Internet Marketing Digital_marketing_for_dummies | Page 347

Failing to Talk about Your Customers (and
Their Problems)
People don’t care about your product; rather, they care about how your product can make
their life better. Stop talking about your product’s features and instead describe how your
product can transform the customer in a meaningful way.
Business is pretty simple. We get paid to move people from a “Before” state to a desired
“After” state. In the Before state, customers are discontent in some way. They might be in
pain, bored, frightened, or unhappy for any number of other reasons.
In the After state, life is better. They are free of pain, entertained, or unafraid of what
previously plagued them. People don’t buy products or services; they buy transformation.
In other words, they buy access to the After state. A great offer genuinely moves a
customer to a desired After state, and great marketing simply articulates the move from the
Before state to the desired After state.
Most businesses that fail, particularly at startup or when entering new markets, do so
because they fail to offer a desired After state (the offer is no good) or they fail to
articulate the movement from Before to After (the marketing is no good).
Needless to say, getting clear on the desired outcome that your offer delivers is
fundamental to the success of your marketing. Turn to Chapter 1 for more on the Before
and After states, and see Chapter 3 for the process of creating offers.