It's very important to know and use the words that your customers will use, rather than your industry jargon.

Back in the days when I offered search engine optimisation services, I worked for an association of plastic surgeons. As part of their member benefits, the association provided a database of plastic surgeons that a consumer could search and find a surgeon to meet their needs.

This association said to me: “We want to be number one in Google for the search term ‘rhinoplasty’”.

Of course, I said: “Well yes, I could do that pretty easily because there's not much competition for the search term ‘rhinoplasty’. And that’s because everyday consumers are very unlikely to go to Google and put in ‘rhinoplasty’ because regular ordinary humans don't think like that! What they all think of is . . . a ‘nose job’”.

(When I'm speaking to live audiences and I tell this story, I always ask: “What would you look for?”, and the entire audience screams out together “Nose job!”)

The association was very concerned about this as a matter of professional pride. They said: “But we're highly qualified surgeons, we don't do nose jobs. We do rhinoplasty”. And I replied: “Absolutely. But to get your audience’s attention, you must speak the language that they speak, and use the words that they’re going to be looking for. Once you have them, you can educate them, and introduce them to the words of your choice, such as ‘rhinoplasty’.

I've always been fascinated by the potential of online tools for communication and business growth. I also find web analytics fascinating because of the power of what we can learn (while respecting visitor privacy and not being "cheesy" about it). And I'm very aware that the technology and analytics areas are both very male-oriented, and also very intimidating for people who aren't naturally excited by all that data!

That's why I started my speaking, writing and consulting business to inspire business owners to understand how analytics can help them, but doing it in English, not techy talk, and making it accessible, interesting - and profitable.