How to Improve Your Mindset in Messaging

Monica Pitts 0:00 Hello again. And welcome back to marketing with purpose. My name is Monica Pitts, and I'm your host today. Why, um, like, pretty much always though. But today, I'm your solo host, because we are going to talk about mindset in marketing. Now, I didn't come up with this idea all by myself, okay? Actually, earlier this year, I sent out an email to our audience, and I said, Hey, what are some things that I can talk about in the podcast? What are some things that you feel like would round out your marketing tools that make you even better at what you do? And one of our loyal listeners that I want you to talk about mindset, and its impact on how we create marketing? So she said, for example, am I writing this message to my friends and fans? Or do I just feel like my messages are an intrusion? And I gotta tell you friends, like, I write every email that you get from, from makery design, like pretty much I write them, all right, if they're a marketing email, I wrote them, I write most of the social posts, because they come from my emails, and I never signed up to be a writer, I didn't I didn't even sign up to be this kind of a marketer. I'm a designer. So I get it, I get it, you feel like you're bugging people, you feel like you're not cool enough to be heard. And I have to talk myself through this every day. Okay, so I'm gonna let you know the things that I say inside my own head. And the beliefs that I have embraced to allow me to record these podcasts to write these blogs to send these emails to write these social posts and to spread this message. And that's because I mean, that's what it is, right? It's the mindset and messaging. So let's get to business. You're on mission, and you just need more people to know about it. And whether you're brand new to marketing or a seasoned pro, we are all looking for answers to make marketing decisions with purpose. I'm Monica Pitts, a techie crafty business owner, mom and aerial dancer who solves communication challenges through technology. This podcast is all about digging in and going digital. I'll share my marketing know how and business experience from almost 20 years of misadventures, I'll be your backup dancer. So you can stop doubting, and get moving towards marketing with purpose. Mindset and Marketing is tricky. It's tricky, because I feel like it funnels through into everything that you do. Like if if a designer doesn't like a business, that they're working for it, they don't like the concept of the business, or they're not excited about it, I can see it right away in their design, they come back to me, and I'm like, This is not awesome, okay. And I feel like some of us were marketers, but maybe we weren't ever trained to be social media marketers, maybe we don't even like social media. We weren't trained to be email marketers. We weren't even really trained to be writers, we were trained to think like marketers and solve problems and help people connect and communicate. And so then when it comes to actually doing the actions of making the messaging, you can get really bogged down in it. Because at the root of the challenge, you might literally think that you're not good at it, or you're not good enough to do it. And that could also funnel out into the way that you perceive your audience is interpreting your messaging, like they don't want to hear it, or they're not interested in it. Right, you're just bothering them. So I think the first thing that we have to understand is mindset in general, right? So where it comes from, it might come from not understanding what you're doing or being in a learning curve. But it also can come from like you as a person and how you perceive the world around you. I always like to go to glass half full glass half empty, right? In my house, we're half and half, half of us are glass half full. Half of us are glass half empty. Okay? So I'm a glass half full girl. So I guess that would translate into a growth mindset. So I embrace challenges. I believe that my effort that me trying hard is the path to me developing my abilities, and it dictates my success. So I'm in control of this, I can always learn new things, I can always get better. And that's a growth mindset. That's my glass half full. My nine year old and I were glass half full girls, right? And then we have half empty, and that's more like a fixed mindset. They avoid challenges because they believe that their abilities are unchangeable it it leads to like a fear of failure for them. And I'm really really working on this mindset with my 12 year old she has been a glass half empty girl for a really long time and it It's been really fun this year because she started running cross country. Now I'm a runner, my husband, he's a runner, and he was actually a really successful runner all the way through college. So as she's running, and I'm like running with her, she is like, a mom, every time that I go down a hill, it means I have to go back up it. But I'm so tired, the whole time she runs, she's like, I'm so tired. It's so hard and so tired. And so with every time that we run together, I have another conversation with her about that mindset, because her mindset is what's gonna hold her back or make her successful as a runner. It's you and the earth, and the other people around you. And that's it. That's the only thing right? So when she takes us half empty approach and thinks, every time I run down a hill, which for me, I'm like, every time I run up a hill, I get to run down a hill. That's awesome. And for her, she's like, every time I get to run down a hill, I have to ride back up, what do you hear the difference there. If I can get her to embrace this attitude that she can do it, that working hard now means there's something better on the other side. And instead of focusing on the fact