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understanding investment marketing Ever read a pitch for some investment product with phrases like “your profit is virtually guaranteed,” or “you’re virtually certain to make money”? “Virtually” is a great word. In fact, it’s my favorite investment marketing word. Why? Compare “virtually guaranteed” to, say, “almost guaranteed.” How interested would you be in an investment that’s almost certain to make you money? Doesn’t have the same ring to it, does it? “Virtually” and “almost” have totally different “feels” about them, don’t they. “Virtually guaranteed” has the sense of 99.99999 percent certainty. But if something’s only “almost guaranteed” it’s more like 50-50…if you’re lucky. Yet if you look up “virtually” in a dictionary, what does it mean? Almost! The English language is rich with synonyms like these, all meaning “virtually” the same thing – but having a very different feel about them. One of the reasons advertising copywriters can much so much money is that they know how to use these synonyms to maximize the emotional impact of their ads. By the time you come to the end of a marketing pitch, if the build-up’s been good the words “…and it’s virtually guaranteed to make money” slip into your mind as “…and you’re guaranteed to make money.” Yet has the copywriter told a lie? Of course not! He can simply pick up his dictionary and point out that “virtually” means “almost” or “not quite”…and everybody knows that something that’s only almost guaranteed has no guarantee at all. [Notice how I slipped in the word “only” there? Bet it didn’t fully register. But adding that one word makes the sense of “almost” even more uncertain than it already is. And putting “almost” in italics “virtually guarantees” that your eye will seem to skip over the word “only” entirely. But the implication still sticks.] Even “tell the truth” laws regulating advertisements don’t protect you.
But it never tells you the whole truth. And if it’s really good marketing the emotional impact of the whole can be a wild exaggeration – or even a lie – even though every single statement in the ad, taken by itself, is 100% (not virtually!) true. So next time you read an ad ask yourself: “Well, that’s all very well and good – but what aren’t they telling me?” Answering that one question could save you a bundle of money. — Mark Tier Have
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