The Difference Between an Answer and a Press Release

Somewhere around year three I stopped hearing words and started hearing texture. It is the most useful thing I own and I have never been able to switch it off.

Here is the distinction. A real answer is specific, slightly messy, and contains at least one thing the person did not need to tell you. A press release is polished, general, and interchangeable with what any competitor would say.

What a press release sounds like

"We really focus on customer service." "We treat every client like family." "Quality is our number one priority." Nobody is lying when they say these things. They are just saying nothing, and both people in the conversation usually know it.

The tell is that you could swap the speaker for anyone else in their trade and the sentence would survive unchanged. That is the test. If the answer works in somebody else's mouth, it is not an answer yet.

What a real answer sounds like

"We answer the phone by the second ring because in 2014 I lost a nineteen thousand dollar job to a guy who picked up on the first." That is the same claim about customer service. It is now unforgettable, and it is unforgettable because it cost something to say.

• Real answers carry numbers, dates, and names.
• Real answers include a cost, a loss, or a mistake.
• Real answers are often slightly unflattering, which is exactly why they land.

How to get from one to the other

You do not challenge the press release. Challenging it makes people defensive and they retreat further into it. You ask for the instance instead.

"When did that matter most?" "Tell me about a time that almost did not go well." "What did that cost you the first time you got it wrong?" You are not disputing the claim. You are asking for the evidence, and the evidence is always a story.

Why people default to the smooth version

It is not dishonesty. It is self-protection, and usually it is habit. Most business owners have been trained by years of networking events to deliver a tidy thirty second version of themselves. That version is armor, and armor is what you wear when you do not know if the room is safe.

Your job is to make the room safe enough that the armor is not necessary. That is done by being genuinely interested, not by being clever.

The stakes for a business owner

This matters well beyond an interview. The smooth version is why most local business marketing sounds the same. Every plumber in the valley says they are honest and reliable. The one who tells you about the night he drove back across town at 11pm to fix something he got wrong is the one you remember.

Your real answers are your actual differentiator. Most owners have several and have never told anyone, because nobody ever asked a question good enough to get them out.