Michael de Groot

24 February 2017

Content, Digital Content, Storytelling, Social Selling

Why is Storytelling so important? Chapter 4 - The END

Michael de Groot

24 February 2017

Content, Digital Content, Storytelling, Social Selling

Now you know that everyone thinks in stories and that we all love them too. What do you think a marketer should be creating when they are promoting their product or service?

Correct! You guessed right... they tell stories.

Then there is just one final thing you need to be aware of and that’s ‘VAK’.

V stands for Visual

A stands for Auditory

K stands for Kinaesthetic

When you listen to or watch a story you are either taking in visual cues from the story or you are literally creating your own visual representation of that story. You will often relate it to yourself, i.e. you put yourself in the story as if you were experiencing it.

If the story has any audio, in the case of, say, a radio programme, a movie (video) or a podcast, then you’ve got an additional way to absorb the story more meaningfully. When you are reading a book and they describe sounds, then more than likely you will create that sound in your brain without actually hearing it. Do you ever wonder when you read a book, whose voice do you actually hear? In fact whose voice do you hear right now when you are reading this? Okay, I’m probably getting a bit deep now, let’s move on.

Kinaesthetic refers to learning something by doing it or feeling it. When it comes to storytelling it refers to how it makes you feel after hearing or engaging with the story.

Take all three together - Visual, Auditory and Kinaesthetic - and you have the best possible formula for the viewer to engage with your story. Tell an engaging storythrough visual graphics, add a voiceover with some music and ensure the story itself leaves them feeling an emotion and the story will literally wire a new neural pathway in their brains.

The END

Do you have any great examples how storytelling has won you business?

You can download the full story by clicking HERE.

#storytelling #content #socialmedia #engagement #marketing #socialselling #sales #empathy #digitalmarketing #storyteller #visual #auditory #kinaesthetic #nlp

Online is great and talking is even better. Everyone's ultimate goal in business and life is to make real connections, where you meet someone face to face. Before that meeting a conversation is the ultimate icebreaker. I value my LinkedIn connections and realise that I don't really know you or what your goals are and how I might facilitate or support those goals. Feel free to click through and book a call with me (https://www.stayingaliveuk.com/discovery-call/). I have blocked out only Fridays each week, excluding holidays, for calls. Hope to speak with you soon.

Michael de Groot

21 February 2017

Content, Digital Content, Marketing

How do you really know that your community is engaging with you?

Michael de Groot

21 February 2017

Content, Digital Content, Marketing

In June 2013 I wrote an article for ‘The non-significant journal of business & consumer psychology’.

The title of my article was ‘Do Social Networks Sell Drugs?’

Nothing has changed, we’re more addicted to Social Networks then we were in 2013. Sure, you do hear about the odd unplugging campaign and of course the Mindfulness movement, but it’s not really working is it? The overwhelming addiction is very well established and will only grow to mammoth proportions in years to come.

See image below for the forecasted growth of social network users by 2020.

https://www.statista.com/statistics/278414/number-of-worldwide-social-network-users

Okay, so it's here to stay and you want to maximise your presence for business reasons. After all everyone has told you for years that you can promote your services for free. But really is it? Seeing as Facebook is by far the biggest social network on the planet, more businesses are using Facebook advertising as a method to get in front of their ideal buyers. So something that has been free for years, getting noticed means you now have to pay. Just have a look at how much Facebook is going to earn from mobile advertising in years to come. Breathtaking!

https://www.statista.com/statistics/241042/facebooks-worldwide-mobile-advertising-revenue/

And all to get more engagement with your content. Is it worth it? Making Mark Zuckerberg the wealthiest entrepreneur on the planet might make you feel a tiny bit sick in your stomach.

Is the answer coming off Social Media altogether? Well, maybe!

Watch the TEDx talk by Dr. Cal Newport called ‘Quit Social Media’.

Many of us believe, really believe that having thousands or maybe even millions of followers is the answer. Some of us are made to believe that receiving likes, comments and shares are social proof that you or your business is popular, appreciated, meaningful, ahead of others and beating the competition.

In truth what you believe is that you are being ‘loved’.

After all this is what you crave the most.

