The Metaphor is NOT the Thing

How many of you have heard someone try to explain a complex topic through metaphor?

“Your ecommerce platform is a car, it has wheels, windows, etc.”

“Your CMS is a bunch of lego blocks and you combine all the parts.”

“Your digital platform is a horse and buggy and…”

The power of metaphor is it allows us to seemingly explain the story without knowing the deep details of the implementation. Isn’t that great? Being able to connect with a client, a person, by using terms we already use and understand is a wonderful and powerful tool that our language provides.

So what’s wrong with that? Actually nothing, but with a large qualifer. We need to be clear that the metaphor is strictly a way of trying to wrap our heads around a complex subject — it’s the NOT the explanation in its totality.

Marketers can use metaphors because their job is to sell, or more precisely trigger demand within the consumer that leads to the sell. I’m good with that, and it’s necessary. But if I want to know how it’s put together, I will talk to the engineer, developer, or subject matter expert.

Like many things in life, this seems like an obvious concept, but in the land of agencies, “story-telling,” our fast pace of digital life, it becomes a very fuzzy line indeed (don’t start on fake news). What starts as a good yarn often gets blurred into an authoritative explanation.

There is a time and place for everything. Distinctions are still important. However, if you ignore those distinctions (or deliberatey obfuscate them), deal with the confusion at your own peril.