Sometimes it can be easy to tell when out-of-towners are doing the marketing and advertising. There’s nothing wrong with hiring an out-of-town firm—in fact, we help clients all over the Southeast and have worked with businesses as far away as Michigan, Kansas, and California.

However, when you are missing familiarity with a region, it’s important you ask a lot of questions. Gather even more information than you might normally. Quite frankly, you need to learn to speak their language. I spent a few decades in Ohio and Michigan, and if you’re going to sell a cold carbonated beverage there, you’d better call it a “pop” and not a “soda.” Say “pop” in Virginia and you may just get a strange look, like you’ve just said “youz guys” instead of “y’all.”

It’s important when conducting business to ensure you are choosing your words and examples carefully. Everyone in Northwest Ohio knows how to pronounce Maumee just like Michiganders can locate The Thumb. Around Greater Roanoke, there is a specific way to pronounce Buena Vista and Staunton (Bew-na Vista and Stan-ton). And there’s no “s” in the Roanoke suburb called Cave Spring.

These are basic things you have to get right as a marketer, but it goes beyond the way cities and suburbs are pronounced or how to order a Coke.

"Ya Got2Know the Territory"

That statement comes from "The Music Man," one of the first musicals I ever saw. My parents loved plays—and that means I followed suit and learned my way around a show tune. In the movie version, Robert Preston starred as the traveling salesman, Professor Harold Hill. There are many famous songs from the Broadway show, but in "Rock Island" he sang energetically that "ya gotta know the territory." Ain't that the truth.

Choose your words carefully. It’s not just for a car wash. You must learn early that not every business has a customer. Some refer to them as clients, users, followers, or in the case of a medical practice, patients. Those words matter, so it’s best to talk that through with your prospect before you start a relationship. Beyond that, it’s wise to be completely confident that the targeted area is spelled correctly.

If this were the first time a billboard in our market depicted Cave Springs, then you could note it and move along. On the other hand, when you see it a few times, it’s suddenly fodder for a local writer to use as an example of focusing on the value of familiarity with language, pronunciation, and locations. And if you’re traveling through Roanoke, remember there’s only one spring, so it’s actually Crystal Spring and Cave Spring.