that she's tired, she can focus on the girl that's running in front of her, or the finish line, or the metal that she wants so badly to get or the time that she's going after that working hard right now is going to get her there. It's a direct reflection of her efforts that she puts in, because quite frankly, no holds her back from success, her mindset, her mindset, because she freaks out and she says, I can't do it. I'm too tired, I'm not good enough. So what's really standing between her and her goal as a runner is what's in between her ears, not how fast her legs can move, because if she puts in the effort to train, her legs can move fast. But it's her brain telling her that she can't do it, that glass half full attitude that stops her from being able to reach her goals. And that's why I talked with her in so many runs. And after so many runs about the exact same thing that we're talking about today. And once she implemented it, while she was running, she went from literally crying and screaming while she was running, because she was so angry at me for encouraging her to keep going and crying throughout her meats and walking, and just not performing the way that she wanted to. She said she was embarrassed when she went to school because her friends would ask her how she did. And she would have to tell them that she did not do what she wanted to do. And then she embraced this glass half full mentality, she started actually practicing during practice, and running instead of just complaining about running. And she went from being the one of the slowest girls on her team, to being the fastest girl on our team. In one season. This mindset thing, it's powerful. And now, she's like, I'm not going to do basketball this winter mom, instead, I am going to run four days a week, because I am going into track season as the fastest seventh grade girl on the team. That's who I'm going to be. People are going to know me because I work hard. And because I'm going to run fast. And I'm even going to beat the boys. And you know what I say? More power to you. Because with an attitude like that, she might just get it right. So why am I telling you this story that keeps going on and on and on about a 12 year old and her running is because mindset is a big deal. And if it can work for a 12 year old, dude, just imagine what it can do for you and your marketing. So when we sit down to make social posts or write emails or letters or any marketing copy, especially if we're not writers, can I get an amen over there friends, if we approach it from that half MD fixed mindset that every single downhill has an uphill after it, then a you might not take any action at all, you might not take enough action, you might feel guilty about taking action. So that's not good, right? Because it's our effort that's going to allow us to get better at our marketing. Okay, like work with me on this here. Alright, so, just like with Ellison are running, the more she runs, the more Hills she runs, the better she's gonna get. It's the same thing with your messaging. Okay, the more emails you write, the better they're going to be, the better they're going to hit home. The more social posts you write, the better they're going to be. You're not just gonna automatically be good at it. You're going to have to work on it. And by putting effort into it, and then looking at how your emails or your social posts perform and adjusting them to make them better. You're learning. You're learning about your audience you're learning earning about what they want what they need, and you're learning about yourself, and how you can do better and better serve your audience, right? So, if you're not sure, if you have a fixed mindset, or if you if you're a glass half full human in the world of marketing, I let me tell you some thoughts that I hear people that are glass half full in their marketing say, they say, but Monica, I just don't want to bother them, or bother them. Or if I say if I talk to them too much, they're just going to unsubscribe, because I'm just cluttering their inbox. Or they probably don't want to hear from me anyway, they have better things to do. That is the glass half full people, right? That's not going to get us anywhere, right? Because that's the thing, we feel guilty about sending them an email, we feel like we're bothering them, we feel like we're intruding in their space. That's not serving us as marketers, because we have to get better at communicating. And we can't do it. If we're not communicating. We can't stop ourselves before we start, okay. So also know that even if you're taking effort, like you're putting the effort in, you're making the posts, you're writing the emails, even though you have these thoughts, you're thinking, Oh, I don't want to bother them. But I'm going to write this email anyway. Because I have two friends. It comes through, it comes through in your messaging, like you can hear it, right. You can hear that someone didn't really want to write that email, but they didn't want to bother you. And you sound half full. In your content. You do you don't sound excited and jazzed and like, ready to like, conquer the world and, and, and get things done and help people you don't sound like that you sound like you're sorry, I'm sorry to bother you. But at your I mean, it doesn't work, it falls flat. And also then when you try to jazz it up. It just sounds salesy. And nobody likes salesy content, we all ignore it. Right? It's gross, we don't like it. One of the things that I tried to do whenever we intake new clients, and especially when I used to be like the salesperson for main create, which I'm not anymore, thank goodness, now we have Stacey and she's amazing. But if I am in a first meeting with somebody, I want to see the value in their business, I want to get excited about what they are, and