In his powerful book, How Brands Grow, author Byron Sharp digs deep into the data to find out what actually works and what doesn’t. Two of his biggest conclusions? Almost no one is truly brand loyal. And simple brand awareness drives sales more than anything else.
Sharp notes four things that you have to do to make your marketing generate sales.
Get Creative
The only way for an ad or marketing message of any kind – including social media and digital ads — to break through your natural resistance is to be really creative.
This means it has to look, sound and feel different from everyone else’s message. Not just your competitors’ but everyone’s. When it works, prospects are willing to process your message repeatedly, building brand memory.
This is where most marketing falters. Without a creative “hook,” your message gets lost and your investment is wasted. So first, make it truly creative. Make them enjoy it.
Connect the Dots
No matter how creative, your message has to be tied firmly and unmistakably back to your brand, or it won’t work.
Sharp notes that the way people process your ad “must be brand-centric; it must refresh the memory structures that relate to the brand.”
Think of all the visual and verbal cues that tell you you’re seeing an ad from Progressive instead of Allstate. You have to be relentless in tying your message back to your brand.
Reach Buyers Regularly
What matters most here is making sure that the right people see your message, and that they see it often enough to make it stick.
Regular and continuous messaging in any medium works better than bursts followed by pauses. And every minute you spend sharpening your focus on the right audience is time well spent.
Memory and Emotion
If you want your message to sell harder, it has to have emotion as the driver, and it has to be creative enough, targeted enough, and frequent enough to build memories in the prospect.
“Persuasive” ads are easy for our brains to ignore. Creative ads that play on emotions are hard for our brains to forget.
If you want to sell more, follow this set of rules. Get creative. Connect to your brand. Stay in front of prospects. Put emotion in the driver’s seat. Build memories. Follow those steps, and sales will increase.