Marketing Insights

“It won’t leak in your pocket and embarrass you.”
— Parker Pen’s English slogan

“It won’t leak in your pocket and make you pregnant.”
— Parker Pen’s Spanish slogan

That’s one way to sell more pencils.

Humor aside, these blunders highlight a serious truth: Spanish isn’t just Spanish.

Dialects, Nuance, and Marketing Risk

If you’ve traveled across the U.S., you know how language shifts: “Howdy, y’all” in Texas, “Wassup?” in New York. Even simple words like chips, boot, or soda vary regionally.

Spanish works the same way — but amplified. A greeting in the Dominican Republic (¿que lo que?) might puzzle someone from Mexico. A cheerful Mexican phrase (¡Qué padre!) could leave a Colombian scratching their head.

For marketers, researchers, and community leaders, this isn’t just a curiosity — it’s a risk. Missteps in translation or tone can alienate audiences and erode trust.

Famous (and Funny) Marketing Misfires

Plenty of brands have learned the hard way:

• Coors: “Turn It Loose” became “Suffer from diarrhea.” Suddenly, beer sounds like a bad idea.
• Mazda: Released the “La Puta” model — which, unfortunately, means “the whore.”
• American Airlines: Promised passengers could “Fly in leather.” In Mexico, the campaign read as “Fly naked.”
• Got Milk?: The American Dairy Association’s slogan translates to “Are you lactating?” Not exactly family-friendly.

Hilarious in hindsight, but costly in reality. Budgets wasted, credibility damaged, trust lost.

Why Marketers and Researchers Should Care

• Segmentation matters. Treating “Spanish speakers” as one group is like assuming U.S., Canadian, and British audiences are interchangeable.
• Data depends on language. Poorly translated surveys confuse respondents — and corrupt results.

Trust is fragile. Communities know when you speak authentically — and when you don’t.

How to Get It Right

• Localize, don’t just translate. Adapt words, idioms, and tone to your target audience.
• Test with multiple native speakers. One person’s Spanish isn’t everyone’s Spanish.
• Build review systems. At True North, every survey passes through native speakers from multiple countries.

The Takeaway

If you’re planning Spanish-language labels, surveys, or campaigns, resist the temptation to rely on Google Translate or software toggles. They help, but they don’t replace cultural expertise.

Good Hispanic marketing isn’t about speaking Spanish — it’s about speaking the right Spanish.

At True North, we help brands and agencies ensure their Spanish-language outreach resonates with clarity, respect, and cultural precision.

Because when Spanish goes wrong, it’s more than a punchline — it’s a missed connection.

Your brain is lazy.

Wait—don’t click away! That’s not an insult; it’s just a fact. My brain is lazy (especially before coffee), your brain is lazy, and your consumers’ brains are lazy. That’s not just me saying that, either. That’s the assertion of Nobel Prize-winning psychologist Daniel Kahneman… so if you’re going to be mad at anyone, be mad at him.  Beyond being an excellent hook for this article (if I say so myself), this fact has wide-reaching implications for how we communicate with our audiences. (And how we research customers).

A lazy brain has important implications for messaging and communication.

Sometimes, your copy and marketing will have to pick up the slack for this lazy brain. It doesn’t like working. Our brain does not analyze all the choices. And it is certainly not rational.

Here’s the key: We have to connect the dots between features and benefits for our audience. Even though the connection between a feature and a benefit might seem obvious, you are relying on a lazy brain to make that connection.

I’m frequently met with pushback. “But the benefit is obvious,” the client reminds me. Usually, I agree with them… but it doesn’t matter.  We are up against lazy brains. It may not want to make the jump from feature to benefit. That is why we need to spell it out.

I know I’m not supposed to use the term “always” (especially when talking to my wife), but if there was ever a time when “always” applies, this is it. When we test messages, the message will (almost) always test better when we add a benefit.

Here’s an example. Which do you think is more motivating?

