Marketing is all about having a childlike curiosity

If you've ever been around a toddler, you'll notice that they ask 'why’ a lot. And that childlike curiosity is one of the most important things you need as a marketer to make a difference.

As I'm sure you know, trying to explain something to a toddler is almost impossible. They are so innocent and pure that they look at everything in curiosity. This allows them to learn new things faster than anyone else.

If you've ever been around a toddler, you'll notice that they ask 'why’ a lot. And that childlike curiosity is one of the most important things you need as a marketer to make a difference.

The Five Whys

The Five Whys technique is a problem-solving technique. The technique was introduced by Sakichi Toyoda, considered to be one of the founding fathers of the Toyota Production System. It is used to explore the cause-and-effect relationships underlying a particular problem. It's an excellent technique to use when you are troubleshooting. It doesn't care if the answer seems obvious, it keeps asking until the root cause is found. 

Here's a Wikipedia inspired example

The problem: The vehicle will not start

Why? – The battery is dead. (First why)

Why? – The alternator is not functioning. (Second why)

Why? – The alternator belt has broken. (Third why)

Why? – The alternator belt was well beyond its useful service life and not replaced. (Fourth why)

Why? – The vehicle was not maintained according to the recommended service schedule. (Fifth why — a root cause)

This technique is great when you want to diagnose a problem. Would you like to try it?

Think about a marketing-related problem that you are currently trying to solve, write out the problem and use the Five Whys framework till you get to what looks like the root cause. You can share it with me by replying to this email or sending it to jolaadephilips@gmail.com. I'd be happy to chat through it.

So let's talk about a few things I've been thinking about

You are telling the truth, but you are lying — and that's fine too.

Do you remember when your favorite startup announced across all digital platforms that they had acquired 500,000+ users?

Did you ever bother to ask what the plus meant? Why couldn't they have announced the actual number?

Besides the fact that 500,003 isn't snazzy enough, saying that they had 500,000+ users is a way to get their audience's imagination to run wild. 500k+ could be anything between 500k and infinity.

So you assume that they have well over 500k users when they probably had only 500,003 users. But did they lie? Not exactly. 

Human beings are creatures of the herd. We tend to follow when everyone else is doing something. By the same token, we also tend to avoid doing things that everyone else is avoiding.

There's always the option to go your own way, but that option is a conscious one, and it often requires a lot of courage. We don't have the time or energy to be truly independent thinkers in every aspect of our lives, so we rely on others to tell us what's good and what's not good. 

We are unconsciously influenced by how we think other people are behaving. Brilliant marketers know this and use it greatly to their advantage. But you may think to yourself, I don't have 100k users to add a ‘+’ to. How do I apply this? Well, flip the statistics.

If 10,000 people visit your website monthly and only 100 of them become users, you can flip the statistics by writing something like this — 'We cater to the one percent that has great taste!'

In reality, you wish you had more users, but you've successfully flipped the statistics, and whoever sees that copy might act because they want to have a sense of belonging.
They want to convince themselves that they have great taste. People like to know that they are part of the crowd, in this case, part of the in-crowd, and that others accept them.

One more thing — social proof

The vast world of social media is constantly changing. New trends, new services, and new algorithms knock businesses off course constantly! But there's one thing that remains constant across all social media platforms - the need to build trust for your brand.

Social proof is something that improves your credibility with potential customers. It shows people that you are real, you are trustworthy, you are successful, and people like you. 

But there's a problem, your brand is new, with no testimonials or a feature on Techcrunch/Forbes. What do you do? There's a platform that you should try out —https://brandfeatured.com/.

They'll publish an article about your brand on over 100 websites, including ​​NBC, FOX, CBS, and USA Today affiliates. With that, you can put a banner on your website that says 'As seen on NBC, FOX, CBS, etc.'

This type of social proof instills confidence in the minds of your prospects and helps them make buying decisions. Have you lied about being featured? Not exactly! Were you featured on FOX, NBC, AND CBS? Not really! But you were featured on their affiliate websites — nobody knows that or even cares.

So, even though you are telling the truth, you are also lying, and that's fine too!

You should also consider listing your startup across multiple startup directories.

I have a list of over 200 startup directories. You can reply to this newsletter or send me an email if you’d love to have access to the list

Is there anyone you think might benefit from reading this newsletter? You can forward it to them or share it on social media!

Talk soon,

Klueless marketer.