiences in all media.

The syntax – the underlying structure, or skeleton – of each medium  determines the way thoughts flow.

So, what are the syntactical structures of marketing communications media?

TV is all sound bites. News snippets, commercials and program scene lengths are all quick encapsulations of thoughts and – most important – emotions. Although TV's take-away is generally simple, its texture can be complex. Programs have interwoven, multi-strand story lines. CSI cuts back and forth between two investigations in each episode, with a bit of personal back story thrown in. News has an anchor, reporters and analysts. NFL football has play-by-play and color announcers and panels of commentators.

Commercials have ever-quicker cuts, music, humor, pathos and surprise. Often all in the same spot. But effective communication in this medium is constructed like a fugue, in which the disparate elements resolve into a single conclusive ending.

The web is quick.  And deep and personal. The rule of thumb that a TV commercial has two to three seconds to capture eyeballs seems like an incredible luxury of time on the web. Web ads must capture their audiences in a couple of blinks and a couple of clicks, or they're toast. Web sites instantly show visitors that they have the information the visitors want, and provide a clear, immediate path to get to that information. 

An effective site must allow visitors to drill down into specific areas of interest without having to wade through any other information. (The site can, of course, tantalize visitors to go to other areas with snippets that don't interrupt the information-mining flow.) And an effective site must be one-on-one. It must give the visitor a customizable experience, and the ability to interact.

Newspaper is rational. And one-way. The essential nature of newspaper communication is rationality. It used to be immediacy, but that's long gone. By the time a reader sees something in a morning newspaper it's been online for a day and was on yesterday's evening news. What newspapers can do that the other media can't, is provide authoritative depth of detail and an audience prepared to receive a possibly complex, rational, one-way message.

Which is not to say that emotion has no place in newspaper advertising. The headline and visual are there for impact, and the body copy is there to persuade. Often, the impact does the entire selling job, with the body copy is simply a reassurance that the emotional decision triggered by the visual and head was, in fact, rational. But body copy can also be effective in newspaper, as it is virtually nowhere else. Unlike TV, with a sound-bite attention span, and the web, with drill-down personalization, a well crafted newspaper ad can draw readers into reading what the advertiser wants to say rather than just what the reader wants to see. 

Magazines are focused and empathetic. General-interest publications are shrinking fast, but special-interest pubs are doing just fine. And special-interest audiences have extremely high focus on the subject and a reinforced feeling of belonging to a group – not just the magazine's readers, but the enthusiasts for the magazine's subject.

There can certainly be conflict within special interest groups: "Knitting needles: titanium versus loblolly pine." might be a source of contention. But interest in or love of knitting is a given. It is absolutely essential that communications for special interest publications be written by someone who uses the interest group's language accurately, and who understands the group's ethos and ambience. Simple-minded word play, "Don't knit your brow with worry. Buy Blatz." isn't likely to work. But communications that engenders a feeling that the advertiser empathizes with the group – or better yet is part of the group – can be extremely effective. 

Radio is ubiquitous background noise. With most other media, the most effective marketing communications tends to play upon the characteristics of the media. With radio, it's essential to go against the grain. Most radio is background sound, music to drive by or the equivalent to a white noise machine that tranquilizes the cubicle brigade in the workplace. Yes, there are shock jocks (though fewer than there used to be) and pontificating pundits, but their audience penetration doesn't begin to live up to the media hype they receive. Most radio is, literally, background music. Sort of semi-heard, but not something the audience is aware of.

So a commercial needs to break out. If appropriate for the product category, music and humor work well. But either needs a strong opening, or the spot may be gone before the audience realizes that it was worth listening to. Shouting may occasionally work, but there is so much of it – and now so much data indicating that folks hit the button to change stations as soon as it begins – that it's not likely to be effective. The exception to going against the grain is stations which still have real, live on-air personalities who can deliver spots within their shows.

Direct mail is a mirror image of sponsored search. Instead of getting the brand in front of consumers when they're searching, the brand goes searching for consumers. In both cases, the better the search criteria, or selects, the better the communications works. "The more you tell, the more you sell" has always been a direct mail mantra.

It still works, but direct mail has to be modeled on a drill-down web site visit. The outer envelope is the sponsored or organic search or behaviorally- or contextually-targeted ad that brings visitors to the site. The inside headline is the landing page, and should encapsulate the offer to encourage interested prospects to "drill" deeper into the mailer to the response mechanism close. A broad-based mailer's typical 2-3% response rate indicates that most recipients opt out, and an interested few continue through an order. BrainPosse has achieved response rates of up to 54% with highly-targeted lists and fairly elaborate mailers. That's the direct mail equivalent of getting an increased response rate with well-targeted search and a very well constructed web site. 

Want to find out more about using the right syntax for the medium and audience? Click here or call BrainPosse at (865) 330-0033.

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