September 2014 - Donnie Bryant | Direct Response Copywriter

Your Should-Be Customers Say “No” Because… (Pt. 3)

June 4, 2016September 15, 2014 by Donnie Bryant

[Don’t miss Parts 1 and 2 of this series]

“It’s not a question of how. It’s a question of what. If no one told you that bullets flew straight, and I gave you a gun and told you to hit the target, what would you do?”

Do you remember that scene from the movie Wanted? Wesley, the protagonist, was training to become a Fraternity assassin. Part of the training was learning to curve bullets. Wesley was clueless as to how to make that happen. Sloan (played by the always-dapper Morgan Freeman) described the difficulty as a belief problem.

In the movie, bullets fly straight because the shooter believes that’s how they should act.

An assassin’s belief in his ability to shoot bullets in impossible trajectories makes it possible.

In the same way, your should-be clients’ belief in you, your products, your industry, etc. — and his own ability to “curve bullets” — plays a huge role in their buying decisions.

I hesitate to talk about this…

The concepts of belief and the suspension of disbelief are advanced and powerful; in my attempt to treat the topic properly, I’ve taken forever putting my thoughts on “paper.”

I’ve just recently started sharing this info with private clients, but we’ll talk about it briefly here today. After all, I am committed to helping you win more ‘yeses’ from people who will benefit from your products and services.

Going Beyond Credibility

It should go without saying that a sales message MUST be believable if it’s going to have any kind of positive effect.

Proof elements such as testimonials, scientific or clinical evidence and demonstrations help clear away doubt about whether or not your product does what you say it will.

Most sales pitches work hard to establish the credibility of the salesperson, service provider or manufacturer. They mention degrees earned, awards won, longevity in business and the fancy magazines they’ve been featured in.

All of this is good stuff. Important stuff. People don’t buy when they don’t trust. But credibility in itself isn’t the stuff breakthroughs are made of.

Consider this. Whenever you step into a movie theater or turn Netflix on, you engage in a subtle volitional activity: you flick off the unbelief switch in your brain — or at least put it in standby mode. You know you’re watching a movie…you know parts of the plot are totally unrealistic (in the real world, no man is THAT romantic)…but for the sake of enjoying the story, you accept these things as truth.

That’s why Morgan Freeman can tell us — with a straight face — that the laws of physics don’t matter. That’s why we believe him for 90 minutes.

As in the theater, so in the marketplace (to paraphrase Bill Jayme).

Your marketing message or sales pitch has to strike at the emotional heart of the hearer/reader and create a vision in his mind. For a moment, he has to dissociate from the “real world” and see himself enjoying the benefits he’ll receive after buying from you.

He has to SEE the bullet curve.

You have to create a story and help him watch the plot unfold — with himself as the main character.

He has to see HIMSELF bending the trajectory of the bullet.

How do you make him envision that?

Briefly,

Talk about a topic the potential client wants to believe, or approach the topic from an angle he wants to believe. Desire forms the basis for vision and belief. (See Business of Belief by Tom Asacker)
What’s the “big idea” behind the thing you’re offering? Let the story do the heavy lifting. The statistics play a supporting role.
Say unexpected things. You have to slap people out of their haze to earn their attention. Then keep earning it, or the audience will tune out. Predictability is boring, like in any other story.
Dig in for the long haul. Be prepared to use a series of messages, because in many cases, the first exposure may not do the trick. The more a person is exposed to something, the more likely he is to believe it (look up the illusory truth effect and mere-exposure theory).
Be a character. Strong personalities take us on journeys and activate the imagination. Polarizing figures force us to make choices. Don’t you feel like you know the characters on your favorite TV shows personally? You probably have similar feelings about some brands and business people.

What’s the difference between store-brand bottled water and Fiji or another high-end brand? The story. That’s some serious suspension of disbelief at play going on there!

(If you’re interested in learning more on this topic, you may enjoy my in-depth article Belief-Based USP.)

Your Should-Be Customer Says “No” Because… (Pt. 2)

March 4, 2024September 8, 2014 by Donnie Bryant

[Read Part 1]

When people who should say yes to “you” say “no” instead, there is one overarching cause. Borrowing a few words (and an image) Dr. Harlan Kilstein shared someplace in cyberspace:

“The only reason you hear “no” when you are selling is because you haven’t connected your product to their highest ranking criteria.” Couldn’t’ve put it better myself — so I didn’t even try.

If what you’re offering doesn’t gain a position of ranking priority in your potential customer’s mind, you’re gonna hear a lot of nos. That shows up in a few different ways, one of which we discussed last week. We talked about how sales messages miss the mark if they don’t appeal specifically to the self-interest of the prospect.

