It's Not You, it's Not Your Product, it's Your Messaging + What to Do About it
- kimelizabethjames
- Jan 4
- 3 min read
I was a guest on a podcast this week and was thrown an absolute curveball question.
“Why isn’t my business growing?”. An audience question with more weight than a Jetstar carry on pretending to be 7kgs.
The answer came to me quite instantly, “it’s your messaging”.
Messaging hard truth:
Why aren’t they liking your content? They don’t resonate with it.
Why aren’t they sharing it? They don’t see themselves in it enough to send to someone and say “this is so me”.
Why aren’t they signing up to watch that lead gen webinar? They don’t see the value of what’s in it for them.
Why aren’t they buying? They can't see the transformation they’ll unlock within themselves through using your product or service.
It’s not you, it’s your messaging.
The industry is stuck in brain rot:
If I’m being frank, messaging across the industry could not be more diluted right now.
Our messaging as marketers and business owners has been overtaken with trends and brain rot. We’re stuck on the dopamine train.
We’ve never had so much access to our competition, 24 hours a day on a device that’s an extension from our limb.
We second guess ourselves, mould to be like someone else.
We have a viral hit, the dopamine rush serges, we realise we need to do it again to keep up the momentum, all while feeling more lost than we ever have been.
We have every trick in the book for hooks, captions, transitions, image sizes, voice changers, image distortions, you name it.
But what does the tactics mean if no one resonates with you?
Step by step on how to fix your messaging:
As both a Marketer and a content creator who’s travelled on this train one too many times, here’s what I’d do.
Step one: Get. Out. Of. The. Feed.
Literally get off it. Unfollow your competitors (block them if you’re feeling fancy).
Get them out of your headspace.
Step two: Rediscover your why
Fill this out:
What is your brand purpose?
What unique opinions or perspectives do you bring to the industry?
How do you want your audience to feel?
What is your brand story?
Ok now you know who you are again, it’s time to connect back in with your audience.
Step Three: Reconnect with your customer
Fill this out:
I want you to whiteboard, Canva board, butchers paper, on the window with funky pens this out.
Think of a time and place where their pain points come up. What are they doing? What thoughts are running through their minds?
Think of their mental, emotional, physical, professional, relational state to these problems.
What are the core underlying problems causing these symptoms?
What mistakes do they make when trying to fix their problems themselves?
What are their desires? What outcome do they want to have?
What solutions do you offer? What gets them from A to B?
What objectives would they have regarding your product/service? Time? Money? Other?
For the love of god do not just throw this all into ChatGPT and get it to do it.
Map this out THEN ask ChatGPT questions on what might be missing, or you will just end up sounding exactly like the crowded market in the industry right now.
Step Four: Start telling stories.
Whether it’s your organic feed posts, your email campaign or your google ads (yes I literally halved my clients google ads last week using storytelling).
These stories will be you. They will be authentic. They will be scroll stopping and when they go viral? You’ll be so thankful and proud you went viral for reasons you’re proud of.
Shall we chat your content marketing?
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