5 Psychology Triggers to Add to Your Sales Pages and Emails

Ever wondered how tapping into your customer's psyche could skyrocket your marketing results? 

We use psychology every day in our ordinary life, whether we realize it or not. And as small business owners, we need to use it in our marketing to compete with the big guys. 

So in this episode, we'll talk about a few well-researched methods for converting your customers on your web pages or your emails...and even on social media.

Here's what we'll cover:

• Trigger #1: Use customer research to find out what motivates your buyers to use your product
• Trigger #2 Give people a simple reason to buy.
• Trigger #3 Make decision-making easy
• Trigger #4 How to Use stories to remember facts 
• Trigger #5 The psychology of personalization 

So join in and get ready to give your small business that much-coveted edge, with a helping hand from the complexities of the human mind.

Transcript

Janice Hostager: 0:04

I'm Janice Hostager. After three decades in the marketing business and many years of being an entrepreneur, I've learned a thing or two about marketing. Join me as we talk about marketing, small business, and life in between. Welcome to My Weekly Marketing.

Janice Hostager: 0:28

I know this sounds geeky, but I've always loved marketing. In my mind, it's the intersection of creativity, communications, data, and psychology, and it's the psychology behind much of it that's fascinating to me. It's an undeniable fact that in order to compete in business today, we need to employ some form of psychology Not in an unethical way, but use it nonetheless. You may feel uncomfortable using psychology to sell your product, but if you think about it, we use psychology every day in our interactions with others, and the big businesses use psychology every day to prompt us to take action. For example, you know that when you have unread email messages, there's that little red bubble with a number next to the icon. They know that that makes you want to click. And those Starbucks stars that you earn if you like to order twice this weekend Yep, they know that will bring you into their store. And how many times have you purchased something at Target that you weren't planning on purchasing, simply because it was in that dollar section at the front of the store? In order to compete, you need to woo customers, and we can do that using the playbook of the big guys. So in this episode, we're going to look at five ways you can employ psychology in your business. So here we go. Number one use customer research to find the trigger events that motivate your buyers to use your product.

Janice Hostager: 1:56

For example, what goes well with a chocolate chip cookie? A cold glass of milk, of course? Right, we could write a short headline saying something like how about milk with your cookie? It only takes a few seconds to read a short sentence, but our minds process images within a hundred milliseconds. So using an image in an ad or post will allow us to process that image without even consciously thinking about it. So putting that image in your ad or in your post will make that connection and it will likely trigger an emotion behind it too. In fact, California ad agency Goodby Silverstein and partners use this very concept with their Got Milk campaign. Milk sales increased by 7% and I'm guessing cookie sales saw a jump too.

Janice Hostager: 2:41

When was the last time you had milk and cookies? For me, it may have been when I was a child or when my own kids were young. Regardless of how long ago it was, that photo of milk and cookies triggered good memories. So if you're selling milk, adding that cookie to an image next to that glass creates a trigger event and you can use images to provoke fast emotions behind a trigger event too. So think about ways that you can do that with your product or service. What does your ideal audience think or feel before wanting your product? Let me say that again what does your ideal audience think or feel before wanting your product? If your health coach may be showing someone poolside on a hot day would trigger a download of a smoothie recipe. Or if your photographer helped with a framed photo of a wedding next to a camera Remember, images are powerful and they can trigger a response. What could trigger a response to your product?

Janice Hostager: 3:38

For number two, give people a simple reason to buy. It's well known that we make purchases based on emotion, which is what makes Trigger Number 1 so powerful, but we also justify these purchases with logic and reason. In the 1970s, a Harvard study found that people agreed to requests 90% of the time when it's tied to a reason, and if you don't add a reason, people only comply about 60% of the time. Humans are predisposed to look for causes of behavior. People will be more receptive if you give them a reason why they should do something. When accompanied by a clear and reasonable explanation, the likelihood of someone doing something can increase substantially. For example, donations to the Red Cross skyrocket after a natural disaster, or people see images of other people who are hurting, and it's not just the non-profit. Space Car dealerships know that they get more business when they announce that they need to make space at the year" end for the new car models. Think about things like overstock sales or promotions centered around events such as Valentine's Day. By simply giving a reason for the sale, will nudge people to come in and make a purchase.

Janice Hostager: 4:53

Trigger Number 3 Make Decision Making Easy. Author Daniel Kahneman wrote a book called Thinking Fast and Slow. He asserts that there are two modes of thinking. System 1 thinking is the unconscious and fast autopilot that we use 95% of the time. These thoughts are automatic, frequent, emotional, or unconscious. For example, determining which object is bigger or smaller, or just driving to work, or making a split- second decision about someone you meet. These are all examples of System 1 thinking. System 2 thinking requires more effort, something our lazy brains wish to avoid, such as puzzles or reading complex text. In fact, we burn more calories when we have to think harder, making these decisions less attractive to us. As author Donald Millard says, when you are confuse, you lose, so the easier you make your marketing to understand, the more likely they are to stop, pay attention, and take action. Here are two ways to appeal to lazy brains with your posts, landing pages, or ads.

