When I was in high school, the geography syllabus required us to study South America for a whole year. One of our teachers who had a special interest in South America decided to make it her business to teach us everything she knew about the continent. Everything. No stone was left unturned, no river basin unexplored, no coastal plain unexamined. Two things were achieved by the end of the year. We could rattle off the capital cities and the length of the rivers, but we had lost all interest in knowing anything more about South America.

The best teachers didn’t try to teach us all of the facts. They piqued our curiosity enough to make us interested in discovering more for ourselves.

And so it goes for our marketing messages. Our job isn’t to tell customers everything all at once. It’s to make them curious to learn more. The best marketers, like the best teachers, know how much information is enough and what to leave unsaid.

Image by Bill Dickinson