Thought leadership and sales psychology are two aspects of selling online that go hand in hand! Today, we are going to be talking about how thought leadership & sales psychology relate.
Whether we like it or not, persuasion is everywhere in the online business space. It may not always be so obvious, but persuasion is always in the undercurrent of what we see online. This can be in your favorite influencer sharing their favorite products of the week, a colleague promoting their latest launch, or even your close friends sharing their new favorite album. Bottom line- they all want you to persuade you to ALSO like what they’re sharing.
Persuasion is defined as the action or fact of persuading someone or of being persuaded to do or believe something. Honestly, this definition isn’t very helpful. Let’s look at some synonyms to help us understand what is going on here. We’ve got: convince, coerce, encourage, urge, entice, pressure, and tempt.
Based on these words, you can see before we attach emotion or context to the idea of persuasion, it already leans towards something slimy. Before we dive into how persuasion can influence our thought leadership content, let’s make a pit stop at sales psychology.
What is Sales Psychology?
Business.com defines sales psychology as a type of process that involves considering the psyche of your target market to sell your products and services. Instead of saying “you need this” again and again and hoping your target market will buy, sales psychology uses persuasive elements to tap into the target market psyche and create an environment, interaction, or piece of copy that persuades the target customers to buy the product or service.
This is done by applying some or all of the six key principles of sales psychology:
- Reciprocity
- Commitment
- Consistency
- Social proof
- Liking
- Authority
- Scarcity
Let’s be clear: no one of these principles is inherently wrong. But as we move through the meaning of each, we can unpack some of the ethical and not so ethical ways we see these principles being illustrated in the world around us.
Each one of the six principles of sales psychology can directly correlate to one of the five pillars of thought leadership content:
- Educate
- Inspire
- Personify
- Sell
- Engage
In this post, we’ll cover how thought leadership & sales psychology relate to help you produce content in a way that is supportive, not sleazy.
How Thought Leadership & Sales Psychology Relate: The Pillars & Principles
Reciprocity
Reciprocity can best be linked to the education and inspiration pillars of thought leadership content. Think about your favorite influencer for a moment. You follow them and watch the content they create every day because (hopefully) they bring you joy or they provide some kind of value in your life.
The same may be true for a favorite podcaster of yours or business owner you look up to. If they’re teaching you something new or providing you with some kind of entertainment, chances are you’ll want to show them some love back (like “If You Give A Mouse A Cookie” in an online biz sort of way).
How can we show these people we look up to some love right back? By purchasing the products they share with affiliate links, by liking and subscribing to their content, or even enrolling in their newest offering! On the flip side, if the content these people are creating provides no real educational value or doesn’t inspire you, are you going to feel inclined to return the favor? Probably not.
When it comes to creating thoughtful content for your own followers, it’s important to serve your audience either by means of education or inspiration- in whatever way/shape/form that feels authentic for you. Without these guiding principles, reciprocity simply won’t exist in your content creator/follower relationship.
Commitment & Consistency
Commitment and consistency can be lumped together when you’re creating content to sell. Honestly, this may be the simplest principle in this whole post. Think about it- if you’re not being consistent in selling your product or new offering and you’re not fully committed to your launch or sales period, your audience will know and they won’t buy it. If you don’t believe in yourself, your audience won’t either!
What’s important in your selling is that the content does not feel slimy or gross. If your followers feel like they are constantly being bullied into purchasing or like they are being chased by the pending end of your sales period, they may feel too intimidated to even go through with the sale. There’s a major difference between being committed to your sales and consistent in your marketing and shoving what you offer down people’s throats.
If you don’t feel committed to your selling or are afraid to be consistent because you know your messaging feels icky, it’s time to take a look at your sales copy (or work with someone like me to help you alter it so you DO feel good about it).
Liking
Maybe you’re still thinking about them since I already mentioned it, but think back to your favorite influencer. It’s more than likely that one of the reasons you enjoy following them is because they share some aspect of their life with their audience that you can relate to. That means they’re doing a good job at personifying their content!
When you personify your content, you are infusing what you share with a full dose of YOU! Not unlike your fav celebrity or influencer, the people who follow you probably do so because they like you as a person and feel like they can relate to your or your principles in some way.
What happens when people feel like they can relate to you? They will feel excited about the prospect of working with you! Being personable and completely yourself in the content you’re sharing online will have a great payoff!
Scarcity
When we think of scarcity, the principle of supply and demand comes to mind. The same can be said when we are thinking about engagement. When you’re not actively engaging with your audience in an authentic way, the demand for whatever you’re inadvertently trying to sell will decrease. If you’re creating content that is grabbing your follower’s attention and drawing them in, they are going to be much more likely to have a desire to be part of what you’re promoting.
Engaging can start to feel slimy if you’re not being strategic about what you’re posting. Chances are good, too, that you’ll be pumping out content in the hope that your followers will want to engage and be sadly disappointed when you get crickets. If you’re expecting to garner engagement from your audience by only posting salesy content and trying to make that sale, you may end up with low engagement and no sales.
Authority & Social Proof
If you are a thought leader, people are going to position you as a reliable source in the community in which you’re working. This is amazing! Some might take this newfound leadership and confuse it with a position of authority. BEWARE! By establishing credibility, you’re not trying to dominate the field but rather opening up a greater conversation within your community about whatever it is you are an expert in!
The social proof here will be the conversations that come out of the thought leadership content you create! People will want to engage in conversation with you and want to learn more about what you know or how you can help them. As you go forward, you’ll have this social proof to refer back to as you recall what works in your biz and what doesn’t.
Persuasion in Thought Leadership
There’s nothing wrong with having a little bit of persuasion pulsing in the undercurrent of the thought leadership content you’re creating. What truly matters is that persuasion is not the thing you’re leading with as you’re trying to become a thought leader in your industry.
Trusting your skills, listening to your audience as much as you’re talking, and providing potential clients with value should always be at the forefront of what you’re creating. When the time is right to throw in a little persuasion in a healthy way, you will know.
How Thought Leadership & Sales Psychology Relate: Next Steps
Now that you have a deeper understanding of how thought leadership & sales Psychology relate, you may be able to go forward trusting your skills. If you’re still looking for some additional guidance on how to incorporate these principles into your own business, end me an email or slide into my DM’s (it won’t be sleazy and weird, trust me). I’m here to show you how I can help you create a marketing strategy that will leave you and your clients feeling amazing!
