LEADERSHIP STRATEGY: CREATE A PAINFUL MARKETING MESSAGE
a prospect's pain is your invitation
The most effective way to begin the process of penetrating a target market is to identify the problems and challenges—“pains” your prospects are dealing with day in and day out.
by LSI contributor Eric Keiles
Meaningful marketing MUST speak to your customer’s pain. Effectiveness demands the creation of a compelling message that will encourage prospects to seek you out. For instance, a plumber’s pain might be, “I don’t want to carry a lot of inventory but I can’t get parts delivered the day I need them”. A procurement manager pain might be, “I hate reading long RFPs, I wish software suppliers would deliver their information in a simpler format.”
Companies that powerfully express their customer’s pain typically win because people make purchase decisions emotionally. An effective marketing message is about the prospect—not you. Pain oriented headlines that hit the mark will lead prospects to your company. They might say, “That’s my exact issue! This company really understands me. They could probably help.” When your message triggers a “they know me” thought, you’ve made a powerful first impression and you’ll be ahead of the competition.
Identifying prospect pain is the first step in creating a “stand-out” marketing message. Once you understand and can express your prospects pains, you can create solutions that will guide them towards buying from you.
4 steps to success:
- Before moving to the solution stage, create pain statements for each target market.
- Talk to everybody who contacts your prospects.
- Document prospect identified pains in each target market.
- Always express prospect pain item in the first person. (see examples above)