De-Jargon Your Life: A Practical Guide to Sounding, and Being, Human

You’re not imagining it. Every B2B company sounds the same.

As the debate over AI’s role in the writing process wages, words are becoming extinct, sentences homogenized, and metaphors flattened into the same five shapes. 

It’s not just a feeling, it’s an undeniable statistical, and definitional, fact. A study published last month by Barron’s analyzed Alphasense’s library of company documents including news releases, SEC commission filings, and earnings call transcripts for the construct “it’s not X, it’s Y.” The study found instances doubled in 2024, and 2025. If my LinkedIn feed is an indicator, there are no signs it’s slowing down —which means we’re headed for exponential growth of the dreaded phrase.

AI “writes” by pulling on the vast body of digital content to develop statistical models and populate language based on patterns. Which means, it surfaces the lexicon, syntax and metaphors that are used most in each sample set. Average on average on average.

And with estimates that AI will generate over 90% of digital content in 2026, we are at risk of our language, of writing, collapsing on itself. Sameness on sameness on sameness.

To prove my point, I asked Claude to analyze the top 25 software companies in supply chain for whether they use “end-to-end,” “cloud-based” and “AI-powered” in their above-the-fold homepage copy. The results were striking: 96% used “end-to-end,” 92% used “cloud-based,” and 88% used “AI-powered.”

If a homepage functions as our digital store-front, these results show we’re marketing completely undifferentiated products. If we marketed water like this, we’d be promoting “our complete hydration solution comprised of two hydrogen atoms per one oxygen atom.”

My fear isn’t that jargon exists, it always has. My fear is that it’s replicating at exponential speed. And generic language will kill your marketing strategy faster than Shein knocks off a runway look.

Here’s Why:

95% of B2B buyers draw their consideration set from memory. And you’re not making it into anyone’s mind with dry, cliché copy: even if you do use the word solution instead of product.

In fact, according to neuroscientists, your prospects won’t even “wake up” without some element of surprise or moment of the unexpected.

The cognitive scientist Benjamin Bergen, who runs the Language and Cognition Laboratory at UC San Diego, proved that novel language and constructions activate the brain's perception and action systems. Tired metaphors and expressions? Won’t even make our neurons fire. Which means we can't accomplish any of the objectives at any stage of marketing — awareness, interest, desire, or action.

When you use jargon on your homepage, you're wasting precious digital real estate, throwing money — or worse, attention — down the drain. But how do you get out of the cycle without losing friends and alienating salespeople?

In this series, I’ll show you how to re-build your copy to use less jargon, be more memorable, and as a result more effective.

Let’s start where we began with the theoretical case: you’re creating above-the-fold website copy for “end-to-end, cloud-based, AI-powered, supply chain solutions”

The 4 Steps to Humanize:

Let’s start where we began with the theoretical case: you’re creating above-the-fold website copy for “end-to-end, cloud-based, AI-powered, supply chain solutions.”

Define

Begin by defining the words in question — or asking your key stakeholders to define the words they're using. In some cases, the word may be industry parlance that should stay because it adds credibility. You still need to ask what it means, and why it matters.

Take "end-to-end." From what end to what end? The answer changes the entire scope of meaning. It could refer to the journey from sample to production, upstream sourcing, downstream distribution, recycling, or all the above.

For this example, let's pretend we're selling a solution to track apparel inventory from production to sale. The beginning is at a garment manufacturing factory; the end is when it's sold. "End-to-end" neatly tracks to a story about the garment's journey "from point of needle to point of sale."

Simply by defining a word, we're able to ground our story in specificity and immediately invite our reader to visualize — and therefore engage with — the copy.

Shift Perspective

The term "supply chain solutions" suggests a problem exists. And there are in fact many problems across the supply chain: fuel prices, geopolitical disruptions, outdated systems, overproduction, an ever-changing web of compliance standards, catastrophic weather events, massive inventory loss. Where do you start?

Your company is not solving all of these. So whenever you see the word "solution," interrogate it — find the customer's actual pain at play. Then shift perspective so you're writing from the customer's experience of the world rather than your company's: their problem, your solution.

For our purposes, let's say the problem is knowing where your inventory is at any given time without a complex calculation or a stack of spreadsheets. The problem becomes the entry point for an an action based declaration: "track your stock, no matter where it is in the world."

Find the Emotion

Now that we've shifted perspective to our audience, the focus becomes the human reading about our product. A rich web of emotional resonance emerges.

Why does it matter to "track your stock?"

Cognitively, it means improved speed-to-market, eliminated chokepoints, and optimized profits. But I don't know anyone who wakes up thinking "I'd really love to optimize shareholder profits this quarter by improving our speed-to-market."

I do know people who feel fulfilled by a job well done. Plenty who complain of headaches caused by spreadsheets on spreadsheets. Decision-makers whose anxiety spikes over a lack of control. People who carry quiet guilt over the environmental impact of deadstock.

These are real emotions — they draw your prospect in, create connection, and subconsciously motivate decisions. Tap into them not just in your messaging, but in your writing style itself. Clear sentences. Crisp language. The feeling of clarity in a sea of uncertainty.

Reframe

After clarifying your terms, adjusting your perspective, and pinpointing emotional connections with the reader, you're ready to de-jargon your company's narrative.

Returning to our above-the-fold copy:

Eyes on Every Mile

From the time it's sewn to the time it's sold, a garment touches dozens of hands, travels a hundred roads, and crosses a thousand checkpoints before making it to its final home. But along that journey, there are interruptions and closures, customs and constraints. When it's your job to keep track, where do you start? XXX tracks your inventory every mile of the journey, so you never lose sight — or sleep.

The principles you've uncovered should then be applied across every touchpoint — how you describe what you do, why and how you do it. You should reuse and reinforce the same threads until your message becomes unmistakable and unforgettable.

And when it does, something shifts: the words on your digital real estate stop describing a product and start living in the mind of the person who needs it most.

Jargon costs you. Not just clicks. Not just conversions. Not just the ability to surface in your prospect's AI chat. Jargon costs you the moment — that fraction of a second when a tired, overstimulated human decides whether what you're saying is worth their attention.

You don't get that moment back. Fresh language makes you feel. Tired language makes you scroll. As a human, a marketer, and a businesswoman, I choose to feel.