From Browsers to Buyers: How to Say What Your Customers Need to Hear
If you’ve ever poured hours into perfecting your website, business card, or service description… only to sit back, hear crickets, and wonder why no one’s calling, you’re not alone.
You might even look at your marketing and think, “But this sounds good. It’s professional. It’s polished.”
The problem? You’re speaking in your language, not theirs.
I call the fix for this The Translation Layer. And if you don’t have it, you’re likely making people work too hard to figure out why they should hire you. And in business, when you make people work to understand you, they move on.
The Gap That Costs You Customers
Here’s how it usually happens:
You sit down to describe your business. You think about your training, your years of work experience, expertise, the special process you’ve developed, or the quality you deliver. You write something like:
“We provide full-spectrum residential and commercial roofing solutions.”
It’s true. It sounds legit. But here’s the problem:
That’s not what your customer says when they need you. They say things like:
- “The roof is leaking into my kid’s bedroom.”
- “There’s a brown stain spreading across the living room ceiling.”
When you lead with industry talk instead of their talk, you miss the connection. They have to mentally translate what you’ve said into their problem… and most won’t bother.
They’ll just move on to the person who says:
“We fix roof leaks fast, and we make sure the repair lasts.”
That’s The Translation Layer. It’s the bridge between:
- What makes you different (your training, process, experience).
- The words they actually use when they talk about their problem.
Why This Hurts More Than You Think
If you’ve been in business for a while, you’ve probably survived on referrals, repeat customers, and word of mouth. That’s great, but it’s risky.
Why? Because people who already know you don’t need translation. They already trust you.
The people who don’t know you yet? They’re making snap decisions based on what they read in a Google search, a Facebook post, or your website.
And here’s the kicker – it’s not just people reading those words. Search engines and AI tools are reading them, too. If the words you use don’t match the words people type or say when they’re looking for help, you disappear from the results entirely.
That means:
- Your “perfect” website might not be showing up for the right searches.
- Your competition might be getting calls you should have gotten.
- People in your area might not even realize you offer what they need.
A Story About a Broken Laptop and a Missed Sale
Let’s say your friend’s laptop died. She runs a small bookkeeping business, so a broken laptop is decidedly urgent. She Googles “fast laptop repair near me.” The first result that comes up is a local shop with a sleek website. Right on the homepage it says:
“We provide comprehensive electronic device restoration services.”
Your friend: Cool. So… does that mean they can fix myt laptop today, or no?
She furrows her brows, bite her lip, and scrolls. She clicks the next listing. That one says:
“Broken laptop? We can have you working again in 24 hours. Call us now.”
The first shop might have been better. They might have been faster. But they lost the customer because they didn’t have a Translation Layer between their technical language and her urgent need.
Building Your Translation Layer
Step 1: Listen For Their Words
Write down the exact phrases customers use when they describe their problem. Don’t clean them up. Don’t make them sound “professional.” Just capture them as-is.
Step 2: Pair Their Words with Your Difference
If you have a guarantee, a unique process, or an extra service others don’t offer, connect it to their words.
Example:
- Their words: “I just need this leak to stop before it ruins my ceiling.”
- Your difference: “We stop leaks and guarantee the repair will last at least 5 years.”
Step 3: Put It Everywhere
Your website, your social media captions, your email signature, even your invoices. The more places people see that connection, the faster they “get” what you do and why they should call you.
Bonus: Work-to-Worth Mapping™ (Your Next Layer)
Sometimes, the problem isn’t just translating industry language — it’s translating tasks into transferable value. I call this Work-to-Worth Mapping™: taking what you do (cutting grass, fixing code, editing podcasts) and extracting the skills, behaviors, and measurable outcomes that matter to buyers.
This is a valuable skill to learn, whether you’re a senior marketer for a Fortune 100 company or you’re someone with limited work experience trying to turn a summer gig into a proof case that makes you undeniable.
Why This Is Worth Your Time
Every unclear sentence on your website, every vague service description, every “industry-speak” paragraph that doesn’t land with customers is costing you potential customers.
Fixing this doesn’t require a marketing degree. It requires a little listening, a little matching, and the discipline to use plain language everywhere your business shows up.
Because when someone has a problem, they’re not looking for a clever slogan or a technical breakdown. They’re looking for someone who understands exactly what they need and can say so in a sentence.
Your One-Page Action Plan
- Write down 10 things customers actually say when they call, text, or email.
- Next to each, write the one thing you do that makes your approach different or better.
- Turn each pair into a plain-language sentence.
- Replace the most important sentences on your website, social profiles, and emails with these new ones.
Do this, and you’ll have your first Translation Layer. Keep doing it, and you’ll stop losing calls to businesses who aren’t as good as you – just because they explained it better.
