From the Rule of 7 to the Reality of 21: Why Messaging Matters More Than Ever
You’ve probably heard the old “Rule of 7” in marketing:
A person needs to see your message around seven times before they remember it and take action.
Cute idea. Completely outdated.
In a world where everyone is drowning in notifications, feeds, and inboxes, it’s not seven touches anymore. It’s closer to 21+ meaningful impressions before anything sticks.
That sounds exhausting—until you realize the real lever isn’t the number of touches.
It’s the quality and consistency of your messaging.
Messaging Creates Alignment
Alignment isn’t a buzzword. It’s revenue.
When your leadership, sales, marketing, product, and customer success teams are all telling the same story, three things happen:
Buyers hear the same core message everywhere they turn
Employees actually know what they’re selling and why it matters
Decisions get easier, faster, and less political
Well-aligned companies:
Close more new business
Retain more customers
Execute faster because they’re not arguing about the basics every quarter
Alignment starts with messaging:
Who do we exist for?
What problem do we solve?
Why is our solution meaningfully different?
What is the WIIFM for each target buyer persona’s FBM?
If your teams can’t answer those questions in a way that more or less matches, you don’t have a messaging problem. You have a strategy problem disguised as a copy problem.
Messaging Allows for Consistency
Standing out is hard. Staying remembered is harder.
A brand needs multiple impressions—often 7 to 23 or more—before a person:
Recognizes you
Remembers you
Does what you’re asking them to do
That number goes way up when your message keeps changing.
If your homepage says one thing, your sales deck says another, your SDR emails promise something slightly different, and your onboarding emails feel like a fourth company… the buyer’s brain never gets to connect the dots.
Brand recognition is often subconscious:
Colors
Phrases
Stories
Promises
If those aren’t consistent, your “21 touches” might as well be 21 different brands.
Touches Only Count If They Reinforce the Same Story
Not all touches are created equal.
Random, disconnected impressions don’t compound. They reset.
This:
LinkedIn post about Problem X
Ad about Problem X
Email about Problem X
Demo framed around solving Problem X
Onboarding that delivers the first win related to Problem X
…is how people start to trust that you really understand them.
This:
Blog post about whatever you felt like
Ad about a random feature
Email about a discount
Demo that chases every shiny object
Onboarding that feels like a different product
…is how people end up confused, disappointed, or gone.
Messaging Is a System, Not a Slogan
If your “messaging work” resulted in:
One tagline
A few headlines
A dusty brand book no one opens
…you didn’t build a system. You built a poster.
Real messaging work shows up in:
How your SDRs write cold emails
What your AE says on slide 3 of the deck
What your CSM says in the first QBR
What your careers page promises candidates
What your actual customers say in their own words
Every time someone in your company communicates with the outside world, they’re either reinforcing the story—or rewriting it on the fly.
Bottom line:
The problem isn’t that it takes 21+ touches.
The problem is most companies are delivering 21 different messages.
Get the story straight. Say it the same way, relentlessly. That’s how you earn the right to be remembered.
