Magic Logix's Least Favorite Buzzwords

Least Man, I'm like, totally synergized out. MAGIC LOGIX PRESENTS OUR FAVORITE BUZZWORDS Here are 20 of the most overused buzzwords in business and marketing today. Use our easy definitions and analysis to simplify your Iife when others use these words. INTRODUCTION SAY WHAT? WAIT, If you spend time in business and marketing, you're no stranger to buzzwords. Those who are attracted to shiny objects are always quick to use the newest word or phrase to describe a business practice or marketing action. After scouring the net, we've taken a look at and analyzed our least favorite buzzwords. Some of these are downright absurd, unless you're really into combining them to make sure your business always practices "proactive synergy for your agile marketing." Disclaimer - to be taken seriously, don't ever use the phrase "proactive synergy for your agile marketing." Trust us on this. 20 EXIT STRATEGY - Having a way out of a situation or relinquishing involvement in the situation without causing harm or damage to yourself or the company. While typically common sense, this can potentially be helpful if on a terrible first date. EDITOR'S NOTE: Do you use this or any of the following? Defend them on Twitter @MagicLogix 19. BEST PRACTICE - The preferred method of doing things. Also refers to industry standards and accepted ways to get things done for optimal results. Often used in a grammatically TEAM PICKS incorrect fashion. EDITOR'S NOTE: For the most part, Magic Logix doesn't have a problem with “Best Practice," but our Social Media Director Chris nominated the word for personal, semi-nuerotic reasons. Hassan Bawab, CEO 18. WEB 2.0 - Second phase in the life of the world wide web which includes user-generated 1. Personal Branding content, social networks and dynamic webpages. Normal people refer to Web 2.0 as 2. Secession using the internet. 3. Viewability 17. NEXT GEN - "Next Generation." Commonly used with technology products. However, Chad Burnett, Creative Director Star Trek can probably claim they were way ahead of the curve on this whole "Next Generation" thing. 1. Synergize 2. Metrics 16. PROACTIVE - Making something happen as opposed to responding to it after the fact. 3. Overarching Often used as "taking a proactive approach." Proactive is often an irrelevant filler word people use in a terrible attempt to sound smart. Chris Apaliski, Social Media Director EDITOR'S NOTE: Again, there's some disagreement about this one at Magic Logix HQ. Chad, our 1. Proactive Creative Director uses it and swears he sounds smart when doing so. That's debatable. 2. Snackable Content 15. LOW HANGING FRUIT - Something that can be easily obtained or a person who can be 3. Low Hanging Fruit persuaded with minimal effort. In the produce industry, there has been concern that Jen Ostler, constant picking of low hanging fruit may later lead to back problems. Sales Consultant 14. CPL - Stands for 'Cost Per Like' – ie, the cost of acquiring new fans for social media sites, 1. Win-win particularly Facebook. In many cases, a completely irrelevant metric, but it could be 2. Business Process Outsourcing useful to gauge friendships within various professional organizations. 3. Core Competency 13. PARADIGM SHIFT - A fundamental change in approach. This is a completely irritating phrase in all aspects. It's also a shred-tastic proggy instrumental tune by Liquid Tension Tony Vazquez, SEO Director Experiment if you're into that sort of thing. 1. Blogosphere 12. THOUGHT LEADER - An individual with authoritative and influential views on a given 2. Spammy subject. Any person who refers to themselves as a "thought leader" is typically not one. 11. SNACKABLE CONTENT - Small bits of info that are easily and quickly consumed by an audience. Get it? It's like a snack of information. It should be noted consumption of brochures and other collateral may result in negative effects for the digestive tract. EDITOR'S NOTE: For once our team is all in agreement: It'd be really tough to say this with a straight face. 10 ADVERTAINMENT - Advertising that's branded as entertainment. The consumer will accept this in tandem with their favorite web content (such as cat videos, food pics etc). The name 'advertain- ment' was clearly invented by the people who coined "Bennifer" or "TomKat." 9. GLOBALIZATION - Worldwide growth. Encompassing every inch of the globe. We live in a tech-heavy world where business transac- tions have been conducted across the globe for decades, rendering this term completely absurd. Once we set up a colony in outer space, it will be changed to "universalization." 8. HTML5 - Hyper Text Markup Language 5. HTML5 is the next revision of HTML. Well known among web developers for years, but mainstream media cannot get enough of using the phrase when writing technology articles. Way to go, guys.you ruin everything. 7. RESPONSIVE - In web design/development something is responsive when it adapts to a variety of platforms and screen resolutions. Over- used only because it should be accepted as the standard from this point on. If you're not building a responsive site, you're getting left behind. 6. AGILE MARKETING - Marketing that's flexible. If there are real-time changes to be made, "Hey boss, apparently all we have to do is pretend we're playing baseball and our organization will be successful. they can be adjusted accordingly. However, a real marketer understands how to keep up It's called Gamification. I read about it on the internet." with technology and adjust to changes when necessary or knows when to stick to a strat- egy. All in all, just a silly term. 5. GAMIFICATION - Using elements of game playing to help increase online marketing engagement. If you attended business school, this type of thing was referred to as 'game Account Executive 2 theory.' The fact that many definitions of Gamification also include the buzzword "ROI" is Account Executive 1 VP of Sales likely to make the universe implode upon itself. Chief Executive Officer 4. ENGAGEMENT - The act of having consumers directly "engaged" with a brand. So widely Chief Operating Officer overused, that community managers sometimes use it every other sentence. A true cham- pion of buzzwords may "proactively use the word engagement" if they're feeling daring. 3. GURU - Guru is defined as "a spiritual teacher, especially one who imparts initiation" in Hinduism and Buddhism. In Marketing, it means "this person doesn't really know what they're talking about" or "don't apply for this job, go get one with a real job title instead." EDITOR'S NOTE Sometimes we call our Social Media Director a "Social Media Guru" just to get a rise out of him. Let's just say it's not his favorite term. PHABLET - If talking about smartphones and tablets, you can just combine them into one. Or you could avoid combining them into a convenient name and save yourself embarrassment. Your call. SYNERGY-This is the mother of all buzzwords. Synergy happens when two or more organizations or people work together and the result is greater than if they worked separately. Deriving from the Greek word sunergos (working together), it also includes variants such as "synergize" and "synergistic." Additionally it's widely overused in business and marketing circles and is absolutely the most horrid word in the English language. WORST OFFENDERS The following buzzwords are featured extensively throughout the web. Have These figures depict the worst offenders in terms of Global Average a look at the top 5 words with the most occurrences of the URL in the title: Search Volume: V 40,000,000 2,000,000 35,000,000 30,000,000 1,500,000 25,000,000 20,000,000 1,000,000 15,000,000 10,000,000 500,000 5,000,000 39,956,175 23,770,144 15,288.364 7,933,920 7,738,592 515,167 497,545 369,364 271,909 195,273 *All numbers current as of Mar. 10, 2014. Figures derived via Google Analytics. But don't worry - MAGICLOGIX we took a normal approach to finding the figures instead of letting our Guru use his phablet to come across them for you. Learn more about our approach at www.magiclogix.com INTEGRATED MARKETING AGENCY