Many, many moons ago, a high school football coach of mine used to whip the student body into a frenzy before our annual cross-town rivalry. The school was buzzing with excitement and adrenaline when my coach would strut on stage and with a commanding, gravely voice proclaim, “I’ve seen the weather forecast for this Saturday’s football game… and it calls for a 100% chance of PAIN! We’re going to bring the pain!”

Just like my coach, physical and mental pain motivates people. It’s a key component of consumer buying behavior. And in your business, you can use pain to elicit a desired reaction from your customers to win more new business. Try to step inside the mind of your customers. What’s their pain forecast?

As much as we like to think we’re rational and logical, people buy products and services because the marketing appeals to emotions. Like pain. So, what problems are so excruciatingly painful that your customers are forced to take immediate action? What causes their teeth to ache and throb? What wakes them up in the middle of the night?

A pretty clear-cut example would be criminal defense services provided by an attorney. Sure every client wants to be assured that their attorney is capable and competent, but the client is less interested in that his attorney has 30-years of experience instead of 25, or that he can recite legal code backwards and forwards. The client’s pain is jail time, a ruined career, the stigma of conviction, a broken family and possible financial ruin. Those are real, palpable pains.

The same applies to business-to-business firms and even employees. To illustrate further, let’s use an IT company providing data storage and protection services to other businesses. The client’s pains are much deeper than correctly implementing a hardware and software solution. The client’s pain is, will my business survive in the event of hardware failure? Will my business go broke because the new technology requires additional staff? And for a lower level manager, will I be fired because the IT company I hired didn’t perform?

Pain motivates. So think about how it influences your customers. Think about what worries, frustrates and concerns your customers. How can you use pain and other emotions in your small business branding? Use that knowledge to position yourself as the whiskey to soothe their aching gums. It’ll put you on the fast track to “yes.”

Here’s your invite! Give us a comment or two on what you liked, didn’t like or didn’t understand about this article on influencing consumer buying behavior. We’d be more than happy to answer your questions and engage in civil debate. Thanks for reading!

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Most small business owners I work with are extremely knowledgeable about what they sell. Down to the nitty gritty details, they know their products and services inside and out… but they just can’t seem to step out of their own shoes when it comes to selling from the customer’s point of view and influencing consumer behavior.

There’s an abrupt disconnect between what we’re (the seller) thinking and saying and what the buyer is hearing and interpreting. And when the miscommunication tips too far, the lost sale turns away, shaking his head, muttering, “these guys haven’t got a clue. There’s no way in hell I’m buying from them.” And we’re left wondering, what more do I need to do to close the sale? Was I misinterpreting consumer buying behavior?

The Answer Is Hiding From You In Plain Sight

Purchasing decisions aren’t based on logic. Even the most meticulous, detail-oriented, rational person defaults to emotion when buying everything from a pack of gum at the gas station, to word processing software for his small business. It’s innate and absolute. The decision to buy is arrived at when the seller successfully satisfies the buyer’s emotional needs.

Appealing to emotion is so simple, yet often difficult to put into practice because it begs an answer to the biggest question of all: why do customers buy from me? What is it about my products and services that really, truly appeal to the buyer?

I’m sure you’ve heard the old saying, “it’s the sizzle you’re selling, not the steak.” And it’s not the drill the customer is buying, it’s the hole the drill makes. It’s the less tangible attributes, or perceived attributes, of a product that people buy into. Not the cut and dry logic. That’s why brand marketing is so extremely important. Because branding strikes a deeper chord with people.

So, How Can You Apply This To Your Business

Develop a list of features and benefits for each of your products and services, similar to a company SWOT Analysis, but product and service specific. Features are more of the core logic-oriented selling points… which is probably where most of your focus has already been. Features are things like product color, shelf life, technical specifications and size or weight. In the case of services, features are things like experience, services offered and your processes.

Benefits, on the other hand, are the emotional needs fulfilled by your products and services. They fall into the following six categories: desire, fear, comfort, security, pride and satisfaction. Most often, different features of the same product or service will have their own emotional benefits.

Let’s use the aforementioned pack of gum as an example. A feature of the gum might be that it includes a chemical to help whiten your teeth while you chew. The emotional benefit of having whiter teeth would be desire—the desire to look good, to have a beautiful smile, and ultimately for the person to be more attractive and accepted. So in essence, a simple pack of gum that can help whiten your teeth is now, in the eyes of the consumer, a vehicle for upward social mobility, a better career, a better mate and a better life.

Sounds ridiculous, doesn’t it? But, again, emotion, not logic, is the subconscious influence on how and why we buy things. And the same also applies to services and business-to-business selling. Use emotional selling in your marketing and small business branding.

A big howdy to you! We love comments and questions! Please take a moment to leave a comment below on how to use emotional selling techniques to rev-up your small business marketing and enhance your branding. Don’t forget to subscribe to our RSS feed or e-mail updates. Thanks for reading!

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