how they serve people and how they treat their employees. I want to get behind them. I want to be their biggest cheerleader. As a marketer, I want to love them so hard. If I can't love them, I don't really want to do marketing for them. There have been companies that we have chosen to do marketing for that I didn't love. I didn't love I could not get behind their core values. I could not get behind what they were doing. And the marketing fell flat. It was hard, right? It was yucky. I didn't like it. And so I think that the first thing that you need to do to change your mindset in your marketing is really get behind your purpose. Right? So what is your business all about? Why are you so freaking awesome. Like that be your own biggest cheerleader, get excited about that business about the organization that you're part of that's the first step is loving what your company does what your organization does, and really believing in it. That's the first step. Then the second step is to do your homework. Because you can love a love, love, love what you do and get behind it. But really, you're trying to talk to someone else. And unfortunately, in marketing, and this is a huge pain in the butt about it as you're doing this mass communication, right? And that's not nearly as easy as if you sat down and had a conversation with a friend. Is it? Like whatever I really get stuck. I just I wish that I could ask everyone a question like, can I just ask you a question? Just maybe a few questions, and then I would know exactly what to say. And I I would be able to help you. Right. And so the second thing you need to do is your homework, and really understand the people that you're talking to. Because you're probably not just talking to one type of person, you're talking to multiple types of people. And I find that the easiest way to do this is by creating buyer personas. And buyer personas are fictional representations of the people that you serve in your audience, your customers or whomever is consuming your marketing. And you create these buyer personas by doing research, having conversations and just really understanding the people that you're trying to talk to. So you might start off by calling past customers and having a conversation with them and understanding like the challenges that they're facing and how you help them solve it. And what was great about working with your company what what happened before they worked with you what what happened when they worked with other companies, not yours and And, and learn about their families and their lives and what makes them happy, what are their personal goals, because those are always you're gonna find connection with these individuals. So if you can just look through the people that you serve and kind of put them into categories, and then start doing research about those different categories, you might end up with a handful of buyer personas that are going to represent the audience that you're trying to communicate with. And then whenever you're feeling lost, you can go back to those buyer personas, they're, they're like your friends, really, I named them, okay, I have names. So whenever I am writing, and I'm just feeling gross, I literally have a person that I'm writing to I write to Katie most of the time. And Katie is a marketer, she might work for a nonprofit or a construction company. Sometimes she's just an office manager that got stuck being a marketer. But Katie's really smart. And she's awesome. And she's motivated. And I talked to Katie all the time to try to help her solve her problems. Okay. So Katie is my person that represents that buyer persona. For me, you won't just have one, you'll have multiple. And once you do your homework, you can kind of see where those people intersect, and where their values intersect. And those are the things you can focus your messaging on. So that way you can make sure that you're having a valuable conversation with people. Your messaging does not need to connect with everyone, it only needs to connect with the people that you're trying to reach. Okay. So I think that's one of the tricky things. And that's how we ended up sounding salesy, and like, you know, yucky marketers is because we're trying to talk to everybody at the same time. And we're just trying to combine all the messaging into one big message. So just stop, just stop that just write to one person, just write to Katie, and do your homework and make those buyer personas, and then you're gonna feel better, you're gonna feel better about it, because you, you did that homework, you put that effort in, and you can rely on that effort to be able to take you to the next step, okay. By making those buyer personas, you can move on to the next thing, which is a mindset shift. Okay? So instead of thinking about your audience as just numb faces in the void, or people who don't want to be bothered people who are just people, or people who subscribe to your list under pressure, right? You have to think of them as your friends. They're Katie, they're not just some random person, they're like a person that you know, right? You had these conversations with your audience, you know who they are, you know, what they need, you know how to talk to them, right? You're talking to them, actual people, they're your friends, and they need you. They need you to keep them updated. They need you to help them solve their problems, they choose to hear from you. Okay. So whenever you're in that pattern, and you're thinking, Ah, I don't want to write this, like, people don't want to hear from me, just remember that these are your friends, they need you, and that they choose to hear from you. Or they wouldn't be on your list, they wouldn't have followed your page, they wouldn't have subscribed, right? They wouldn't be. And then, as you're encountering these thoughts