The framework for the marketing journey is simple -- it’s about communicating why people should change, why with you, and why now? Often, we get questions about the first part of that concept -- how do you develop messaging that really communicates the why change? And really digs deep into the pain.
The pain, fears and dreams people have is the most important part of the journey because it’s how you get people to start their journey -- to click on your emails, enroll in the conversation, etc. Let’s talk about what that really means. To have people look up, or wow them, through their pain, that’s really about their fears and their dreams. In marketing, we communicate with individuals.
B2B marketing is really the same as B2C marketing with one main differentiator: in B2B marketing, we convince an individual customer to then go spend someone else’s money. We do B2B marketing at Kalungi, and we’re very aware that when we’re trying to communicate to business as our audience that in the end, it’s a person. It’s really B2C marketing. Let’s think about what it means to connect with the fears and dreams of that individual.
Pains, fears and dreams from Maslow’s Hierarchy
Once we get a person to enroll as a customer and become an advocate that you’re solving their pain, we can help that individual sell it to others in their organization. That’s where you get the more complex B2B sales journey that definitely involves other people, because it’s a multi-level sale and there are other challenges.
But before we can do that, we need the customer to really enroll with the company and engage with our messaging. One way to do that is to come up with fears and dreams is with Maslow’s pyramid. If you think about his pyramid of needs, it really comes down to what they care about -- their fears and dreams. And if you think about the hierarchy of needs in its most basic form, you have things like physiological needs -- safety -- do I have a job tomorrow?
Some of our customers sell software that help customers become more productive. When you sell that to individuals who think of that as a threat to their job, you have to be able to connect with the fears some people might have that you want to connect with to market the value of the solution.
They may have fears lower in the pyramid about job security, safety and other fundamental elements to someone’s well-being. Can they spend more time with their children? Are they going to be more successful in relating to their peers? Will they be part of a certain group, feel included, be a hero, or seen as an innovator by adopting their solutions?
But what about self-fulfillment -- how do you connect with someone who wants to learn more? Mabe their dream is to learn something new. All of those fears and dreams make up the framework for your marketing communications.
That’s why I suggest developing a strong understanding of your audience’s fears and dreams when you develop messaging and write an email. This way, you can understand the pain your audience can connect with by using Maslow’s pyramid as an anchor.
