The Monday Morning Marketing podcast is brought to you byEsther of IPA Group, bringing premiere online promotion to your business.
And Melanie of Stump Social Media training, who empowers business owners to manage social media and marketing for themselves. Welcomeback to another episode of the Monday Morning Marketing podcast. Today we're talking about does your product or service solve problems? M aybe you'rethinking you're listening to us go, Well, of course it does. That's why I'm in business. But do your customers know what problems you solve?
Well, it very much depends on who your customers are and howyou're approaching them. The assumption is that people know the problem wesolve, but unless we put it out, I suppose it's harking back to an old episodeof features tell benefits sell. But unless you explain to them explicitlywhat's in it for them, what they're going to get out of it, then they'll justsee it as a post. That's why people remember how you make them feel and not bywhat you just say.
Plus there could be times that people don't even realisethat they have this problem. When my kids were really young, there weremillions of things on the baby market. It sounded a bit like the black market.But on the market for babies. One of the things that came up to be added to theregister for baby shower and stuff like that was a baby wipe warmer.
I remember you saying that. What is that?
What is that and why would I possibly need it? So for thoseof you who have never come across this wonder, wet wipes are wet and cold. Whenyou're changing a baby's nappy at three o'clock in the morning, the wet, coldwipe wakes them up even more. So it's harder to get them back to sleep again.So you don't realise these things until you're going through the process ofchanging a nappy, dark o'clock in the middle of the night, to be able to thengo, Oh, I wish somebody had come up with this idea or has come up with thisproduct or service to be able to solve this problem that I now have. So youmight not even realise that one of your products or services solves the problemthat people don't even realise they have yet.
So it's verbalising what you may think has been a uniqueidea, probably has been, and then putting it into practice.
Yeah, absolutely. So think about what the problem is. Why isit a problem that in the example that I gave, why is it a problem that wetwipes are cold? And why would they need to be warmed up? What the set up costs,the profits, everything like that. But then how do you market it to people whohave never come across the problem? Right? So that's one of the things you'llhave to think about in your marketing is explaining the problem and explainingthe solution before people even realise that they have a problem. What miraclecan you solve?
Are you being clear enough in explaining the problems you'recurrently solving?
Yeah, the language that you use is definitely up there withhow things are done and not just be sell, sell, sell, sell, sell in the post,or you need this, you need this in your life. Explain why people need it.Explain what problem it is actually solving or why it's a problem in the firstplace. Because wet wipes have existed for a long time before a warmer camealong. So how did people even realise it was a problem?
But now I can't think of how I coped before. We've all usedsomething, be it flannels or wet wipes or whatever. But if we've had the chanceto make it warmer ourselves by putting it in our hands, we use warm water, itmakes so much sense, doesn't it?
Doesn't it? Now you're going, Why didn't I think of that?
Or why did I struggle.
Through all those things? But why did I struggle through allthose things? In another example, there's a friend of mine who is a hypnotist,and every time he says that he's a hypnotist, I'm just like, Yeah, yeah, yeah,yeah, yeah, get it, you're a hypnotist, you know, you hypnotise people. Butfrom time to time, he'll throw in a little nugget of, Well, you know, I washelping this family who the child is going through exams, and the exam stresswas making the child not sleep, and I'm looking at him going, You're talkingabout a problem that I'm going through with, at the time with my child havingto go through exams and not sleeping well and being a bit stressed. I was like,Is he reading my mind? That's the point you need to get to with your clients,to be able to read their minds. Your promotions or your standing up at anetworking event or wherever you're telling people about your product andservice needs to be almost that freaky mind reading, Whoa, he's talking onlyexclusively to me about this thing. Because otherwise it's just, Oh yeah, Iknow what he does.
I know what they do. Yeah, I've heard it before. Melanietrains people in social media. Brilliant. Yeah, but why would I ever need that?
It is a language thing. I find a lot of people tell us whattheir pain points are, normally in the first sentence when they contact you ona phone call, or in the first paragraph of an email. Even your testimonials,they'll tell you there as well. It really does depend on where you look. You'dbe surprised sometimes what pain points you're actually solving. It's actuallybeyond the ones you think you're catering for as well.
Yeah, exactly. Well, if you're doing group trainings, forexample, maybe it's the getting together with other people who have the sameproblem and having other people ask those questions that you're too embarrassedor ashamed to ask. Maybe that's the problem that you solve because somebodymight be, Well, Facebook's been around for 15 years now or more. So why do Istill not understand how it works? I don't want to seem silly and askingquestions one to one. But a group setting might resolve those problems by otherpeople asking those questions that they're too embarrassed to ask.
