K.I.S.S.–Keep It Simple, Silly.

Remember this? I think I first heard it back in junior high (am I dating myself since I did not go to a “middle school”?) when an English teacher was lecturing about public speaking. The idea still holds true—perhaps now more than ever.

Right now, as I write, as you begin reading this, our phones are buzzing with incoming calls, texts, and voicemails. Perhaps your tablet is set to your favorite streaming news source. Not to mention that our social media accounts are minimized and on continuous alert. It makes us more productive and it makes us less productive. Overall, it makes us less present—something I’ve been thinking a lot about lately because I have a toddler.

Toddlers live completely in the present, their simple worlds growing more complex day after day as they add schemas, vocabulary, memory capacity, and more. Amazingly, their straight-forward sentence structure and limited vocabulary can still communicate pretty comprehensive thoughts. For example, the other day my two year old looked out the window at the snow and said “no park, cold outside! I wear Santa boots. ‘Member Santa boots movie?” Translation: “We can’t go to the park today because it’s too cold outside. I should put on my snow boots that look like Santa’s boots. That reminds me of a movie we watched that had a man with big Santa boots–do you remember that movie, too?

There’s something refreshing and genius about the way their language, senses and mind aren’t over cluttered, but their thoughts can still be communicated effectively.

Does this mean I’m advocating incorrect sentence structure for marketing communication purposes? Of course not. Just something to think about as we consume more messages every day… many times the benefits of communicating clearly and concisely are lost in today’s world. Our content clutter has made simplicity refreshing—and authoritative.