Welcome to episode 3 of Dreamchasers! Today we’re covering how to improve your marketing – especially if you hate doing it. The secret is to dig around in the bathwater and find the baby again.
If you’re running a small, business, and stuck with a zero-budget lead generation strategy, then your marketing can’t start with your adspend.
It starts with you.
Join my guest Sarah Santacroce and I as we dig into how we can do it better, and end with a tip you can use right now.
Dreamchasers is the interview series for people who want human marketing on a zero budget. I’m your host, Dominic de Souza. Listen in for tips and insights, for 15mins a week. It’s the dreamers who make the future. Chase yours.
About Sarah Santacroce
sarahsantacroce.com | Linkedin
Sarah Santacroce is an internationally recognized LinkedIn Consultant, entrepreneur, podcaster, ‘Hippie turned Business Coach’ and the Founder of the Gentle Business Revolution.
Why are people feeling icky about marketing?
Without blaming anyone, it’s just become part of the culture to approach marketing the same way: sleazy, aggressive, dishonest, etc.
What’s wrong with marketing is that a lot of heart-centered entrepeneurs want to do good, offer their services, but they hate selling.
That’s because they’re following the popular gurus who promotion loudness, obnoxiousness, and not integrity.
This creates anxiety. We feel like we have to market that way.
We often don’t remember the good ads we see. We remember the bad ads, because they annoy us.
All the courses and trainings focus on pain points, rubbing salt in the wounds. This is what feels ‘icky’. People want to help others. ‘If you don’t take this course, your life will be terrible’, etc.
For the conscious entrepreneur, more of you needs to show up in your marketing. That is what attracts your client.
Sarah’s remodeled the 7 P’s of marketing into a her own formula.
Before identifying your target audience, you need to identify who you are as a person. What you stand for. Your personal values.
Right now, the bigger companies are doing this. Standing up for things. It’s what attracts people. So go inwards first.
Identify personality traits – like being an introvert. We attract others who are like us, who we believe are the ‘right’ kind of people.
Sarah had to unlearn the methodology of ‘doing’, and focus on the ‘being’. Hence her program, learning more about who you are, and making sure that’s clear in your marketing.
‘Authentic marketing’ is the buzzword, but we don’t know how to actually do that. Authenticity is a sense of comfort and confidence in yourself.
Your brand is an extension of you, and your personality. It’s your heart. If you’re not clear on that, and if your consciously trying to be something else, then you’ll suffer from an identify gap. A valley between who you are, and what you’re doing.
Storytelling & Branding
Sarah grew up in a close-knit communtity, and for much of her professional life, she ‘ran away’ from her origins, and didn’t ‘own’ it. Her parents were deeply socially conscious, and she felt it was a ‘shadow side’ that didn’t belong in the boardroom.
Now that she has become a leader of a new community, she’s realized that it’s her strength. Now she’s helping other businesses bring their story more into their marketing, so that there’s no more comparison.
If you don’t bring in your story, you’re just a commodity. There’s hundreds of other Linkedin specialists. With my unique story, I can stand out. Be different.
Allow people a chance to connect with me, to buy into you. Not just from you.
Sometimes you need to take stock of your own background, how it orients you, and how you approach your own skillset.
A lot of Sarah’s clients want to ‘get rid’ of their past. They think it’s not relevant. But that’s exactly where you’re going to find connection with your first clients.
Sarah’s Solution
I want to bring more empthy and kindness to the business world.
Sarah is doing that with marketing.
The bigger picture is the Gentle Business Revolution, to get entrepreneurs to open their eyes and be aware.
Most marketing does create anxiety for you, for your clients. Is there another way?
Sarah is pioneering it. It’s not called ‘authentic marketing,’ because it has become such a buzzword. You can’t try to be authentic. You are, or you aren’t. Anxiety-free marketing made sense, because that was the feeling she got from them.
It’s a program where part of it is the doing – products, pricing, promotion, partnerships (collaboration is going to continue to be huge). But the first three models are about the being.
And today, she is building her community. That’s what’s needed, because we crave community. We feel too isolated.
Check out Sarah’s gentle business manifesto!
Use this Tip
Start with awareness. Whenever you get an email, or an ad, pay attention to how it makes you feel.
When you send out your own marketing, be aware of FOMO (fear of missing out), the ‘conventional’ approaches geared to make you feel worse about your situation.
Instead, look in the other direction. Clarify an exciting and inspiring future.
While it’s true that everyone has pain points, they also have a ‘promised land’ that you can help them reach. Try focusing on that.
Links:
The Gentle Business Revolution
Save the Cat! The Last Book on Screenwriting You’ll Ever Need
The number one thing a good logline must have, the single most important element, is: irony.
