Author Sam Horn (an old friend) tells you early on that POP!: Create the Perfect Pitch, Title, and Tagline for Anything has two purposes.
- It will help you quickly capture interest and
- It will help you “break out, not blend in.”
For that to happen, you have to read the book and then use one of many suggestions to help you improve or craft a message with POP, which stands for Purposeful, Original and Pithy. The book is organized around those three standards.
First comes Purposeful. To help you boil your idea down to its essence the author asks you to answer the 9W questions about it. They give you a foundation to build on.
You’ll go back to those nine questions and your answers time and again. You may even change some of your answers. That’s a very good thing.
The second section helps you make your communication Original. The ideas here will help you turn your idea around so you can see it from the other side and then massage it into different forms. You’ll learn how to do your own take on common sayings, advertising slogans, and pop culture phrases.
The third section helps you create Pithy communication. The Merriam-Webster dictionary defines “pithy” as: “having substance and point – tersely cogent.” If it’s short and carries a big message, it’s pithy.
This was the most helpful section for me. You’ll learn how to use alliteration, rhythm, and rhyme to make your statement more powerful and more memorable. I’ve seen all this before, but never in a single place.
The book closes with “Seven Secrets to Keep Their Interest Once You’ve Got It.” Don’t skip this section.
I got incredible value by working through the exercises as I read. As advertised, they helped me craft a POP statement. More importantly, for me, this was a powerful exercise in understanding my business offering and what is unique about it.
I recommend this book to you if you want to craft POP statements that present you or your business or idea to others. I also recommend it if you want exercises that will help you think creatively about what you do.
I’ve been a professional speaker and writer now for over a quarter century. I found help and ideas here that will help me tell my story and the story of my business more effectively. That’s the promise of the sub-title: “Create the Perfect Pitch, Title, and Tagline for Anything” and it’s a promise kept.