Narrow Your Focus for a Better Digital Marketing Strategy

If you’ve spent some time around our blog, you know we’re big fans of Donald Miller’s StoryBrand framework. Time and time again, we’ve driven big results for our clients by creating their content around all of the major components of a good story: the character, the problem, the guide, the plan, the call to action, and the result—achieving success and avoiding failure. 

All of this messaging begins with one simple component: the character want. Leverage a focused character want that your prospect can relate to for a compelling story and digital marketing strategy that will drive your sales.

Keep Your Offer Simple

As humans, we’re drawn into a good story. Stories help us make sense of the world, navigate the world, and find our place within it. 

Whether or not we realize it, when we hear a new story, we immediately look for ways we can identify with the main character. As soon as the character’s “want” or ambition is defined, we make that connection, and we’re off on a journey!

Think about your favorite book or movie. What does the main character want? How does your ability to identify with the main character make the story more compelling? 

In the classic children’s story, Peter Rabbit, Peter wants to get into Mr. McGregor’s garden to eat vegetables against his mother’s stern warning. And we learn right away that his mother’s warning is not unfounded. Peter’s father was caught in Mr. McGregor’s garden and put into a pie.

While you may not want to sneak into your neighbor’s garden and devour their cherry tomatoes—or, like myself, maybe you do—you can likely relate to the central conflict: Peter wants the freedom to explore beyond the boundaries his mom set for him. What adult wasn’t in Peter’s shoes at some point as a child? Ah yes. Now that’s relatable. 

But what would happen if Peter wanted many things? If Peter wanted to get into Mr. McGregor’s garden, take a trip to Kentucky with his siblings, Flopsy, Mopsy, and Cottontail, and learn how to ride a bicycle, would you be able to follow the storyline then? Would you even want to try?

When you define one specific character want, you make it easy for your prospects to engage with you and follow your storyline.

According to Donald Miller,

 “...you must summarize what you offer in just a few words. If you throw out multiple solutions to multiple problems, you’ll be ignored. The human brain just isn’t made to process that many storylines.” 

Resist the urge to be everything to everyone by offering multiple solutions to multiple problems. 

Your website visitors will spend an average of 45 seconds looking around, so you have less than a minute to engage them. If it takes mental gymnastics to understand what you offer, your prospect will move on.

What If My Business Offers Multiple Solutions to Multiple Problems? 

When you StoryBrand your company’s messaging, you start by creating a BrandScript. This BrandScript helps you hone in on your target market and distill your messaging so everything you create—from your website content and blog posts to lead magnets and campaigns—will hit the bullseye and drive sales. 

The BrandScript requires you to choose a primary character want. That determines your front-and-center offer that appears on your website’s homepage. 

Many B2B and B2C businesses are multi-faceted. Don’t worry! You can still share all of your solutions on your website and in your content. It’s just imperative to lead with one primary offer. 

Imagine for a minute that you own a landscaping company. Creating flower beds, planting trees and shrubs, and laying hardscape materials like rock, gravel, mulch, sand, and stone are the bread and butter of your business. As soon as the snow melts, your crews get to work, and they work until the snow flies and the ground freezes mid-late October. 

But let’s be real. It’s Minnesota, and you’re not landscaping in the winter months…which is nearly half the year. So, to sustain your business, you offer a winter snow removal service. Your winter revenue is a drop in the bucket compared to the revenue your business generates from landscaping services. But offering snow removal is still a profitable business decision during the off-season, and you want your prospects to know about this service, too!

No problem.

Center your homepage around your landscaping services. Include beautiful photos of your projects with clear, engaging messaging. 

Then, include a tab at the top of the page for “Additional Services” and a dropdown menu with “Snow Removal Services” to inform curious visitors about what else you do. 

The reality is, however, that many first-time visitors won’t navigate beyond your homepage, and you want to capture their attention with your primary offer in that short 45-second window. 

Lead With Your Primary Offer and Build Credibility

Create messaging around your character’s primary want (which stems from your primary offer). 

In this scenario, your character wants a beautiful yard their neighbors will envy. This approach will cast the most profitable net for your business. Offer an indirect CTA on your website—perhaps a downloadable article, Ten Things to Consider When Designing Your Landscaping, in exchange for your prospect’s name and email address. 

After your prospect connects with your predetermined character want—landscaping their neighbors will drool over—and you have their attention and basic contact info, nurture the relationship with regular communication. Stay top-of-mind with valuable content such as a weekly newsletter with relevant, insightful articles, testimonials from satisfied customers (with before and after photos of their landscaping projects, of course!), and clear next steps. 

Just remember, you’re their guide, and they’re the hero. Guide them through the process to a sale and show them how they can achieve their aspiration—having the most beautiful yard in the neighborhood!

Intersect Your Hero’s Journey With Additional Support

Each year, as we roll into August/September, we start looking ahead to the fall and winter months. This is a great time to post a blog article on your website about the upcoming season changes and get people thinking about snow. 

Do they really want to deal with snow removal themselves again this year? Shoveling and snow-blowing are backbreaking, inconvenient, and chill a person to the bone. Why not hire ABC Landscaping—who they’ve come to trust as an industry leader—to take over the burdensome task and free them up to be the hero, devoting more time to their family and other meaningful activities? 

Accentuate your prospect’s pain points in true StoryBrand fashion. Don’t worry. It’s not cruel because you have the solution!

Publish an article on your blog about your snow removal services and link to it in your weekly newsletter. Post it to your social channels, linking back to your blog. For prospects who’ve taken the plunge and hired your company for summer or fall landscaping services, consider a special promotion for your winter snow removal services. 

You can also run campaigns as a means to highlight other services you provide. Think of these other solutions as subplots to your main story. Identify additional character wants and highlight your solutions. Show your prospects how they can be their best selves and the heroes of their own stories by utilizing your products or services. 

Miller sums it up well: 

“Once we identify our customer’s problem, it deepens their interest in the story we’re telling. When we acknowledge their problem, they recognize us as the brand that understands them.” 

Then, when we’ve established this connection and gained our prospect’s trust, we’re qualified to offer additional solutions to additional problems. 

Reject the temptation to boil the ocean, thereby diluting your messaging. Narrow your focus and attract your ideal customer. Nurture them with valuable content, and showcase additional offerings as subplots to your main story. Guide your hero on a journey that’s too compelling to miss out on!

At Wild Fig Marketing, We’re StoryBrand-Certified Guides

When we first meet with new clients, they’re often anxious about how to effectively market their wide swath of products or services. We help each client create a poignant digital marketing strategy that attracts their ideal customers and educates them on everything they offer. 

If you’re curious how we can help you effectively market your business, schedule a free 15-minute exploratory call with Kari to learn more!