So how do you create engagement that means something, really means something? At any stage of the buying process nothing happens until the person trusts you or your company. Your work is only ever about developing trust, nothing else. And trust can not happen unless you touch your buyer at a very deep emotional level. They literally need to feel loved by you. Instead of you needing to feel loved by them. Do you get the difference?

Infographic shared with permission from www.nallure.com

I'd love to hear from you and how you are making your buyer feel loved, totally, completely and unconditionally. Use the comments section below to share your thoughts on engagement and content strategies.

LinkedIn created a brilliant eBook with my favourite illustrator. @gapingvoid (Hugh Macleod) creates the most amazing messages through his illustrations. Read more about him and @gapingvoid here: (http://www.gapingvoid.com/blog/team-members/hugh-macleod/)

Regularly I will share one of the articles and illustrations from the eBook and give you my opinion, interpretation, insight and my meaning.

@stayingaliveuk 🚀

#contentmarketing #content #socialmedia #engagement #marketing #socialselling #sales #empathy #distraction #purpose #relevance #trust #love

Michael de Groot

12 February 2017

Content, Digital Content, Marketing, Sales, Social Selling, Storytelling

Why is Storytelling so important? Chapter 3

Michael de Groot

12 February 2017

Content, Digital Content, Marketing, Sales, Social Selling, Storytelling

It is said that narrative thought creates stories that are coherent of particular experiences, temporally structured and context sensitive (Baumeister & Newman, 1994).

On a day to day basis you take in millions of bits of data and in order to make sense of it all you literally develop your own daily story with all that data.

You are actually the biggest storyteller yourself.

This means you are already very accustomed to stories and therefore anything that comes your way in the form of a story, you will accept quite readily and weave that into your own story with its own characters, outcomes and timeframes.

Let’s take your trip to the gym. Some of you go daily, 3 times per week or just at the weekend and some of you may not have made it yet.

However, we all have a picture of what a gym looks like. Lots of exercise machines, weights etc., maybe a pool, a cafe and many other amenities.

When you think about going to the gym you almost certainly create a short story in your brain. You see yourself getting up, doing whatever you do, changing into your gym wear, travelling there and doing whatever you like doing the most and travelling back.

You may not include the travelling part, you may just see yourself doing the exercise. Just enough to get you motivated to follow through.

Everything you think about, well nearly everything, develops in the form of a story.

What have you been thinking about lately? Share your answer in the comments below.

You can download the full story by clicking HERE.

#storytelling #content #socialmedia #engagement #marketing #socialselling #sales #empathy #digitalmarketing #storyteller

Michael de Groot

7 February 2017

Content, Digital Content, Social Selling, Storytelling, Purpose

Do you clearly articulate your purpose in your content?

Michael de Groot

7 February 2017

Content, Digital Content, Social Selling, Storytelling, Purpose

In the image above, the part of the sentence that grabbed my attention is ‘we stand for something meaningful’.

Deciding what content to write and publish is the easy bit. Seriously it is becoming easier, because there are so many great content writers out there, which means our subconscious is absorbing it and eventually this comes out in our own content.

The tougher part is making it connect to your purpose, your passion and making it meaningful.

Most content nowadays is forgettable, even the headlines are so sensational that they are becoming a massive turn off. The professional media is trying desperately to get our attention.

Whether you are in employment or running your own business, you have a desire to feel valued, for your contribution to be meaningful and deliver something that will have an impact on people’s lives. Most of us have those desires. And even if we don't have those desires for our business, we will have those for our family.

There is a meaning, a purpose to all our lives and maybe you are not fully aware of it yet, it is vital that you understand what it is when you are writing content.

If your content is just about what you do and how you do it, i.e. selling yourself then you are, sorry to say, going in the wrong direction.

Simon Sinek is a master at teaching us how to become better at defining our purpose, our WHY? I have included his best video to explain this below. It's only had 30+ million view so far, so he must be on to something right?

Our ‘why’ has to be evident in what we say, what we write and how we market. Basically all our content.

The reader has to feel a connection with you beyond the words, the facts and the content. She needs to be convinced that you are congruent with your content and have written it with the right intention and with purpose and meaning.

