They Ask, You Answer, 2nd Edition

18 The Critical Need for Unbiased Content

Whenever I’ve taught audiences about the need to address the comparison-based questions we continually hear from customers, someone will inevitably say something like “It’s impossible for businesses to address that type of question well. They’re biased, and consumers know it.”

Let me simply say this statement is fundamentally false.

Consumers do want to know what your business believes about these types of questions; otherwise, they wouldn’t ask you the question in the first place.

But the response you give them … now that’s where you have to overcome this incessant need to brag, exaggerate, and only focus on why your company (or product, service, and so on) is the greatest thing since sliced bread.

How do you do it? How do you immediately gain the reader’s (or viewer’s) trust while overcoming this hurdle of sounding biased? Well, let’s go back to the example of writing an article (or producing a video—the process doesn’t change) that compares fiberglass, concrete, and vinyl-liner pools. If you’re going to write an article like this, the proper way to do it might sound something like this:

Each year customers come to us at River Pools and ask us, “What is the difference between a concrete and a fiberglass pool?”

This is a very good question. We can certainly understand the need to know the difference, as it is a choice pool buyers are going to have to live with as long as they’re in their home.

At River Pools, we only sell fiberglass ...