Wes Kao - Talking to vs about customers
Talking to vs about customersAre you talking to your customers, or to fellow founders and marketers? The difference is subtle but it makes a big impact. Be clear on who you’re speaking to in your customer-facing messaging.
👋 Hey, it’s Wes. Welcome to my weekly newsletter on managing up, career growth, and standing out as a high-performing leader. In this week’s newsletter, you’ll learn about a common mistake when writing public-facing copy. The line between writing TO vs ABOUT your customers isn’t always obvious. If you conflate the two, you risk appearing distant and manipulative to your customers. Here’s how to avoid that. Read time: 8 minutes I’ve noticed that founders can accidentally talk about their customers, when they intend to talk to their customers. The below is homepage messaging from a vendor I hired, with light edits to anonymize. It’s an excellent illustration of this concept. I color-coded to make it easier to see parts that are TO vs ABOUT the customer.
The text in red is about the customer and would appeal to fellow industry professionals. The green is talking to the customer. Here’s the text:
Why this doesn’t work:
Don’t think you’re too smart to write like this. I saw examples of this all the time when editing copy for my team. I don’t have screenshots of those examples, so I’m using this example above which I came across more recently. This color-coded example is more obvious and egregious, which helps illustrate the concept. Usually, instances of “to vs about your customer” are more subtle. But make no mistake: It can just as easily sneak into your writing. With the trend of building in public, the line between talking to vs about customers gets even blurrierLet’s say you want to share screenshots showing you’re making $50k ARR. Talking about how much money you’re making might work if your customers are creators, business owners, and founders. They want to grow their businesses, too, and they like the sneak peek behind the scenes. But what if your customer is an in-house operator—and your goal is to get them to buy your software? They probably aren’t as interested in your revenue dashboard. They want to know how your software will save them money or time, whether you speak their language, and who else at similar companies is using your product. In fact, hearing your revenue updates could even backfire. “Cool, this company is making money off me. I’m another pawn in their quest to become a billion-dollar company.” Here’s how I see the difference:
I believe it's important for founders and marketers to be aware of the difference between talking TO vs ABOUT customers, so you can make a deliberate choice about which path to take. One isn’t better than the other. They are simply different. Sometimes you want to talk about your customer, other times you want to talk to them. When you talk about your customer, you’re actually talking to another stakeholder, such as investors and fellow founders. Sometimes, a news announcement is interesting to both your customers and your investors, fellow founders, etc. When you post publicly, you can’t control who will see your messaging. But you should still write for one primary audience in mind, and only share what you’re comfortable with your secondary audience and everyone else seeing if you share in a public channel. For example, let’s say you’re selling analytics software and your buyer is a CMO. Here’s what talking ABOUT vs TO your customer might look like:
^ This is more likely to attract fellow salespeople who are also trying to sell to CMOs. They want tips on how to not get ignored when sending mass DMs.
^ You show that you understand your buyer’s frustrations. This is more likely to attract marketers who are glad you’re giving a voice to what they’ve been trying to tell their org. Another example. This is based on a real product announcement I recently saw a startup CEO share:
^ This positioning is mainly interesting for startup folks looking for product-market fit because they want to learn from other companies on a similar journey.
^ This is interesting for customers. Basically, most of what you’d tell your investors is talking ABOUT your customer. In that world, your startup is the main character and customers are minor characters along the way. This might seem obvious, but I've seen many sharp operators speak to a different audience than they intended without realizing it. When in doubt, make your customers the center of your story. Do this by talking directly TO them about what they’d find interesting and valuable. Identify who your audience is and speak to themTime for a pop quiz: Let’s say you want to write about how v2 of your product is easier for your engineering team to maintain on the backend. Is this talking to or about your customer? The answer: It depends on your goal and the audience you’re writing for. If your goal is to attract potential customers:
If your goal is to recruit an engineering job candidate:
The key: Be clear about who you’re speaking to and what action you want them to take. Now that you know this concept, try to spot examples where you might accidentally be conflating writing TO vs ABOUT your customer. Look for it in own work and point it out for your colleagues. Have you encountered this in the wild? Where might you be conflating talking TO vs ABOUT customers? Hit reply because I’d love to hear from you. Thanks for being here, and I’ll see you next Wednesday at 8am ET. Wes PS If you found this valuable, here are more ways I can help:
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