Clearly.

I know. Right?

Three of the worst recent offenders. I challenge anyone to go through ten minutes of cable news without hearing those first two multiple times.

Then flip over to a scripted show and see how long it takes for a character to say, “I know, right?”

Blech!

Rose – I’m a big offender when it comes to “in terms of” in emails and reports; need to work on that…

Joseph – “solutions” definitely gets used much too often; I wasn’t surprised to see that one make the top 10.

Well when styling everything as “solutions” was new & becoming all the rage, I worked in a department for a while that was known (officially) as. ‘IP Solutions’.

Though I still work for that same department it’s name has changed many times to keep up with the fashions, and my colleagues still fail to see the funny side.

Now we’re just called UC IT IS Platforms.

Also nothing is more fustrating than hearing the same word used twice. Or seen.

And what’s worse is when you catch yourself saying it!!

I hate to break it to you, but there’s a new overused phrase coming round the bend and you’re using it. That word is “engaging”. A couple of years ago, you very rarely heard it but now you hear it all the time. Keep your ears open over the next couple of weeks. You’ll be astounded. I wonder who’s circulating the secret memo about engaging.

T.K. – good points on “authentic” and “premium.” How authentic is it to call yourself authentic?

Tracy – I think we’ve all used a healthy portion of these at one time or another. And to be fair, in certain contexts some of them have legitimate uses. But many certainly do get overused.

Jeff – I guess that qualifies as philosophical, existential meeting speak.

“…we are where we are, becuase it is was it is…”

Drew and Reginald – “at the end of the day” is a great example of meeting speak and I agree on the overuse of “actually.” I’d like to do a separate post on the spoken word offenders some time.

Tim – “valued added” is a good one, thanks. As of today there are 2,900 instances which would put it at #40. I hadn’t thought about “so” before but I have to admit I use it quite a bit in my posts too, although not exactly in the way that you mention

Drive us mad as a family its not the words as so much as the way there said. We wonder what did they use before the word controversy

the worst offender this week was the common wealth games was like watching paint dry seen more life in a glass of alka Seltzer, with the exeption of the India womens relay team. controversial games dogged by contoversey so annoying..

Julian – it’s a good point, but I don’t think that anyone is saying that none of these words ever have legitimate use and to be clear that is not the message I’m trying to convey.

“Dashboard” was added after a suggestion in the comments; there is some discussion about it and other terms like “real-time” above that you may have missed. I definitely agree that both have legitimate uses so their inclusion is borderline. But I decided to add them as examples of legitimate terms that start to get co-opted by marketers to associate their products/services with a particular trend or terminology, even when that’s not really the case. So those are terms with the potential to be abused or overused – sort of buzzwords in the making.

I’m hoping that “game changer” instances are low enough to keep Lance from snapping; wouldn’t want to cause an incident…

Otherwise a world-class list, best of breed even, possibly mission critical to some end-users and evidently very scalable!

Tracy – look at the most overused words in media coverage is a good idea. That would be harder to do but it would make for an interesting post

I’ve written a blog post on why hopefully this should get PR people to change the language they use http://measuresconsulting.wordpress.com/2010/08/17/the-leading-innovative-best-blog/

Do take a look!

John – I wonder if using “absolutely” by itself started out as “I absolutely agree.” As for the use of “absolutely” in press releases, there are 2,780 instances of it, so that is candidate too. But since your point is more about its incorrect usage as a single term, and as adverb it is not necessarily overused in releases, I opted not to add it at this point.

Main Entry: ab·so·lute·ly
Function: adverb
Date: 14th century
1 : in an absolute manner or condition —often used as an intensive
2 : with respect to absolute values

Therese – I agree, “iconic” is definitely thrown around too much.

Michael – Hard to argue with any of that. A large percentage of the press releases out there probably never needed to exist in the first place.

Richard – I really did just think it would be interesting to see what terms are most overused in press releases these days. But I do agree with your point that the best approach is for companies to just provide straightforward information and leave the rest behind.

Thomas – “dimension” is an interesting possibility, thanks. As of today it comes up 932 times.

But enough from me in this coruscating discussion.

I should do a separate post just on “meeting speak.” There have been lots of good suggestions here over the past month.

Elena – Good points. Rather than using more ordinary or even unflattering adjectives, I think what the media and the public at large (who encounter press releases on websites and search engines) would most like to see is companies providing the information in a straightforward manner without all the hyperbole. Too often over-hyped releases end up costing a company the attention it seeks because they end up disregarded.

Yoav – I actually did a post last year on that: Do People Search for “Breaking News”?

Hey, wait…I can read this stuff! I believe we have our Rosetta Stone in Adam’s excellent list.

Frank

Thoughts? Thanks for the list…truly world class!