(Photo by Dan Dvorscak)

If you are introducing a service or product that’s innovative, you’re likely to run into a problem. How do you describe it to someone who’s never seen your novel solution – since it doesn’t fit into their mental framework?

Use Itslikea (“it’s like a…”) to explain it simply. Hollywood movie pitches are great examples of this – a new movie is explained as a mash-up of a couple of other (known and successful) movie story lines. The trick is to make the itslikea connect to something that your audience is familiar with (it doesn’t have to be related to your market niche) and then help them to make the mental leap between that image and your innovation.

Finding great analogies isn’t something that everyone’s naturally good at, since you often need to think “horizontally” (looking at other industries) rather than “vertically” (just at your market segment). To help jump start your thinking, pick three words that describe three attributes of your revolutionary offering. For example, if you’ve created a better small car, you might describe it using: lightweight, shrunken, and eye-catching. Then, use a tool such as Google Images to get some visual ideas for what other things share these attributes. Scroll through the list to find an image that somehow relates to your offering. If you’re stuck, pick 3 other words, and repeat. Once you’ve latched onto an image, then create your analogy leapfrogging from the image (for example, “Imagine putting a small engine into a child’s plastic peddle car…”). The analogy will help to create the right mental image to quickly convey your offering.

A great analogy plants a seed into your audience’s mind. Then it’s up to you to harvest your customers.

(Photo by Mark Giles)

Why do people choose to hire your services? You may think you know, but you likely don’t know the whole story. It may be your witty personality. It may be your location. Time of your classes. Parking convenience. Yelp reviews. A great coffee shop next door. Results. Price. But you don’t know unless you dig deeply.

You can start by asking your clients, “Why choose me?” You’ll likely get a set of logical reasons. But no doubt many of your competition would also satisfy these same points.

Ultimately, you’ll need to understand their emotional reasons. How do they feel after working with you? How do you affect their senses? Do they smile more when you’re around? For this sort of observation, you’ll likely need a helper who’s paying attention to all the clues. Perhaps they’ll video your interactions with clients or ask subtle questions during interactions. There are clues everywhere, but you’ll need to tease them out.

Once you understand why people pick you, make that message one of the pillars of your marketing campaigns. It’ll make it easier to find more people who are looking just for you.

(Photo by Stephen D)

If your client is asking for feedback (or if you’re giving your consultant feedback), it’s important to not only focus on what you say, but how you say it – for effectiveness’ sake. If you’re brutally honest, you may enforce your point, but you’ll build resentment which can reduce the desire to work harder.

The next time you need to give feedback, use the “sandwich principle” (2 pieces of bread with the good stuff in the middle):

Start by stating something you like about the submitted work (even if it’s something trivial – like how quickly the work was completed).

Next, list the specific things that need improvement. Don’t say “I don’t like what you did”.  Give tangible clues of what specifically you don’t like, and examples of things you do like (don’t make them guess).

Then end with something else you like about their work (maybe it’s something they did previously that you admire).

The “sandwich principle” works well psychologically since people remember the beginning and end of a meeting/presentation more than the middle. By starting/ending the feedback with things you like, you instill a positive feeling about the feedback – so the  “meat” of your feedback can be more easily digested.

(Photo by Aimee Plesa)

How direct is your marketing message? For B2B (business-to-business) marketing, it generally needs to be fact-based (and data-driven), for example: Our solution to this problem often produces a 50% improvement in bottom line-revenue. For some B2C (business-to-consumer) services (soft skills – like coaching – for example),  producing a fact-based message is difficult (you likely don’t have case studies proving the effectiveness of your work). What can you do instead?

Tease your audience with information. If you’ve ever signed up for a free webinar or teleseminar, you’ve likely experienced this marketing technique. Instead of getting to the “good stuff” immediately, the presenter spends a lot of time showcasing their credentials: awards won, articles published, celebrity clients, books written, large seminars taught, etc.  Ten minutes has gone by. They then tell stories of the amazing successes of their past students. Twenty minutes has gone by. You’re wondering if they’ll ever share any of their techniques with you.

At thirty minutes, they then tell you that they’re about to tell you about one of their amazing “secret” techniques, and then describe how important it will be for your life. And finally, at thirty-five minutes, they share the secret.

What’s the impact to their audience? For those that have stuck through the preamble, it’s a cool drink of water to the parched audience. They revere the information. They worked for it (waiting until it was revealed) and know that the value of the presenter’s (with world-class qualifications) time is high.

Now imagine instead, that the speaker simply began the presentation simply, with a minimal preamble, and then shared the secret. Your perceived value would be much lower (even though the information is the same). The key is that through extended foreplay, your desire is heightened.

For your next marketing campaign, consider if increasing the “tease” will result in more closed deals with your target audience.