Are you telling or selling?
In this blog I will explore the right kind of language and mindset required before doing any kind of online marketing.
So the blog title is a little misleading right! In the end we are all sales people and therefore selling. It's actually not a bad thing at all to be selling when you realise you are solving peoples problems and they are happy to pay for that pain to stop.
So the fine line between telling and selling is all in the way its communicated and if done well, you should be doing both.
As I mentioned in a previous blog the mindset for your website is "its not about you".The same is true for all of your online marketing. The truth is nobody care what you do. Harsh? Maybe, but what we care about is how you can help us. If your website copy starts by telling us what you do and how good you are, we switch off.
Always start off by outlining quickly and clearly what is the problem you are solving. This enables visitors to be sure that they are either in the right place or not. How many times have you landed on a website and you are not entirely sure what it is they are trying to tell you or even sell you?
By making it crystal clear with no mistake what the problem or problems you are trying to solve are the prospect can then rule themselves in or out of investing more time on your site.
Now you may think I want them to stay regardless and then convince them. This is practice may happen from time to time, but in reality there was a reason they ended up on your site, and that comes with an expectation and it imperative you meet that expectation.
Lets talk about that expectation for a minute. Another mistake people make is that they assume that everybody ends of on the homepage. But in reality we are sharing content on social media and search engines are suggesting pages from your site that are not your home page. With this in mind you should think about what a user is expecting when they land on any page on you site or open any email from. There is nothing worse than not getting what you expected. Clear navigation at the top and bottom of your site will help people understand how to find the next step. As for email, use enticing headlines always, but don't mislead. If there is an information gap and a link to find out more again make sure you meet that expectation or give a clear path how the user can fill that gap. Too many hoops though and they will get bored and leave.
Overall you should be telling a story about you and your company, it should explain how you approach a problem and why it's important its solved. Remember that we buy based on emotion as much as logic. There needs to be a good balance of the two.
There is of course a place for your product or service but it must come after the "why" and the "how" then once the prospect is happy this is a problem they have and how you will solve it fits their needs then is the time to tell them what it is you will be selling them.
When done correctly the "what" is the least important part of the process, what is important is that you clearly understand their problem and you have demonstrated you can solve it.
This is all both telling and selling, but in a way that we want to be sold to and in actually fact we buy.
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Author- Speaker - Consultant. Passionate about all things digital.