A marketer always faces the same challenge … how do I best describe a product that will make people want to buy? Regardless of the business or the industry or the product … how do I tell you what it is and what it does? And there are many ways to come up with the secret sauce of an effective message. You can think about it yourself for a little, or a lot … and come up with something that’s simply brilliant. Chances of success are slim-to-none with that approach, although your mom and perhaps your dog will think you’re a genius, but sadly they are not going to buy your product. Or you could convene some of your best and brightest team members … sit in a room pontificating about how great you are and how great your product is, and voila, you have a message. Chances for success here are slightly better, but still not the greatest. The best way to find the magic is to talk to your customers … understand what they want and how they describe you and your products … and then translate that to a story. Chances for success increase greatly with this approach.
Still … how will you say it … and why should your audience care? Recently thinking about this dilemma for a client offering, I was scanning my LinkedIn posts, either for inspiration or simply wasting time. But in those moments of “reflection” or “work avoidance”, I discovered an interesting pattern. Looking at my prior posts, I noticed that the number of “likes” and “shares” was significantly higher when my updates were about friends, colleagues, their successes and so forth. I found that very interesting and took a quick look at others who have a few posts. Same thing. Their posts about individual people had more “likes” and “shares” as compared to their posts about new technology or financial results or anything less human.
People react and respond to … people. That’s right. We all are drawn to stories … messages … updates … about other people, especially when the story is positive. And that applies to anything we’re trying to market and sell. When you tell a story about the ingredients of your product, your audience may take note, but they may ignore you too. When you tell a story about what your product does, you may get better traction, but still not likely to get real attention. But when you tell a story about the results of using your product, and specifically how that product will positively impact people, like you and me, there’s a very good chance that your product will get noticed.
Give it your best shot … find out what your customers like … and then tell a story about people … helping people. Get Better Results with SFB … click here to learn more.