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| "If you're like Rush Limbaugh!" |
Six words. That's all it took in February, 2012 when President Obama uttered those words to the world, after Limbaugh made a comment about a young woman testifying before Congress in regards to birth control on his radio show. The media talked about it for weeks. People at work voiced their opinions, at church, the car wash...on and on it seemed to go. Good or bad, Limbaugh received millions of dollars worth of free publicity long after the comment subsided.
Question: how do you "feel" right now?
Are you happy? Sad? Angry? Ambivalent? Are you paying attention?
What I just did was one step in a series of steps (that I'll outline shortly) designed to "engage" you emotionally AND TRIGGER A REACTION.
This is an area that many businesses don't really focus on when it comes to their advertising. Making an emotional connection with their target prospect.
Most business owners are so focused on promoting their products, services, staff, etc--that they never consciously outlined how they could best connect emotionally with their customers or prospects.
This is important as a first step in the advertising cycle in building a relationship with your audience. Good communicators understand this. Great marketers focus on this.
Not wanting to delve too much into the psychological aspects of emotional triggers--I do want to quote Dr. Don McMannis from his discussion about how the brain works in uncovering emotional triggers:
Events that remind us of an emotionally charged experience from the past trigger the same feelings associated with that experience without our conscious awareness. - See more at: http://howsyourfamily.com/uncovering-emotional-triggers-or-where-did-my-brain-just-go/#sthash.rTLEoKjY.dpuf- See more at: http://howsyourfamily.com/uncovering-emotional-triggers-or-where-did-my-brain-just-go/#sthash.rTLEoKjY.dpuf
Once we understand this--as discussed in my last post about repetition of a message and how it can affect a prospect's sub-conscious, our goal is to create "an event" or a positive experience in association with your product to trigger those good feelings. This will engage the prospect and you'll stand out compared to the competition.
We then repeat that experience over and over and over.
This I believe is really the "magic" of great advertising. Most of the time--consumers aren't even aware of it.
It's the best kind of brain-washing (I say that in jest)--because you, the advertiser can choose to repeat your message as often as your budget will allow it.
At the beginning of this post--I mentioned an "event" from last year that received a lot of "repetition". My goal was for you to respond emotionally.
Ideally, I would use a past event that wouldn't be as polarizing as the President or Rush Limbaugh.
For example--I used to work with a client that did home remodeling. He would do his own radio ads. In addition to having a drawl--he would talk about everything but his business.
Huh? That's right. He would talk about his dog...."a good critter named Hootie". Or his grand daughter at Christmas asking for "grand pa pa".
Even though no one knew what he looked like--they could relate with him. This was very important for him to build trust and a connection with the prospect.
Hearing him--you got the impression of Andy Griffith, etc.
He would talk about a "positive" past event/situation that all of us could identify with--and he would air it over and over and over.
At the end of his ad--only then he would mention his business--"if I can do anything to help in remodeling a kitchen or bath...give me a call...etc"
These ads were so successful over decades that people began requesting if they could buy a CD of his ads!
They felt like they knew him and therefore could trust him to tear up there home!
One of the best ads I heard demonstrating this technique of building emotional real estate, was Rush Limbaugh going on about something...then, without breaking stride--said, "you know folks--when I think of Hillary Clinton--I get so hot under the collar...kind of like that space heater I've been telling you about...it heats up to 400 square feet....blah, blah....
Before you knew it--he was in the middle of an live ad for the space heater. Talk about product placement!
Four keys to getting your prospect emotionally involved with your product (and this could be for radio, TV, print, etc):
- Tell a story about something in the past that has an emotional angle/trigger (everyone loves a good story--a positive one that they can relate to).
- Connect your product/service with the story (the space heater, etc).
- Provide a call to action/offer
- Repeat it over and over and over
The more memorable the message--the better.
I still remember the remodelers' "grand pa pa" ad after twenty years--because it reminded me of my own grandfather.
If you'd like to learn more about emotionally connecting with your prospects, click HERE!
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