that that don't serve you write these glass half full thought, like, I don't want to bother them. Instead, think to yourself, if I don't tell them what's going on? How will they know? I say that to myself all the time. And like a another email. They don't want to get another email from me. But then I think if I don't tell them, what's going on, how will they know? How will they know that we're doing a workshop that can potentially solve their problem? If I don't tell them? Right, it would be a disservice to them. If I did not tell them. I tell myself, I'm here to help solve their challenge. And they can solve it faster with my help. So you can say the same thing, right? You are helping people solve their challenges faster by communicating with them, that's powerful. You are doing an important job, friend. Don't let I don't want to bother them stop you from giving them what they need to solve their problems. That's what you're doing. That's what you're doing in your messaging. And if that's not what you're doing, then you need different messaging, right? You can shift you don't have to be a salesperson, you can be a problem solver. That's what people want. They want help solving their problems no matter what you offer, right? And what you're going to do if you're saying, I don't want to bother them, and you're gonna remind yourself that you offer value. That's what you're doing. You're offering value in whatever way you're doing it. Maybe you offer value by giving them something to smile at or laugh at or something that's gonna get their head on straight so they can write their marketing right? Or maybe you're saying I help them solve their problems, or if I don't tell them who will right but you offer value. embody that. Okay, friends Instead of thinking, I don't want to bother them, know that you offer value, because you do. Instead of telling yourself, they're just going to unsubscribe. What I say in my head when people unsubscribe is if they don't like what I have to say, then I don't want to bother them. It's their loss. Okay. And I hear this a lot, especially from my nonprofits, especially near your end giving time, because I have for years, helped my local nonprofits run a year end giving campaign called como gifts. And it's partnered with the Community Foundation, they do so much work for this, what we do is we do the website. And for years, we also did marketing training with them. And they would say, Monica, I send these emails that you told me to send and all these people unsubscribe, so I don't think I should send them. And I here's the deal, though. Do you offer value all year long? Do you talk to them all year long? Because if you don't, and the only reason that you're contacting them is to ask them for money, then they might unsubscribe. Yep, they could do that. And when I write the emails on behalf of the campaign, I write them from such a place of love, and thankfulness. For all these people that help the nonprofits in my community, and thankfulness for the nonprofits in my community, and all the amazing things that they do for us. If people don't like to open emails and hear about how amazing they are, then they can unsubscribe, that's fine. That's absolutely fine. Okay, but I wrote them from a place of love from a place of value from a place of purpose, and you can do the same thing. So then when people don't subscribe, or when they unsubscribe, it's okay. It's okay. It's literally their loss. If they don't want to hear that they're amazing in the emails, that they're loss, right? It's totally their loss. It's not yours, it's okay, you, you just need the people who want to be with you. That's the people that you need to reach, right, you need to reach the people that you can offer value to and serve and that want it from you, not everybody, you don't need to reach everybody, you just need to reach the people that are your friends that are your fans. And instead of saying to yourself, they probably don't want to hear from me anyway, because I get it, I get it, you're like, they don't know who I am, they don't care. Instead, you can say to yourself, they're probably expecting to hear from me, without my messaging, they won't be able to take the opportunity to solve a problem or take action or get involved or live a better life, right? They won't be able to do that. Because you won't have connected with them. They are expecting to hear from you. They are that's why they signed up, they expect it they wouldn't have followed your Facebook page, or like to or follows you on Instagram, if they didn't expect to hear from you. If they didn't expect to see things from you. Why would they do that? That doesn't make any sense, right? And if you're running ads, and you're freaked out about that, hey, here's the deal. They fall into the demographic, you offer value. They need it, you help them solve their problems. So it's not an intrusion. It's not an intrusion. When you're selling me something I need. It's not an intrusion. It's not an intrusion. When you help me solve my problems, it's not it's a service. Okay, friends, it's a service. So as you're writing those emails, I want you to make sure or those social posts or whatever in heaven's name it is that you're writing. Just realize that you're going to offer value, you're going to help them solve their problems, you're going to make their day make them smile, make them laugh, make their day, they're your friends. You want to make your friends smile and laugh. That's why you send them memes and your audience is no different. Okay? Show them that you care. Show them that you care about them, show them that you care about solving their problems, because everyone wants to be heard about everybody wants to be important. And that brings me right back up to those buyer personas. Again, if you love your company, if you