Republishing Guidelines * You may republsih this article with
the author’s bylines. * An email to mafoor@mafoor.com is
appreciated if you do. * You may make slight changes to avoid
spa’m blockers. * Words: 878 Lines: 146 * Email:
mafoor@mafoor.com SMS: +94 777 763682
Can You Control Your Customer’s Mind?
Is it possible to control your customer’s ‘buying’ decision? Let
me start off with an example. Say many people selling bags in
one place and John wants a bag. John buys the bag with the most
attractive packaging.
What influenced his decision? The packaging. This bag had
something better. So in a different view, this bag influenced
the ‘buying decision’ of John. This is just a simple example to
get you familiar with the concept.
Almost all of the modern marketing campaigns are designed to be
effective from the customer’s point of view. They all try to
control the customer’s feelings. You must follow the trend or
you’ll be a loser.
Just brainstorm / think what can influence the decision to buy
‘your product’. You can come up with a lot. Call each of them a
strategy and jot them down in a paper. I will discuss 3 generic
strategies that can be used with any business and how to apply
them, so it will give you some idea as what to think of and how
to apply them.
1. Curiosity
2. Because / Reason Why
3. Greed
Curiosity
———–
What is it? Curiosity can be defined as “the desire to know the
unexplored” in simple terms. People want to know things that
many others don’t know. They like to discover the ’secrets’ that
only some people know. The desire to know is a compelling force
in marketing, so we have:
* Secrets of the Diet Industry Uncovered
* What Time Share Companies Don’t Want You To Know
* Msteries of A Youthful Appearance Revealed
* The Hidden Keys of Car Buying
People don’t want
* How to Diet Successfully or
* A Guide to Buying Cars
for example. First set of titles surely outshines the second set
of titles because the former takes advantage of curiosity. You
must design your advertising in a way that arouses curiosity.
Getting to see the powerful of curiosity? (When compared the two
sets above)
Because / Reason Why
—————————-
Telling people a valid reason for your action is another great
influencer in human behavior. People will trust you if you can
offer a reason for what you are doing. Say you offer a 50%
discount on your digital cameras for the last 10 days in this
month. People are too smart today and start to think it’s
probably because you want to get rid of your defective products
or because its 2 days before the expiry date (in case of food
items). Wouldn’t you and I think the same way when we see a
similar message?
Give them a true believable reason. For example, let’s say you
have a slow time of the year and you want to increase your
business during this period. Make a special, limited time offer.
Offer to throw in an extra free bonus or a special discount
simply because it’s your “slow time” and you need to pay your
staff anyway.
Don’t you think people will believe it? If you can give a solid
reason for a particular action, people will have no doubts about
what you say - there is simply very little room for doubt.
Greed
——-
People are greedy. I’m not talking about food but ‘greedy’ in a
marketing perspective. Everybody feels from “what’s in it for
me” syndrome. They really want to know how your product can
benefit them. Notice that, the “customer’s will buy benefits and
not products”. Confused? You’ll see what I mean in a minute.
Analyze the following list of benefits written about a digital
camera.
* Can store over 200 photos
* Supports every color you can see
* Manual included so you can start even if you have no previous
experience
This will certainly open the eyes of a person who has an idea of
bu’ying a camera one day. This is in complete contrast to the
following, where the ‘product’ is described.
* Has a memory of 6000k
* Supports 16-bit colors
* 60-page manual included
Customers don’t want a memory of 6000k, but they want to store
200 photos. Get it? You must clearly tell the customer how will
they benefit by bu’ying your produc’t. You can then describe the
prod’uct itself, when they are looking for more information.
To make this point clearer, understand that,
“Customer’s will bu’y benefits and ‘not’ the features.”
Okay.. Whats the difference between features and benefits?
Features describe the product itself - what it has. Benefits
describe the advantages a customer gets by bu’ying the product.
The first list above is a benefits list and the second is a
features list.
Benefits will drive customers to explore more information about
the product. This is when you should give them the features and
describe the product itself. To summarize, get customers into
looking for more info by telling them the benefits and then
describe the prod’uct. This will assure the best results.
I laid out just 3 powerful strategies here. There are many more
‘explored’ and ‘unexplored’ tactics, and hope you can discover a
few too. Please let me know if you do. I hope this information
was helpful to you and wish you good luck and success in your
future mark’eting efforts.