That's a tough one, isn't it? Because in some groupsettings, people don't want to look like they don't know.
That's a tough one, isn't it? I mean, you can have both, Imean, but if you can have somebody in there who just really is all in for theknowledge and it's like, I really don't care how bad I look, I'm going to ask,what is this thing that you keep talking about? What is Lincoln bio? When I seethese letters, what does it mean? What is a KPI? What is an SOP? What is it?Because they're there to learn. So facilitating that learning and making iteasier for them with your language and with your openness in the group, thensolving those problems. And if you put it into your marketing in the firstplace that it is an open group to be able to ask the questions about. If it's aknitting group or a jewellery making group, put it into the, do you havequestions about this, this and this? And people are going, yeah, I really do.But you don't know where to look for the answer? Yes, I really do. Becausewe've all got access to the internet, but there are so many conflicting adviceout there and conflicting articles sometimes that you're just going, but who doI believe?
Do I believe that person or do I believe this other person?I really think that at the end of the day, down to the nitty gritty, if you'renot getting out what it is that your problem... The problem that your productor service solves, then you're doing yourself at a service and you're doingyour customers a disservice because they really need to know.
You didn't go through all.
That market research.
Assuming people would just know what to do with your productor service isn't enough, you do need to spell it out to them.
You do. Like I was saying, you didn't go through all thatproduct research and market research and research, the R&D and the set upcosts and to just not sell anything. Where did your inspiration come from? Whatmade you make that product? What made you provide that service? Where did yousee a gap in the market?
Sometimes what actually starts you in your business doesn'tnecessarily answer a problem other than your own. No, I'm right here, totally,because when I set up my business, my motivation was I can't bake and they'relaying off SNAs left, right and centre. So I can't do that either. So what can Ido that will fit around my family? And that's why I started. Well, I fell intothis business, in fairness. But a lot of people do. They fall into their littleniche, their little field. But that's the problem. Because we set up our ownbusinesses, we're more invested in finding out an answer to our problems than,I need to make money, I need to pay the bills.
It actually takes testimonials and people from outside.People are objective to come and tell us exactly what problems we're solving.And so if you're really struggling to really understand, especially if you'reearly stage, what problem do I solve? Then it's worth asking around people whoaren't your immediate friends and family who you've balanced the idea off, butsomebody you can look at your images and your messaging and your wireframeinformation on your website. That was a new word I learnt last week. That was.It's something that you need to do objectively, I feel. I think that's whymentors are really helpful.
Absolutely. Especially if they're ones that you don't knowand they're coming in, like you say, so from an external point of view andlooking at it, like if you were to open up somebody's Instagram account,because we just talked about that last week, open up their feed, what does itsay? What does their wall say to you? If it's just pictures of random objectsor lots of cups of tea. What do they sell? What problem are they solving? I'mnot saying go out and emblazon your.
Whole thing. You said cups of tea and all I thought of wasmaking.
See, she's got that down pat. You think of making sang theFOMO creator because she's always making tea.
And she did make tea for a living. Yeah, I know.
When you have a clear message, the message will beunderstood no matter what platform your customer's on. That's what we'retalking about today, guys. If you have any questions, if you would like us toreview your socials to see what it is that you're selling or what problemyou're solving, do get in touch. We're happy to help. If you do need anytraining on it, Melanie would be more than happy to help or rejig of yourwebsite, then come to me. Selfless plug.
Well, that's the problem we're solving.
Exactly. It is. And we don't talk about it enough on thepodcast. So there you go, guys. That's a bit of a shameless plug from us today.You don't hear too many of them, but we'll be back next week. Just beenwondering what you think. Until then, bye. Bye.
Have you noticed you always go bye?
Yeah.
Bye, bye, bye.
I always do that.
Why do you go bye? Why don't you just go bye?
Because it's a Northern Irish thing. They go bye, bye, bye,bye, bye, bye.
Bye, bye. That's an Irish thing.
They.
Don't go bye, bye, bye, bye. They go bye, bye, bye, bye,bye, bye. It's not bye, bye, bye. They don't go bye, bye, bye, bye, bye, bye,bye, bye. That's what I said. Bye, bye. That's not what you said at all.