If you are not clear on how to do this, start with thinking about why you do what you do? What you love about what you do and how you would like to make an impact in the world or maybe closer to home in your community. Once you start getting clarity about this and portray this through the content you write or share, your audience will feel a closer connection to you, a deeper feeling of trust will develop and a greater connection will emerge.

Defining yourself by metrics alone is never enough. Awards and league tables are the result of ego and self congratulations. You can only ever measure yourself, your business, the impact on your community, by the amount of change that is taking place as a direct result of your purpose.

How are you articulating your purpose in your content?

I'd love to learn and I am sure others would to, so help us out and share your answer below.

Regularly I will share one of the articles and illustrations from the eBook and give you my opinion, interpretation, insight and my meaning.

@stayingaliveuk 🚀

#contentmarketing #content #socialmedia #engagement #marketing #socialselling #sales #empathy #distraction #purpose #relevance

Michael de Groot

31 January 2017

Digital Content, Marketing, Social Selling, Storytelling

Why is Storytelling so important? Chapter 2

Michael de Groot

31 January 2017

Digital Content, Marketing, Social Selling, Storytelling

Telling stories isn’t always that simple though is it? Let’s take the scenario of a product or service.

This is what most people believe.

You have to share what the product/service does.
You must share how the product/service performs.
You’ve got to demonstrate, through testimonials, how the product/service has helped others.
You’ve got to give people an incentive to purchase your product/service.

Wrong! Your buyer will think, ‘so what? My problem is unique, nobody has my problem, I am the only one with this problem and I can’t see how your product/service will help me.’

The reason they come up with these objections is the fact that they haven’t emotionally connected with your company or product yet. The only way you can create emotion in anyone is to have them buy into your story first. This could be about you personally, your company or your product.

How interesting would it be if you told the story of how your product was created and road-tested. Even more powerful would be to share who was involved in the product creation and how long it took you to come up with the idea, prototype it and then manufacture it. How you got consumers of the product involved in testing it and giving their feedback. How the feedback made you shape the product/service and made it even greater.

You may remember Apple’s iPhone 4 ‘Antennagate’ a few years back where consumers had reported that the signal was poor when your hand obscured the antenna. In the end only 0.55% of buyers complained but Apple gave everyone free bumpers to stop them from obscuring the antenna. In an unprecedented move Apple showed us a strange room where the iPhone was tested. Not everyone will have seen it but it’s the only internal room that I have seen in Apple. It gave me a fabulous insight and increased level of trust in them. Apple never shared how the product performed, they just shared with us a story of how it was tested. Do you get the difference?

You can download the full story by clicking HERE.

#storytelling #content #socialmedia #engagement #marketing #socialselling #sales #empathy

Michael de Groot

20 January 2017

Storytelling, Social Selling, Social Media

Why is Storytelling so important? Chapter 1

Michael de Groot

20 January 2017

Storytelling, Social Selling, Social Media

Because it takes us back to our magical childhood. Even before we could comprehend what was being said, our parents read stories to us. They took us on a journey, where anything was possible, where we could imagine anything with the use of our brain. We created mystical characters who did not exist in the real world but, as far as we were concerned, they were as real as you and me.

Hollywood have always known that we all LOVE stories!

When we watch or read a story we start creating images in our brain to fill in the missing parts. Let’s take the following paragraph.

“Jane, who drove too fast in her red sports car down the busy highway, was excited about the prospect of meeting up with her friends, who were waiting for her. They were waiting for her in her favourite restaurant at a table by the window with a view over the lake. Sundown had just started and the light was bouncing off the water, which was still and sparkling in the remaining light. Ducks were drifting peacefully on the water, heading towards their night retreats. Jane was running late”.

You just created several images in your brain taken from your library of images which are stored in billions of neurons. More than that you emotionally connected with Jane: we’ve all been late for appointments and know what it feels like to be rushing to try and get to our destination faster. You also love being able to get a table by the window in a restaurant, especially with a view over a lake. Oh wow, just imagine that. And who doesn’t like seeing ducks drifting on a lake at sundown?

This means that you didn’t just imagine Jane’s journey and destination, you actually wished you were Jane. Or John, of course, if it was a guy who featured in the story.

So, if we emotionally connect with stories what do you think the best marketers in the world do? Correct! You guessed right...they tell stories.

You can download the full story by clicking the link HERE.

