Guess what.

No one will like you if you’re boring.

It’s harsh — but real.

The whole point of marketing is to make your products or services seem more appealing and purchase-worthy. How on earth are you planning to sell to people if you’re boring them to death?

Or worse. They’re not even reading what you have to say because you’re so boring that they’ve given up.

Here’s an idea.

Stop being boring.

It’s quite simple actually. Figure out what your audience likes, sprinkle in some humor and creativity, and voila, you’re already more interesting.

Don’t believe me? Feel free to stop reading and continue losing engagement and interest. Or, you can try using the following suggestions for your next campaign and see what happens. Your call.

If you are in fact still reading, that means you care about actually using marketing to your advantage. Well good for you. Let’s get started on making you less boring.

Step 1: Find out who you’re even talking to.

You can’t be interesting without knowing who you’re trying to interest. You need to know your audience, understand them, and speak to them in a way that makes them actually like you.

Imagine that you’re trying to sell clothing to teenage girls. Would you advertise with boring statements about being sleek, clean, and office-friendly, or would you focus on being upbeat, trendy, and Instagram-worthy? Hopefully, you would pick the second one.

Apply this concept to any campaign you launch. Whether you’re selling to business executives, medical product suppliers, first-time home buyers, beauty enthusiasts, or any other target market you can think of, you have to know who they are exactly and what they’re looking for. 

Spend some time (or a lot of time actually) really diving into your research. Think about your ideal customer: What do they do for a living, how old are they, what’s their education/income level, what are their interests and hobbies? In other words, you want to build a character profile on your prime target customer.

Get creative with it. Give them a name, a background, a life story, everything. But remember to base it off of facts, not biases. Don’t assume that a person might have certain characteristics or desires just based off of what you might think — make sure you have research and data that supports it.    

Step 2: Start talking to them.

Once you know who you’re talking to, you can figure out how to talk to them. If it’s a more serious audience, you may want to stray away from informal language and incorporate more factual data, statistics, and insights. If you’re speaking to a more playful, perhaps even younger audience, then you can really get creative with your messaging.

Ever heard of memes? 

Meme culture has exploded recently across social platforms, delighting and entertaining audiences across generations. You’d be surprised as to how many memes have been created regarding pretty much any topic. Try searching memes about your industry and you’re bound to find a bunch worthy of adding to your marketing materials — or better yet, make up your own.

Got gifs?

Gifs are like memes on steroids. Add a few to an email and they’ll automatically make your copy ten times more fun and enjoyable. I mean, as great as this article is on its own, it definitely wouldn’t be the same without the added gifs sprinkled in.

And let’s not forget puns.

Need a fun slogan? Pun. Social media caption? Pun. Product or service name? Pun. 

Let’s face it: Not every product or service is very glamorous or fun. If you’re not an Apple or Nike of the world, then your offering might not appear particularly interesting. This is where you really have to sell yourself with creativity and humor. Puns are simple, short, fun, and catchy, making them more likely to stand out and be remembered. And from my own experience, the most ridiculous ones often become the biggest crowd-pleasers. 

Dare to be daring with your messaging. Break away from generic, stereotypical, boring advertising and create something exciting and memorable. Be funny, interesting, witty, creative, different, surprising, and fresh.

Whatever you do, don’t be boring.