are a champion of your company and your organization and you know that you're amazing, then you have to serve yourself by putting in that effort and doing your homework and creating your buyer personas because you need to be able to really understand that person to show them that you care about them. You need to have a conversation with Katie, not everybody because you cannot love everybody the same. Okay? It doesn't work that way. I have one kid that loves gifts as her love language. And the other one loves quality time. All right, they don't get they are both loved the same amount from me, but he's showing my love in different ways. And that's what those buyer personas are going to do for you. They're not just going gave you that like reassurance that you know what you're doing, they're also going to allow you to really connect with the people that you're trying to talk with. So friends, here's the deal. Even after all your homework, even after all the examples of different things that I just said that you can think inside your head, if there's anything else, any other piece of advice that I can give you, it's just that you're not alone. Almost everybody feels this way whenever they're writing, like marketing to the masses, right? And it's because the feedback is low. So you put all this love out, and you very seldom get something back in return. But just know that they are not always going to return love all at the same time, I just had somebody email me three times about the same thing. And on the third email, I was like, holy cow, I really need to respond to this person. And it wasn't that they weren't important. It wasn't that I didn't love the opportunity that they were giving me it was that I was really busy. And I've had other professionals tell me the exact same thing. So regardless of whether your natural mindset is half empty, or half full, as you're approaching your marketing, just know that if you really do have the half full mindset, it is going to come through in your messaging. And it's very difficult to make friends, when you don't have that vibe, when you don't have that positive vibe. Because people want to be friends with people with energy, who are helping them solve their problems, who have similar values and interests as them that's who they want to be friends with. So do your homework, do your buyer personas. And when you find yourself getting stuck, just go back and rewrite the script that's going on in your head. Your audience are not faceless people, they are human beings who chose to be on your list who are your friends, and they need you. Okay? Instead of saying, I don't want to bother them, remind yourself that you offer value and that you are helping them solve their challenge. And unless they hear from you, they will not get there. Instead of saying that, they're just going to unsubscribe, and it's not even worth it, just realize that you're pouring love and so much value into the marketing that you do that if they don't appreciate it, they probably shouldn't be on the list anyway. And that's okay. Because that gives you more space and energy to serve people who actually do want to communicate with you, instead of thinking to yourself, I'm probably intruding or they don't want to hear about me anyway, just realize that without your messaging, they won't be able to embrace the opportunity that you have to offer. And that you can make their day with this messaging, you can show them that you care. And sometimes that's exactly what people need to hear. They need to hear that you care, because you do. And you can do that you can do that for somebody else, even with never having met them. And that's a really powerful gift, my friend. And that's what makes marketing so incredibly cool. So get that message out there, check and see how it did. Tweak and repeat over and over again. And then you're gonna get even better at it. Even better at marketing, even better at communicating. And it'll be awesome. It'll be awesome for you and for your audience. And for your business. Who doesn't want that right. Now, if you're new to marketing, or if you're in a rut, or maybe you just need a little bit of inspiration to be able to make your new marketing plan, I have a gift for you. This summer, I made a free mini course it's called Marketing on a Shoestring. It's a beginners mini course to market on a budget. And what I do in this mini course I broke it down into small videos that comes with a workbook is I challenge traditional marketing assumptions about what it takes to market your business. It's designed to give you a rock solid foundation for making the right marketing decisions for you. Not for somebody else, but for you and your business with total confidence, okay, and it's completely free. So go on over and check it out. It is at you may create.com. That's why Oh UMAYE, create CR EA t e.com. And then just click on Marketing on a Shoestring. It'll be right there for you. And like I said, it's free. Check it out. It'll give you ideas. I promise. It'll give you that and it'll give you some decision making parameters because I think that's the trickiest thing when you're planning your marketing is sometimes it's just like this flood of ideas and you don't even know or there's no ideas at all. So I'm not going to flood you with a billion ideas. I will give you some ideas, but I'm not going to overwhelm you. Instead, my goal is to give you what you need to be able to make decisions as it yours are thrown at you as to whether those ideas will actually work and come to fruition for your business. So check it out at you may create.com. It's a free Marketing on a Shoestring mini course. And with that, friends that's all I have for you today. I appreciate all your time and yeah, until next time, go forth and market with purpose. Transcribed by https://otter.ai