“Earn 1.26 APR up to $25,000 balances”

Or

“We will give you up to $315 for purchases up to $25,000 that you can use however you’d like.”

The first is standard financial industry language and focuses on the feature. The second makes the connection for the reader as to why they should care.

It all starts with understanding the benefits that are most desired

This should be an easy process to simply add the benefit. But what makes this difficult is the need to define what the benefit should be. It is so easy to have a list of features. But linking those features to key benefits is a bit more difficult. We must first understand the most important benefits and then build messages around those.

Here’s another example that comes from the financial advisor world . . .

We charge based on a small percentage of the assets we manage.

Or

“We do better when our clients do better.” “We don’t make money unless you make money—that means we’re always working hard for you!”

While most advisor firms will answer the pricing question with the first statement, the second statement completely turns that negative (fees) into a differentiating positive (we work hard for you). (The second statement is a modified version of that used by Fisher Investments.)

The solution – start with the benefits that are desired, find supporting features that can be used as “reasons to believe” or “proof points” that support the benefit.

As consumers, being selfish can pay off. It’s practically the point! As we browse products and try to decide on a purchase, we’re constantly asking the question, “What’s in it for me?”

As marketers and advertisers, answering that question can pay off. With every piece of promotional copy you put out, communicating the benefits has to be your top priority.

We have tested thousands of messages.  Those that leave off the benefit will always score low.  And more often than not, messages stop at the feature and never get to the benefit.

“Show me why I should care.”

Advertising and marketing copy needs to explicitly state the reason why a customer should care about their product. Let’s face it: social media has our attention spans diminishing. No one wants to search through the weeds of wordy copy to know why they should trust your solution to their problem.

With so many options to choose from, and with B2B audiences understaffed and not enough time to do their own job much less read your copy, we need to be upfront and clear about why they should care.  And that means going beyond discussing features.

It’s simple: Show them the benefit.

“But wait: I’ve been showing benefits!”

You may be feeling a bit taken aback right now. After all, as advertisers and marketing professionals, it feels like our entire workdays revolve around communicating benefits to consumers.

This is where a critical distinction needs to be made. Many companies that feel like they are effectively conveying benefits to their audience may only be relaying features.

Fortunately, switching your mindset to benefits doesn’t have to be too complicated. And, because this is such a common mistake in advertising, you could even beat a Fortune 500 company to the punch.

Product features vs. product benefits

Alright, it’s time to distinguish between features and benefits clearly. I hesitated to put these definitions in this article thinking it might be too basic.  But I see this so often, it is worth a quick refresher.

A feature is a fact about your product, often relating to its design or unique capabilities.

A benefit is an impact that features have on the consumer. For example, these could include saved time, improved quality of life, or ease of performing a task.

Let’s look at an example. Since this post is about getting our benefits and features ironed out, we’ll talk about… an iron.

Suppose your company is selling an iron that includes an LED temperature display. In that case, that’s a neat feature that you’ll want to highlight. But don’t make the misstep of stopping there!

Consider what this feature will mean for the consumers that use it. A bright temperature display will make it clear when the iron is ready to use or when it’s gotten too hot.

Putting it all together: finding the meaning

When you’ve identified the feature and its benefit, one more variable will take you to a successful message.

Jim Edwards wrote an excellent book called Copywriting Secrets, and I’m going to spill one of those secrets for you now. He posits that the formula for successful marketing is as follows:

Feature + Benefit + Meaning = Successful Message

That means we’re just one step away from having a successful pitch for our iron. We need the meaning. In other words, why should the consumer care?

To find this, take your thinking one step further. Why, exactly, would it be valuable to know the temperature of your iron?

“The LED display of our iron allows you to easily identify the temperature of the device, eliminating the need to wait around testing it and ensuring that fine fabrics don’t get singed.”

Hopefully, this helps get rid of any wrinkles in your communication strategy!

And if you need help developing and testing messages, we’d like to help.  To schedule a call with one of our professionals, click here.