3 Messaging Mistakes No One Talks About

Summary

Messaging fails when it’s generic, inconsistent, or too rigid. Avoid these mistakes with data-backed strategies for differentiation, consistency, and adaptability.

By Brittany Lieu, Marketing Consultant at Heinz Marketing

Good messaging is an art, but effective messaging is a science.

Done right, your messaging should not only be indicative of your brand value but also differentiated, persuasive, and backed by insights from real customer data.

If your team has developed a messaging framework, you’ve likely done your due diligence and created a narrative that starts with your ideal customers’ biggest pain points and ends with compelling persona-specific benefit messages. The story you tell with this framework not only guides your content strategy but also ensures consistency across marketing, sales, and customer success teams.

So how do you make sure the story you are telling is not just good, but effective? Although there isn’t a definitive formula to ensure your messaging is perfect, there is a science behind strengthening your strategic approach. 

Here are three mistakes to avoid in refining your messaging. 

Relying on A Compelling Message

As April Dunford, author of Obviously Awesome, best puts it, “if customers can’t immediately see what makes you different, they default to price comparisons.” Many companies make the mistake of crafting messages that sound compelling but fail to differentiate.

Your challenge and benefit message points may resonate with your audience, but if they’ve heard it all before, you’ll blend into the noise. To stand out from the crowd of like-minded competitors, you have to challenge the status quo.

How to avoid this mistake:

• Audit competitor messaging: Identify your top 3-5 competitors and document their positioning statements. Highlight overused phrases and avoid generic claims (e.g., “best-in-class,” “all-in-one”).
• Analyze why you win and lose deals: Use CRM data or interview your sales team to understand the top 3 reasons customers choose you versus competitors. Adjust messaging to highlight these differentiators.
• Test differentiation in the market: Run A/B tests on LinkedIn ads, homepage headlines, and sales decks. Compare engagement and conversion rates to identify which message resonates best.
• Leverage customer voice: Pull key phrases from customer testimonials, G2 reviews, and support tickets that showcase how customers describe your unique value.

Inconsistency Across Channels

With a compelling and unique message, you have something that both resonates with and intrigues prospects. But even the best messaging fails when it’s not consistently applied across your website, sales pitches, and campaigns.

What does that mean?

Consider the concept “mutually exclusive, collectively exhaustive” or MECE. Used by strategy consultants, MECE is a method to organize ideas in a way that is easy to understand and reiterate to others.

To break it down further, you want your messaging points to be (1) mutually exclusive or each distinctive without overlap in ideas and (2) collectively exhaustive or comprehensive of all possible ideas. In practice, this translates to clearly identifying how your brand stands out from others and the value you deliver simply and holistically. This structure leaves little room for ambiguity and ensures your prospects get the full and accurate version of your messaging across all your sales and marketing channels.

How to avoid this mistake:

• Create a centralized messaging playbook: Document core value propositions, proof points, and positioning statements. Ensure all teams (marketing, sales, customer success) have access.
• Audit your website and collateral quarterly: Compare landing pages, email nurture sequences, and sales decks to ensure alignment. Update inconsistencies immediately.
• Train your teams regularly: Host quarterly messaging workshops where marketing and sales align on the latest positioning and reinforce key messaging pillars.

Staying Inside the Box

In developing your messaging framework, you want your template to be as intuitive and clear as your messaging points. Using a simple template, like the one mentioned here, is an easy way to visually organize your points and present your ideas. However, staying inside these predetermined boxes may be limiting. 

Don’t be afraid to adjust how you approach a template based on your messaging needs. Are you developing messaging for multiple products? Different sized companies? Tailor how your messaging framework is presented to make the most sense for your messaging objectives.

How to avoid this mistake:

• Segment messaging based on ICP data: If your business serves different industries or company sizes, create tailored messaging frameworks. Adjust tone, examples, and value props accordingly.
• Incorporate customer feedback loops: Set up monthly customer interviews or analyze support tickets to identify gaps in how your messaging aligns with actual user experiences.
• Use real-time data to adapt: Track email open rates, ad engagement, and demo conversions. If a message underperforms, adjust wording or value framing and retest.

Elevate Your Messaging

Like the market and your customer, messaging must be dynamic. With these tips, continue to refine how you express your brand without falling into common pitfalls.  

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