Whose language is it in?
Read the opening of your proposal. Would the recipient describe their problem that way? A physician, contractor, and title officer may use different words for similar concerns. The reader should not have to translate your offer before they can consider it.
Give AI the reader’s context.
Share the proposal, the recipient’s role, and their field. Ask it to use familiar language while preserving your argument, scope, price, and commitments. If you have their own words from a conversation, use those to ground the revision.
Read it out loud.
Cut phrases you would not naturally say on a call. Keep useful industry terms and remove jargon that makes the message harder to understand. Check that AI has not changed the deal while changing the words. Clear language helps the right offer get understood; it cannot make the wrong offer relevant.
Sources
Sources
- Ludwig, de Ruyter, Friedman, Brüggen, Wetzels and Pfann, "More Than Words: The Influence of Affective Content and Linguistic Style Matches in Online Reviews on Conversion Rates," Journal of Marketing 77(1), 2013, 87 to 103. 18,682 Amazon reviews across 591 books over 17 weeks; linguistic style matching against the product interest group's own style raised conversion, p < .001.
- Bullock, Colón Amill, Shulman and Dixon, "Jargon as a barrier to effective science communication," Public Understanding of Science, 2019. N = 650. Jargon significantly lowered processing fluency and increased resistance to persuasion.
- Bullock and Bisbey, "Jargon in the Workplace Reduces Processing Fluency, Self-Efficacy, and Information Seeking and Sharing," International Journal of Business Communication, 2025. N = 1,826, randomized, jargon-heavy versus plain-language workplace email.
- Jeff Fargo, Fargo Factor Insight: How to Make ChatGPT Emails Sound Like You
Transcript
Verbatim from the Fargo Walks clip, as recorded.
If you want to get one of your proposals accepted, stop talking to the person and talk as if you're one of them. Use AI and put in whatever job sector or industry they're in and say, this proposal is for John Doe, John Doe, the doctor. Please use any type of phraseology or terms to make him more comfortable and make him more likely to engage with what I'm sending him. It works. I'm Jeff Fargo. I help streamline and scale your business with AI. Go forth.