Establishing that emotional connection
Customers, suppliers, or consumers, they're all people. And perhaps sobering to read, but people are not rational beings. If you want to get people to do something and influence their behavior, you need to know how to communicate with them to influence their knowledge and attitudes. Communicating rationally with them is usually not the smartest approach.
Purchase decisions are always based on knowledge and attitudes towards a category, brand, product, or service. That's why it's important to invest in this area. After all, unfamiliarity breeds indifference. But when you invest in building awareness, it's most effective and efficient to also create a positive attitude, preference, and affinity! Because being known doesn't automatically mean being loved! And that's where storytelling comes in. It creates that emotional connection.
But how do you exactly arrive at a compelling brand story? What questions should you ask yourself and your employees to capture the essence of the brand? What do you do? What are you good at? What makes the brand unique? And perhaps even more importantly, why do you do it? When answering the question "Why do you do it?" you tap into your target audience's desires. Additionally, your product or service should provide a solution to fulfill one or more of your target audience's needs. Needs they're likely unaware of. People then sell products or services to themselves by convincing themselves through a story. We deceive ourselves and justify a new purchase by explaining how the purchase will fulfill our needs, even though we're unconsciously giving in to our desires. We rationalize the purchase to ourselves in that way.
