We believe marketing is emotional.

Before they made the decision to buy what you’re selling, you made an emotional connection with your customers. Whether you meant to or not, you made them feel some type of way. Something you said or did showed them what you value and it struck a chord with them in a way that was relevant to their own experience.

Purchase decisions are rarely made solely according to reason, yet many of us still try to appeal to a person's rationale in our marketing. We'll spend a whole bunch of money to talk about our products' awesome features or that special price we're running and completely skip the step of appealing to their emotions first (or more realistically, at the same time). 

I'd argue that appealing to emotions first and rationale second is crucial in any communication with potential customers, but it's most important in the age of social media. If you guessed that that might be because people want to be social and not sold to on social media, you'd be correct. 

Ok, so what should you do differently?

How do we check ourselves to make sure the messages we're communicating in our marketing connect on an emotional level?

It starts with why. Why should they care?  

Actually, it's more like, why is what we're communicating relevant not only to our brand but also to what we know they care about? 

Start here.

If you take your product or service totally out of the equation, what are you actually "selling"?

This is the crucial question I ask everyone that asks me for marketing help. The initial reaction is a blank expression, a furrowed brow of regret for asking my help in the first place. Usually, we get past it and we press on.

How do you want people to feel about you?

What do your customers care about?

What is your differentiator?

But, why do your customers choose you, specifically?

How are you benefiting your customer and improving their life?

These sound like useless, somewhat existential questions, but if you try to answer them, you'll find your thinking might shift on what your customers value. Think about your answers before posting something on social, writing a blog post, or placing an ad in the City Paper, because it might just influence what you say to your customers. Keep thinking this way, and you might just find an increased response from them, too.