"I hate shyster pitches on the radio or TV," says Steve Woodruff in a post at the MarketingProfs Daily Fix Blog. "Like the services that want to extract money from your well-intentioned but naive wallet so that they can 'clean' your PC. I want to throttle those marketers."

But he began to appreciate their marketing savvy when his adolescent son approached him with a URL copied from a television ad, and proposed that their sluggish computer might need to be cleaned.

"Now our family PC is getting somewhat long in the tooth, and admittedly is a bit slow," notes Woodruff. "It certainly doesn't need the virtual snake oil these crooks are selling. But the message made sense to a 7-year old. It got through, to the point of him taking action in the only way he could. Advising Dad to visit this website to get a PC cleanup!"

If scam artists can so adroitly deliver their message, he reasons, surely those of us who market legitimate products or services can do at least as well—if not even better.

Woodruff's Marketing Inspiration is to make your solution so obvious that a child understands what should be done. "Can people easily repeat back my value proposition?" he asks. "Is my message so clear, so compelling, that those listening know exactly what they're supposed to do?"

More Inspiration:
Ted Mininni: Starbucks: Undercutting Its Own Brand?
Elaine Fogel: Living Your Brand Includes Telephone Calls, Too!
Christine Whittemore: 10 Tips for a Remarkable Blogger Event

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