Why is it that something really is not worth covering, talking about or paying attention to unless it is going to get worse?
Think about a weather forecast: We can’t just call it 20 degrees. We have to have a wind-chill factor, because it feels so much colder that it is. And if it is hot (obviously there is no wind-chill factor in the summer), we talk about “humiture” and how much more hot it feels. And now we can’t have just an unemployment number without adding in the underemployed number, because it is worse than we thought.
During the 2008 floods in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, I watched a national news reporter standing in “receding” flood water and declaring that things “were only going to get worse” in Cedar Rapids. I don’t ever want to go through a flood again, but things look pretty good in Cedar Rapids today. It isn’t getting worse, it’s so much better. Many new buildings are going up, unemployment is way down and the downtown is looking much more vibrant—even in this recession. Listen to any newscast and count the times during traumatic stories where the report ends with, “…and it will only get worse.”
It’s a reminder of why positive marketing is so important. And, why we need to focus on the benefits of products and services. In a world where politicians, reporters and thought-leaders can only see the black cloud and the blacker cloud coming, we need to keep promising and delivering products and services that make things better—or, this world will only get worse.
Well said, we really do need more positive messages out there.
The Green Guerilla
What is always forgotten is that even when “it will only get worse”, after that it can only get better. It’s easier to spread a message with fear, but hope is what people really want to buy into.