I was flicking through a book I first read over 20 years ago. How to Be a Marketing Superstar, by Jeffrey Fox.
Page 53 still hits hard:
Never use 'we'. Never use the personal pronouns I, me, we, us, or our in advertising, packaging, sales literature, or anywhere else in marketing communications.
So who is your marketing really about? Be honest.
When you post something, write an ad or send an email, who is standing in the spotlight? If it's "we", "our" or "me", you're making a mistake. A big one.
I know, because I made it for years.
Why? Because "we" is about the marketer.
And the customer doesn't care about the marketer. They care about themselves. Their needs. Their frustrations. Their next step forward.
That sounds harsh, but it's just how people are. You do it too. When you read an advert, you're quietly asking one question the whole time: what's in this for me?
Early in my career I thought good marketing was about showing how great we were.
Our experience. Our story. Our clever messaging.
I thought we had to make ourselves the heroes. I was wrong.
What I learned, slowly, is that the marketing that works is about the person reading. Their problem, in their words, with a clear next step.
If I had to boil every marketing lesson I've learned into one line, it would be this:
It's not about you.
Your customers only care about you if you do something that benefits them. That's the deal. Once you accept it, writing gets a lot easier, because you stop trying to impress people and start trying to help them.
This is one of the oldest rules in marketing, and people still break it every single day. Big brands, small businesses, me on a bad day.
It creeps back in because talking about yourself feels natural. You're proud of what you've built. You want people to know about the team, the award, the new office. None of that is wrong to share. It just needs turning round so it points at the reader.
"We've been doing this for 15 years" becomes "You get someone who has seen your problem hundreds of times before."
"Our new service launches today" becomes "From today you can stop doing that bit yourself."
(And yes, I'm aware this post has a lot of "I" in it. It's a blog post about my own mistakes. Page 53 is talking about your ads, your emails and your sales pages. I'm letting myself off on a technicality.)
So go and look at your last few posts. Your landing pages. Your emails. Count how many times you said "we", "our" or "I". Then count how many times you said "you".
If the first number is bigger, pick the worst offender and rewrite it so the reader is the hero. Don't add anything clever. Just swap the spotlight.
Because the second your message becomes about them, they start to pay attention.
