The No Jargon Email: Use Storytelling to Sell More
Use storytelling to sell more
Just a reminder to make sure you use CTA's that make sense ??????????
Martin's Musings: Loops and Story's
Imagine this…
You’re a freelance marketing consultant.
Because you watch a lot of YouTube videos relating to marketing, YouTube keeps recommending videos from an entrepreneur who promises to, “Help you build a 7-figure marketing agency in 9 months”.
You finally give in and watch one of her videos.?While you hate to admit it, you actually really enjoy it.
Before you know it, you’re down the rabbit hole.
You’ve watched 6 more videos where she shares the backstory about how she went from a solo consultant to running a 50-person agency.
Each video starts the same way—with a personal story about a real challenge she faced while growing her agency. Then she shares tips on everything from client management software to getting more leads.
She plugs her course for new agency owners at the end of each video, but you ignore it.
You’re a freelancer—not an agency. You don’t need her course.
The next day, you wake up to an email from one of your freelance clients. They’re expanding and want you to work with two new companies they just acquired.
More work means more money, which is great. But your calendar is already jam-packed.
You can’t bring on these clients as a freelancer… but you could if you built a full-blown agency.
There’s just one problem: you don’t know how to run an agency.
Why are you suddenly considering buying the YouTuber’s course?
Storytelling - why great storytelling leads to more products selling.
Storytelling & Psychology
Facts are sometimes not easy to remember. But a fact wrapped in a?story is 20x?more memorable. Storytelling is a science backed technique not just marketing Jargon (although us marketers love flogging that horse).
Stories are captivating they send us down rabbit holes, consuming content trying to piece together the entirety of someone's story (like the examples above "how they built such a successful marketing agency)
Stories get inside your humans mind
If you tell stories well enough (that connect, are funny, moving, etc) your potential humans will emotionally connect and start trying to predict what happens next. In short, they will develop an affinity for you and your brand.
They will begin to envision themselves in the story, which makes it (and your promises) so much more compelling.
So?how can you apply this to your business?!
Let's look at 2 ways in which we can apply this to sell more of the things you sell.
Use open loops to keep people reading
An “open loop” is a writing technique where you leave an unresolved question or tension in the reader's mind.
You can use open loops in your content to keep your humans reading or watching your content all the way through to the end. At the end of your content close the loop to relieve the tension so your humans feel positive about you and your brand.
This is a section of my first welcome email. I introduce the?"WARNING: RANT ALERT"?opening the loop. I close the loop in email 2.
This is just one way to use open loops, we can entice people in lots of ways
A word of caution:?if you use open loops to keep people reading and don’t deliver the answers you promised, you’re just creating clickbait—and people hate clickbait.
Flaunt your flaws (it makes you likeable)
Your potential buyers like to see the human behind the brand. They also like to see your humanness, and humans have flaws.
People don’t want picture perfect. They actually prefer for you to share your mistakes, challenges, and hard times.?It makes you seem more relatable.
Elon Musk famously said the glass was bulletproof when unveiling the Tesla Cybertruck, and then it cracked twice. Instead of pretending that it did not happen or trying to PR their way out of it......they made T-shirts laughing at the incident.
This is an area I also embrace (regular readers will have seen more than 1 or 2 spelling mistakes) with my written content and videos - just being me.
领英推荐
The Rub
From childhood to adulthood, humans love stories.
Stories make it easier for us to remember, relate, and take action. We remember celebrities, brands, and products tied to stories.
Get attention while becoming more memorable by telling stories that intrigue your humans.
Curated reading
Get stuff done: 4 tips to get more of what you need (Sales!!!)
On our courses at Relearn we don't focus on conversion rate optimisation (CRO). Why you ask? Well CRO makes the assumption that your website or digital presence is the main?focus of making sales, which for most of us it is, but for many businesses, their website is just one step in the sales process.
That being said its always an important step so lets look at some easy-to-implement tips to help you get more conversions (whether that be sales, leads, form fills, phone calls) from your website.
Mine customer reviews
Customer reviews hold some of the richest data sources about your humans there is. Telling us what they like (or don't like). Better than any survey.
Mining these reviews can help us convert more in so many ways:
If you are a new business no worries, mine your close competitors and get ahead before you start!
Keep your copy focused on them
This is a universal tip but so important for increasing your ability to get more sales.
Remember it's about them not you. It's about their problems, not your products or services features and benefits.
Let's look at Relearn Digital, we could say:
"In-take based Digital Marketing courses that will teach how to be better at digital marketing"
Ok, so this is true but a bit navel-gazing.
What about if we focus on YOU:
"From overwhelmed to under control without the marketing jargon with Relearn Digital"
By focusing on the problems of your humans and translating this into your copy you will help them and draw them into your business.
Don't guess - watch
This is a little more technical but absolutely worth it - watch what is happening with your customers on your site and gather feedback.
There are lots of tools out there that help you to monitor what is happening on your site in real-time (and its not as hard or scary as you think). One of the most popular is HotJar (see my tool suggestion section below) but by?no means is it the only one.
These tools allow you to monitor what is happening through heat maps, post-conversion surveys, and instant feedback quick questions so you can remove the guesswork from you elevating your website's experience.
Focus on converting the traffic you have
All too often we get hung up on finding more and more traffic, when the best bang for buck can come from focusing on the traffic we have.
If you are getting traffic but a low conversion rate (the rate at which people do the thing you want them to do) then looking at this part of your website and improving it is the best pace to start. Simply fixing/improving these elements will improve sales more than driving more traffic to an underperforming site.
Start by watching and not guessing (see above) and find out what needs fixing
Digital marketing tools: HotJar
Hotjar?is a visual observation and optimisation tool that allows you to see what is happening on your website. More than that you can use it to conduct surveys and gain feedback and even conduct user interviews.
The best thing you can use it for free (it has a limit on the amount of sessions but great to find your feet).
Often we see investments like this as unneeded and not critical. But think of it like this, let's say you go to the gym regularly or like to run. Tracking how you do lets you know the progress you are making and lets you know if the "investment" in your health is paying off.
Same for your website. You've invested in building it, writing content, paying to send traffic to it so why would you not invest in knowing what is happening?
Relearn Digital
Like the email? If so check out more from Relearn Digital:
?? "Marketing is no longer about the stuff that you make, but about the stories you tell." - Seth Godin. Love how you're embracing storytelling in digital marketing! ?? The power of open loops and authenticity in sharing flaws really resonates with this approach. Keep rocking the digital space! ??#digitalmarketing #storytellingmagic #SethGodinWisdom