There’s a photo that’s circulating around Facebook right now that is causing a ton of laughs.  The reason that this photo is causing so much laughter is that when first viewed you will think that you’re looking at a picture that a little girl drew of her stripper mom dancing on a pole with men trying to hand her money.  Once you read the note that the mom sent the teacher you will learn that the picture is actually of the mom handing out the last snow shovel that was available at her hardware store and that people were fighting for that shovel.

I too got a huge kick out of this photo, but then I realized that there’s a good lesson that can be learned from this photo and accompanying letter – context matters!  When we’re trying to convey a message to our customers or our peers we need to make sure that we’re painting the right picture.

We convey messages in various ways; speech, pamphlets, websites, presentations, and more.  When you are creating these messages to your audience make sure you are being clear and concise.  Have people that know nothing about your business or topic review your material to make sure they don’t get the wrong message.  Children are often a good audience for this.  Once you have had the person review the material ask them to repeat to you what they thought the message was.  You’ll likely find that you need to change your message.  Keep repeating this method until people understand your message and can give the message back to you.

In the meantime, enjoy the attached picture!

If you like this post, you might like my other post about the most important thing to consider about your business website.