✏️ If I was your marketing strategist
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‘Tis (almost) the season of frantic shopping, marathon baking, and endless wrapping and trimming.
And if you’re a small business owner, it’s likely a period of frenzied selling, too.
For some of us it’s uncomfortable. For others it’s unavoidable. But for just about all of us, it’s stressful.
So I wanted to drop in with this valuable sales-boosting reminder:
✨ People want to buy when they see a valuable solution to their sticky problem. ✨
The 3 main jobs of your marketing?
→ Find the people who have the problem you solve. The best way to do this is to open with it. (As David Ogilvy said, “When you’re selling fire extinguishers, open with the fire.”)
→ Show how you, your process, your approach, your product can help them solve that problem BETTER than other things they’ve tried or other solutions available to them. How does it transform them from where they are now into who they want to be?
→ Offer them a way to get your solution. And make it EASY.
A trap I see business owners fall into a lot is skipping number 1 and going straight to 2.
We sell the features or the benefits.
We focus on what our thing does, how it was made, how it’s different.
Because that's what WE as the creators eat, sleep, and breathe.
(To be clear, those things have their place in your marketing, ab-so-lutely.)
But the biggest thing I care about as a shopper? Can this thing actually solve MY problem the way I need it to.
That’s the first domino. The one you need to topple to make all the others fall, too.
People don’t really care about the face cream. ➡️ They care about the crows feet on their face and how to erase them.
People don’t really care about the storage bins. ➡️ They care about the stuff that’s overtaking their house and how to contain it.
People don’t really care about the marketing membership. ➡️ They care about the fact that their sales are a mess and how to get control of them.
People don’t really care about the hair cut. ➡️ They care about the fact that their hair is out of control and they look like they just stepped off of a 1970s hippie commune (c’est moi, at the moment 😑).
🛑 Stop thinking about your products or services as things you have to sell.
🟢 Start thinking about them as valuable solutions you get to offer to the people who need them.
It’s a small shift, but insanely powerful and crazy profitable.
So your challenge for the week...
Think about whatever it is you offer. Then ask yourself:
- What is the problem my people have that my offer helps solve? What is the number ONE thing they’re struggling with?
- What is the ultimate result they want?
Good marketing starts there.
It’s THE BEST way to capture the attention of your people and get them to pay attention.
Think about the last thing you spent money on. What was it you were really buying?
It’s never the thing you’re after. It’s ALWAYS the result.
