The New Rule of 29
I took last week off for rest and relaxation in West Texas, my happy place. We now return to your regularly scheduled programming.
Even if you don’t know about the Rule of Seven or about the concept of “effective frequency,” you’ve likely heard it referenced in the form of something like: “the average customer needs to see or hear something at least 7 times before they remember or take action.”
If you ever buy Facebook ads, the “Frequency” column alludes to this same concept.
Many studies have been done over the years to understand how effective frequency has evolved. The last three studies have put the new number not in single digits but (to some) shockingly in the high twenties. Because: the phone, and the internet. Continuous partial attention is real and getting worse. We’re more thick-headed than ever.
At JDI, we now often cite what we call The New Rule of 29.
One of our favorite questions to ask in a client workshop on messaging and positioning is: “what enduring phrases or soundbytes do you remember from Hillary Clinton’s 2016 presidential campaign?”
In more than a few rooms full of 500 or more people, we’ve been met with utter silence. Everyone once in while someone shouts out “I’m With Her!”
Hillary’s visual identity was a bit of a chameleon too. You may remember the “H” with an arrow coming out of it, kind of like the Fedex logo. It went rainbow on pride day, and spooky on Halloween.
Nearly every time she gave a stump speech, in fact, Hillary’s team tailored the message uniquely to her audience. She was the ultimate segmentation candidate. It was never surprising to me that many found her inauthentic.
After some thorough kvetching about Hillary, we then ask for enduring phrases or soundbytes from Donald Trump in 2016. The answers come quick and easy. Crooked Hillary!! Lock her up! Make America great again!
We always remember those undulated seas of red baseball caps, ourselves. Whether he’s a genius marketer by accident or on purpose, it makes perfect sense that the TV President, Donald Trump, used the New Rule of 29 to his great advantage.
Drain the swamp, drain the swamp, drain the swamp drain the swamp, drain the swamp...
We often catch clients — smart, well-educated, and often well-to-do executives — reinventing their pitch on the fly, in large part because they’re tired of their own voice. Or like Hillary, they’re just too clever for their own good.
Whether it’s a stump speech or web copy, a sales script or an ad campaign, repetition is under-appreciated. Repetition is your number one tool for cutting through the noise.
Repetition is your friend, and never repeating yourself is stupidity, not sophistication. We trust things we hear repeatedly, and we’re more likely to think what’s repeated is true.
Of course, you have to choose the right messages to repeat, and you have to repeat them to the right people. But the vast majority of marketers and businesspeople don’t even come close.
Did you expect this Substack to advise you to summon your inner Trump? Well, it does.
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At my firm JDI, we make precedent-setting science companies well known and understood. Learn more at: www.jones-dilworth.com