Why You Can’t Separate The Words from the Mouth (Thought Experiment)
What is this nonsense?
Life is too short to be told the same shit accompanied by different-coloured emojis.
I want to see, hear, and feel creative advice that doesn't reek of regurgitated penguin vomit.
So, this is me injecting creativity and philosophy into the world of business.
Buckle in for an interactive thought experiment that will actually get you thinking.
Today I'm Helping You See Why You Can't Separate The Words From The Mouth.
In other words: why you can't separate what someone says from the person who says it.
It's because image is important.
I'm not saying it has to be a stereotypically perfect' image.
Take me for example: mean, my eyebrows look like I stapled two owls onto my forehead.
But I'm showing a version of myself to the world.
Eyebrows-and-all.
And what I say is influenced by that image.
The Experiment:
This is Jenna Ortega. She’s an actress.
Source: Headline Planet
Now...
I'm going to show you a series of photos of Jenna playing different characters.
I want you to read the sentence above each photo and try to imagine how each character would say it.
Make sense?
Good.
Let’s begin.
Source: Netflix
Source: Stuck in the Middle
Source: The Fallout
Source: Scream
Source: The Babysitter: Killer Queen
You read the sentence differently every single time, right?
(If not, go away as you're ruining my experiment...)
The sentence even changed in meaning slightly, right?
One sounded sweet.
One sounded depressed.
One sounded ironic.
It was the same sentence.
But each image changed its meaning.
Why?
As every word passes through a mouth. And that mouth is attached to the speaker.
And that speaker is an image. An image far more powerful that the word itself.
The Lesson:
It's a simple one: Words matter.
But...
An image, a mouth, a person - they change the meaning instantly.
So when next writing copy, step back and consider how it's presented.
Most copywriters won't admit it but copy and design go hand-in-hand.
So, hire a writer with a good eye.
(And incredible owlbrows.)
