Emotions can play a vital role in business. From emotional intelligence increasingly becoming a requirement for business leaders to emotional TV adverts. To connect with customers and make a lasting impression, small business owners need to consider using emotions in marketing campaigns. A great example of this is the release of John Lewis Christmas adverts, which is now a national event in the UK. This is because they create content that tugs on the heartstrings of the audience.
Emotional marketing can really be a game changer for small businesses. It can help build the brand as well as building customer loyalty. Here is how to get emotional marketing right for your small business.
Inspire
You can build your brand and connect with your customers emotionally if you inspire them to do something, be better or just be happy. There are a vast amount of opportunities to inspire your customers. Some of the bigger brands such as Nike use sport stars like Serena Williams, to create an inspiring message. By using huge role models, the brand already comes across in a positive light.
However, if you don’t have the budget to get Serena Williams to feature in your marketing campaign, perhaps come up with an inspiring message and spread it. For example, you might focus an issue such as global warming. You will need to appeal to human emotions, so you could feature animals losing their habitat due to the issues that you are inspiring the world to fix. Make sure the message you are trying to spread correlates with your brand and comes across as genuine.
Fix their problem
Most products are there to fix a problem or are created to make things better. You need to focus on making the product come across as helping a customer. For example, you might have a coffee business, and you can show parents having coffee after a long night being kept awake with their children. Or you might focus on a nurse working tirelessly so she has a cup of coffee to keep her going. These are everyday heroes, and people immediately warm to them. Therefore, the product is fixing a problem of lack of sleep, and the advert is creating sympathy placing the brand in the golden light.
Pull on heartstrings
A marketing campaign that tugs on the heartstrings be widely talked about, helping increase brand awareness. The best example of this is the trend of annual Christmas adverts that compete to make the audience emotional. John Lewis, having started the annual event always create adverts that pull on the heartstrings of their audience. John Lewis usually features young children focusing on qualities such as kindness, innocence and their imagination. They do this effectively, usually they won’t feature one product, but the brand and the name itself are widely spoken about.
Focus on local
This may be the best option for small businesses as you will have customers locally. If you feature a marketing campaign that people can relate to and is ‘close to home’, it can be great for the business brand. If you run a restaurant then consider showing locally sourced ingredients. More importantly focus on the people behind the products, the hardworking farmers that have a family to support. By making the marketing campaign as relatable as possible, the more effect you can have on the target audience.
Focus on global issues
The idea is to make the audience feel something when it comes to emotional marketing, ideally you would want to evoke a strong emotion. By focusing on global issues, and making them part of your campaign and brand you can evoke emotions from your consumers. A great example of this is the Amazon 2016 advert which feature amazon prime next delivery as the product. The advert focuses on coexisting and shows a friendship between a Christian priest and a Muslim Imam, who are both shown practising their faith. The advert was praised for its message of co-existing in peace and friendship, and there is no doubt that it was beneficial for the brand.
More on small business marketing and emotional intelligence.
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