Another reason people who should be your customers will reject you is because change is hard. When we’re selling our products and services, we’re asking people to

change from inaction to action
change from one course of action to another
change brands or providers
change their thinking
change their habits

People generally do not like to change and we usually try to avoid it, even when we know the results will be good.

As the saying goes, we usually change our behavior when the pain of staying the same becomes greater than the pain of changing. And this is really the key to overcoming this reason people reject our selling messages.

Many times, we try to persuade tough prospects by piling on benefit after benefit and bonus after bonus. What we don’t realize is that the problem is not a lack of value (although extra value is rarely a bad thing). We oversimplify the persuasion process.

When people make decisions, they have to weigh multiple factors. As marketers, it is easy for us to only address two main categories: payoff of taking action and the cost of not taking action, i.e. the benefits they get from buying and what they miss out on if they don’t.

What we fail to consider is that, in the mind of the potential customer, there are HUGE benefits to inaction.

Changing is hard; your prospects most likely aren’t going to do it just because you offer a better alternative to what they’re doing now (which could be nothing). You’re going to have to paint the picture, taking into consideration the payoff of inaction and the cost of action.

Recognize that change is difficult for the prospect (just like it is for you). Acknowledge the fact, but put it in its proper perspective. “It feels good to smoke a cigarette when your coworker gets on your nerves, but is it worth shortening your life because he’s a jerk?”

The Cost of Truth

Sometimes we’re stuck in our ways. We like our way of doing things and seeing things. Even when we learn about a better way, we’re not trying to hear it. I was that way with the Dewey Decimal system. The Library of Congress classification traumatized me.

Speaking of books, how many book publishers, newspapers and magazines have gone bankrupt because they didn’t want to change along with the digital revolution?

“Everyone—yes, everyone—has an emotional attachment to their view, no matter how trivial. Some attachments are more easily severed than others. But they are still there.” ~ Abdu Murray

We have to realize that there’s more behind the “nos” we hear than a lack of value on our part. We have to explore ways to facilitate change.

Can that be done through marketing? Absolutely. We’ll get deeper into that in the future.

[Check out Part 3 now!]

Your Should-Be Customers Say “No” Because… (Pt. 1)

January 20, 2020September 1, 2014 by Donnie Bryant

Who is the hero of your marketing message?

It is a common mistake for businesses to promote themselves by…promoting themselves:

“Quality Service and Affordable Prices”
“Over 40 Years of Excellence”
“Nobody Does XYZ Better Than Us”

Each of these statements has some degree of meaning. They’re fairly generic, though, and almost completely focused on the leadership’s opinion about the business itself (or how they hope to be seen by potential customers).

Marketing claims like these are not very persuasive, are they? Why not? Because consumers do not care about businesses; they care about themselves. They care about fixing their problems and getting the various things they want in life.

That is the key to connecting with customers. When a business is the main character in its marketing messages, it sacrifices a large part of its persuasive power.

The Reality: People are Self-Interested

The late David Wallace Foster, a renowned writer and professor, made the following remark in his commencement speech to Kenyon College in 2005:

“…everything in my own immediate experience supports my deep belief that I am the absolute center of the universe; the realest, most vivid and important person in existence. We rarely think about this sort of natural, basic self-centeredness because it’s so socially repulsive. But it’s pretty much the same for all of us. It is our default setting, hard-wired into our boards at birth.”

I’m not saying it’s right. It’s just true.

Customers owe no loyalty to a business that doesn’t make their life better in some way. If that life-improving potential isn’t communicated in customer-centric ways, the business will probably be ignored.

People are self-interested. Businesses are self-interested, too.

Something wonderful happens when a potential customer hears exactly how buying a product will make his life better — in clear, specific, compelling language. He buys! That kind of message can penetrate the inward focus that dominates the customer’s worldview.

Emphasizing a prospect’s self-interest is in the business’ best interest.

“Results — Nothing Less.” Drayton Bird tells potential clients that they’re not paying for marketing or consulting (which they don’t care about). They’re buying the results they want.

“Income On Demand: The Simple Secret to Unlimited Stock Market Payouts.” Who doesn’t want income on demand? Rather than saying “Great Stock Market Tips,” Agora Financial adds emotional punch and begins telling you how easy it is to reach your objective: making lots of money on the stock market.

“Is Cancer a Fungus? Can It Be Prevented? Learn How To Help Your Body Destroy the Candida Fungus, Get Your Energy and Your Life Back” Specific, surprising and all about the reader.

Now, who is the hero of your marketing message? Remember, your should-be customers are not thinking about you. They’re looking out for their own best interest, not yours. (And rightly so!) They care about you only insofar as they can benefit from doing business with you.

It is in your best interest to show potential customers that you’re looking out for them and you’re uniquely equipped to help them achieve the results they want.

Check out Part 2!