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Articles filed in: Storytelling
Thinking About How People Feel Vs Making People Do
filed in Marketing, Storytelling, Strategy
Every one of us is a marketer.
We spend our days persuading people to do what we want them to do.
“Buy now.” “Click here.” “Please retweet.” “Only 5 4 left.” “Don’t drink and drive.” “Eat your greens and you’ll grow big and strong.”
My friend Mark and his wife Cindy own and run a tiny bakery. If four whole wheat buns in a batch of two dozen don’t rise they look each other in the eye and ask, “How will we feel if someone takes these home?” And then they simply don’t sell those four buns. Mark and Cindy are in it for the long haul. Yes, they have to balance the books at the end of the month, but they don’t make that happen by putting all of their energy into persuading people to do something.
They spend their days wondering how what they do can make a difference, and how it will make their customers feel.
You could spend your time working out how to make people act in the moment. Or you could think about how you would like to make them feel in the long run.
Image by Quan.
How To Scratch Your Customer’s Itch
filed in Storytelling, Strategy
Speak to the few, the ones who really ‘get it’.
Empower them to do what they want to do.
Find ways to help them do the things they don’t even know they want to do yet.
Tell them the reason you exist.
Remember what problem you are solving and spell out how you solve it.
Give them reasons to care, taste, buy, join, sign up or share.
Show them how you do this, so that they can do that.
Demonstrate how it works.
“What itch are you scratching for your customer?”
—Richard Reed Co-Founder of Innocent
Image by ML Duong.
The Best Brand Stories Are True
filed in Marketing, Storytelling
As I was overtaken by the van of a solar panel company on the freeway today, I noticed that they weren’t telling the whole truth.
If this is the story you’re telling on your website then your company had better be living it too.
“It only takes one person to make an eco-conscious difference in this world and now you can save money whilst doing it. ‘Greenwashed Company Name’ have married financial savings with environmental advocacy by becoming leading Energy Efficiency Specialists in green consulting and energy saving.”
Alas this company’s contractors drive diesel vans.
If you’re going to try to persuade me, persuade me with the whole truth.
Don’t just tell a story.
Live and breathe it too.
Image by James Whitesmith.
How Low Can You Go?
filed in Marketing, Storytelling, Strategy
There are over fifty yoga studios within striking distance of the affluent Eastern suburbs of Sydney and they’ve discovered a tactic to get bums on mats. Many of them now offer two weeks of unlimited Yoga for just $25, which works well…… for a little while anyway.
A savvy Yogi can take them up on their generous offer and then move on to the studio making a similar offer next week. She can do that for two years without penalty, if she chooses to.
There’s always someone who can go lower than you. If you’re prepared to compete on price to attract customers today, then be prepared to compete on price to keep them tomorrow.
Far better not to be the cheapest but to be to be ‘the most’ to your customers.
To deliver joy. To connect people. And to create a lasting impact on something that’s bigger than your customer’s wallet.
Image by Lisa Picard.
How To Sell An Idea With A Better Story
filed in Marketing, Storytelling
This is the story of Brick Maier who sold a cardboard box and a poster for $49 and got his Kickstarter Project backed within a week all because he knew how to tell a better story.
Brick didn’t just tell us about dimensions and weight or specifications and functionality. He framed an ideal and painted a picture of children itching to tell their own stories.
He made us connect emotionally with something in our past.
Showed us what might be possible.
He called on us to imagine.
Then sold a vision which the people who cared could buy into.
And we did.
Image by J. Mark Dodds.
Go Where The Others Won’t Go
filed in Marketing, Storytelling, Strategy
Have you ever watched someone learning to ice skate? Perhaps you’ve been there too?
When people are starting out, hopelessly uncoordinated and a bit scared they do what all the other fearful learners do, they cling to the sides for dear life. It feels a little safer there in amongst the pack. Not standing out, but blending in.
The thing is it’s probably the worst place to be. The spot where there is no room to maneuver. The place that feels safer but actually isn’t, where there is every chance that someone will skate over fingers, or take the others down with them when they fall.
No, the best place to start is more likely away from the pack where the more confident skaters are. There’s just more room to move there. Perhaps more room for error too, and that’s what scares everyone. But there’s also more room for growth. More room to spread your wings and fly.
Most SEO company websites look and feel the same. Most florists sell exactly the same flowers, wrapped in slightly different paper. Most gyms have the similar training schedules. And most real estate agents run the same adverts.
If there’s a formula that looks like it’s working we’re happy to follow it.
Most people don’t take the risk of going where everyone else isn’t. That’s why it’s the best place to be.
Image by Marcovdz.
Selling The Benefits
filed in Marketing, Storytelling
Tell stories, don’t write descriptions.
Speak to hearts, not minds.
Paint a picture of the effect.
Tap into the senses.
Illustrate the impact.
Describe the joy, the relief, the pleasure.
Give people a reason to care.
Show them how you’re different.
Then let them know why it matters.
Image by Cliff Ravenscraft.
Why The Price Doesn’t Always Matter
filed in Marketing, Storytelling, Strategy
At the start of the last school year as I stood in a queue I overheard a mother asking an assistant if the $200 calculator she was holding would be coming down in price. The assistant replied that this had been the price for a while, pointing out that the calculator was only required for certain levels of maths. Of course the mother bought the calculator. “Oh well we’ll take it then, because he will be doing advanced maths next year,” she said.
For a long time marketers thought that rational human beings made decisions based on the facts alone. So advertising was designed to help us to weigh up the benefits versus the costs. The truth is that being human means we rationalize all the time, and that most buying decisions we make have little or nothing to do with price.
That’s why we stand in line for twenty minutes at trendy cafes, to pay $4 for a cup of coffee served in a paper cup. It’s also why we spend $23 billion a year on vitamin supplements even though we have no idea if they work.
Value for money then is subjective.
The price of your product or service is part of a story that your customers want to tell themselves. I’m worth it. He cares. Our kid’s success matters.
What story are you enabling your customers to tell?
Image by Apun Pital.
Marketing Is All About Values
filed in Marketing, Storytelling, Strategy
In 1997 Steve Jobs was unhappy about how much Apple was spending on marketing and about the message the company was communicating. He realised that in an increasingly noisy world the chances for any company to be remembered were diminishing and that Apple needed to get really clear about what it was they wanted people to remember.
So he asked himself these three questions.
Who is Apple?
What do we stand for?
Where do we fit in this world?
And came up with this elegant answer.
“What we’re about isn’t making boxes for people to get their jobs done, although we do that well. Apple’s about something more than that. Apple’s core value is that we believe that people with passion can change the world for the better.”
—Steve Jobs
From this starting point Apple’s ‘Think Different’ advertising campaign was born and it’s said that this also marked the company’s re-emergence.
When you’re building your business. When you’re busy being good enough from day to day, it’s easy to forget who you are. Sometimes what you stand for and where what you do fits into the world gets lost along the way.
That’s why it’s so important to understand and declare your values at the start. And why working out what you’re not is as good a place as any to begin.
Story Is The Universal Marketing Tool
filed in Storytelling, Strategy
Story doesn’t discriminate. It’s not dependent on a big advertising department or celebrity endorsement. It’s the universal marketing tool available to anyone.
That includes you.
When Target had a store in every suburb. Zappos had a story about delivering ‘wow through service’. When Borders had floor upon floor of books you could touch. Amazon had every book in stock and available to order today. Now Sappho has books you’ve forgotten and long to touch again. When Gillette had celebrity endorsement Dollar Shave Club had the truth.
The big guys might have a marketing budget, but you have a story.
Don’t be afraid to tell it.
Image by Pixelmaniac.