Fact vs. Insight: The difference that makes a difference.

LT
Sep 20, 2022
3 min read

Updated: Nov 11, 2022

Facts inform. Insights inform and inspire.

Facts are truths. Insights are unexpected truths.

Facts work through description. Insights work through allusion.

The definitional distinction between a fact and an insight is elusive yet profound. The brilliant Jeremy Bullmore has tackled this distinction acutely.

Bullmore, the “most admired man in advertising”, has emphasized that an insight needs to reveal an understanding of what is already in the mind of the receivers as well as what is not already in their mind. Not only does an insight speak to accuracy and originality, but it also ought to be expressive, evocative, and memorable. That’s what makes an insight differs from a fact.

Marketers and communicators are constantly in search of an insight that empowers them to orchestrate a message that galvanizes the audience into curiosity, conviction, enlightenment, imagination, and ultimately engagement. And that’s the exact order we want:

The audience needs to be curious about what is the message trying to say.

The audience needs to be convinced of the truth being communicated.

The audience needs to be enlightened as to an unexpected thing they haven’t known.

The audience needs to take their perception of the message one step further, imagining what they can do with what they have just known.

The audience needs to engage with the message or in the actions perceived through the message.

Motivating the audience to embrace all those attitudes and behaviors through one message requires an insight that underpins the functionality and efficiency of the message. An insight that can serve as a message on its own.

Indeed, a fact can inform marketers and communicators about the audience just fine. But a fact can seldom inspire communicators to create a message that actually works.

An insight not only informs what is and isn’t in the mind of the audience, but it immediately unveils the type of message the audience wants to hear. It prompts an instant, exultant response from us the moment we hear it. And often enough, the message is the insight itself.

Here is an example. Remember the post about the CDC and its campaign, “A Tip From a Former Smoker”? The following is one of the print ads used in the campaign.

What do you think the CDC has learned about its target audience, who are current smokers, in order to create this impactful message?

In the form of fact, it is that most smokers already know smoking is deadly. But the fear of dying from smoking-related causes does not motivate people to quit. Instead, they feel more motivated to quit when they witness the suffering from living with chronic, debilitating diseases caused by smoking and also the emotional and financial suffering their families may face.

In the form of insight, it is that most smokers feel attached to their cigarettes until they have to live with an oxygen tank.

You see the difference? While there is an equivalence of truth between the two, there is a substantial difference in diction, structure, compositional techniques, and rhetorical effects.

While the fact version focuses on literal accuracy and goes on to inform and… inform, the insight version is brief, leaving space for the symbolic words to sing spontaneously in the minds of the receiver and empowering the receiver to form a customized perception of the truth.

Sure enough, the insight was modified a little to become the message itself for the ad.

Picking up on the insight, as a result, the teams at CDC were able to produce several variations of the message, letting the insight inspire them to think creatively. Here are other ads coming from the same campaign: