IYBS Local

I stopped using the word "audit" a few months ago.

Every consultant in this space says they do an audit. AI audit. Marketing audit. Visibility audit. The word has stopped meaning anything specific. When a prospect hears it, they think "checklist someone will email me that I will not read."

And "audit" is the language of a tax accountant, not an operator. It implies something done to you, by someone official, with findings. Compliance, not collaboration.

What an operator actually wants is a conversation about what is broken, not a checklist mailed to them. That is not an audit. That is a diagnostic. Two different relationships entirely.

Words do quiet work. The wrong one stops the door from opening.

If your category has a word everyone uses and nobody hears anymore, that is the first word to stop using.

Annette