Janice Hostager: 5:59

Number one clearly state the benefit of your product in metrics your buyers are most likely to be familiar with. Use clear, easy- to- understand language and, better yet, use the words your customers use to describe their problems. It's better to say something like we help women build a business than to say our focus is on fostering the growth of ventures led by women, providing the tools and guidance they need. See the difference Relating to this concept. Rather than using vague words or difficult- to- understand words, use specific examples. Don't say more sales. Say 35% more sales. In fact, using specific numbers can drive up to 25% more traffic in comparison to vague wording. See what I just did there. Number two our minds are naturally drawn to look in the same direction as other people's faces are looking, so using an image which looks at your most important heading or copy on a sales page or landing page actually increases conversions by triggering our system one thinking.

Janice Hostager: 7:04

Number three is price anchoring. The anchoring effect names a tendency to be influenced by other numbers. This is effective with price anchoring. Have you noticed that when something's on sale or clearance, the original price is also listed, usually crossed out or marked as the original price? That gives the viewer an estimate of what's worth. We perceive higher values when we are told it has a higher value, and it's something our lazy system one brains pick up on.

Janice Hostager: 7:33

Okay, moving on, here's trigger number four. Trigger number four is the use of stories. A fact is over 20 times more memorable if it's wrapped in a story. According to a London Business School study, storytelling can drive the retention rate of your audience up to as much as 70%. Stories captivate our attention. They can send us down the rabbit hole of consuming hours of social media content when we were just going to quick jump on Facebook to reply to a post. Am I alone in this? When you're listening to a good story, your brain waves literally start to synchronize with the storyteller, causing you to feel the emotions of the storyteller and putting you in a trance-like state. Why? Because we remember what we feel. Ooh, I love that.

Janice Hostager: 8:21

Neuroscience shows that different parts of the brain are activated when strong emotions are associated with memory. This causes both the memory and the related emotions to be retained longer and in greater detail than other memories. Think about it Looking back at your childhood or teenage years. What are the events you remember most? I bet you remember those incidents where emotions were high. It could be memories of a high school sweetheart or a night at the prom. Music from that time is a powerful trigger and a reason many use music in their advertising. If you're clear on your ideal customer, get to know what type of music they loved or loved when they were young, and that will trigger those events as well.

Janice Hostager: 9:03

So how can you use stories around your business? How about why you started your business in the first place, your origin story, or stories your customers have about how they use your product or service, or maybe why your employees love working for you? We're bombarded with messages every day, so one thing is clear you need to make your messages memorable. My recommendation take a few minutes to brainstorm story ideas around your business and then add them to your website and on your social media. Okay, winding up here.

Janice Hostager: 9:35

Here's trigger number five the psychology of personalization. People love their own names. It's one of the few things they've associated with their entire lives. People also love experiences that make them feel special. Using personalization shows buyers that you value their individuality instead of making them feel like they're just another customer. Nobody wants to feel like a number. The words dear customer don't feel warm, but hey, Janice does. And science backs us up too 56% of buyers prefer purchasing from retailers that recognize them by name, 65% of buyers prefer retailers that know their purchase history and remember what they like, and 58% of buyers prefer retailers that make product recommendations based on past purchases. Every time I open my Starbucks app, they ask if I want what I ordered last time. In fact, I get personalized sales promotions just for me on my favorite beverages. Do they know me personally? Probably not, but it feels like they do right.

Janice Hostager: 10:44

So how can you use personalization to sell more? First off, use your name, not just at the top of the email, but throughout the message. Make them feel like you wrote it specifically to them. Use the words they, use references, they understand and speak to the problem they have. This all comes down to really knowing your ideal customer. I have a free worksheet to help you with that. I'll put the link to that in my show notes. Next, use the word you in your promotions. Don't use the word us or them. Using the word you make it feel like your message is more personal. You're talking to them, right? Then use personalization after their purchase. If you're familiar with my trail to the sale framework, I'll put the link in the show notes. You'll notice that the trail goes on after the sale. That's because people like to be remembered and acknowledged for what they did, which was buy from you. So reaching out to them after the sale through an email, a special note or a letter, or even a phone call in the right situation goes a long way to keep people coming back again. People like to be remembered.

Janice Hostager: 11:52

Also, you can segment your list based on your subscribers' pain points. According to HubSpot, subscriber segmentation is the most effective email marketing campaign strategy, and creating personalized email nurture files can help move new email subscribers along the trail to the sale even faster. Here's where to start. First, create a list of your ideal buyers' top three to five pain points. If you don't know what the pain points are, a one-to-one chat with your buyers will help that. Then build out an email funnel that relates to each point.

Janice Hostager: 12:27

Once you have a list of their pain points, you can test which leads to the most conversion using an A-B or a split- testing tool that many email services, such as ConvertKit and some others, have included in their plans. In your welcome email sequence, you can ask a few questions about their pain points or their specific situation, then segment subscribers based on their list. There are hundreds of ways we can harness psychology and marketing and I've seriously only scratched the surface today, but I hope these will help you think through what you can do on your social media posts, your website, your emails, and your landing pages. That's all for this week. For more information about what we talked about today, including the links, visit myweeklymarketing. com Forward slash 44. Thanks again for joining me today. See you next time. Bye, for now.