#storytelling #content #socialmedia #engagement #marketing #socialselling #sales #empathy

Michael de Groot

14 January 2017

Habits, Social Media

Right then, what's actually causing you to be so distracted?

Michael de Groot

14 January 2017

Habits, Social Media

I'm sure you have heard that little voice in your head, you know the one that tells you that you should have done something when you haven't, the one that NEVER shuts up. Oh and it's never positive, it's ALWAYS a negative commentary.

Well it's the same one that talks to you when you are writing, posting, liking and commenting. Constantly evaluating what you're writing, questioning whether you should have done it differently, said more or said less and even if you should have said anything at all.

Should you tap the like or the love emoji on Facebook and tapping the angry one when someone is complaining or the sad one when they're sharing some personal heartache. Is tapping the emoji enough or do you add some comments too. But what if you say the wrong thing. You’ve only got 10 seconds to add something. Look at all those other comments, should you even bother or should you just like one of the other comments you agree with, but oh some of those other comments are dreadful, should you say something back or should you just move on. But you may be enraged with it all and your inner dragon can't resist it.

All of those voices are happening instantly and in split-second succession and you don't even know it's happening to you. And it's very likely that you were being distracted by the next post, the next notification on your mobile and your need to write and post the next article or blogpost.

We are convinced that the distractions are outside of us and in fact they are all in our heads. We are the ones who allow ourselves to be distracted, it's never anyone else’s fault, really it isn't.

So how do you manage to stay focussed and on topic with all the thousands of opportunities for distraction?

BETTER HABITS

You are never going to drown out all those distractions but you can train yourself to develop better habits.

Better habits means getting organised around when, where and how you engage with all of the thousands of distractions that you have to face and all the tasks you have to perform. It means being organised and you decide when you allow yourself to be distracted.

Examples:

Notification to say someone's tagged you? You schedule a reminder when you know you have time to look at notifications.
You need to write an article or blogpost? Again schedule a reminder and block time in your schedule when you will have time to write it.
Ideally you'd like to have a steady flow of posts going out to your social channels. Use a social media scheduler like Buffer or Hootsuite and there are other schedulers too.
You need a source of interesting and exciting content to learn from and to repost to demonstrate your thought leadership. Investigate using RSS aggregators, like Feedly, Flipboard and others.

I have found by using the Apple reminders app and scheduling the reminder for specific days and times I am able to be far more productive and disciplined in developing better habits. It's an ongoing journey and with practice you can and will develop a better habit in reducing the amount of unnecessary distractions.

I can highly recommend The Habit Guide by Leo Babauta, who has some excellent tips and strategies to develop better habits. He also writes a great blog zenhabits.net.

What strategies have you developed for reducing the amount of distractions?

I'd love to learn and I am sure others would to, so help us out and share your answer below.

---

Regularly I will share one of the articles and illustrations from the eBook and give you my opinion, interpretation, insight and my meaning.

@stayingaliveuk 🚀

#contentmarketing #content #socialmedia #engagement #marketing #socialselling #sales #empathy

Online is great and talking is even better. Everyone's ultimate goal in business and life is to make real connections, where you meet someone face to face. Before that meeting a conversation is the ultimate icebreaker. I value my LinkedIn connections and realise that I don't really know you or what your goals are and how I might facilitate or support those goals. Feel free to click through and book a call with me (https://www.stayingaliveuk.com/discovery-call/). I have blocked out only Fridays each week, excluding holidays, for calls. Hope to speak with you soon.

Michael de Groot

6 January 2017

Content, Digital Content, Marketing, Storytelling

So how do you create more relevant content?

Michael de Groot

6 January 2017

Content, Digital Content, Marketing, Storytelling

I really and honestly haven't got the answer, if I did I'd probably be on a beach somewhere during the freezing winter months. Are you feeling cold right now?

If you do think you can answer my question, please skip to the end and I'd love to hear your perspectives and of course we all need to know, urgently.

What I will do is share what content personally turns me off and what attracts me. And in the words of Tony Robbins we are either 'moving away or moving towards something', this could be pain or pleasure and in this case content.

Turn-offs (no way a complete list, but what comes to mind for now an I may continue to add as they come up in the future).

Too many adverts saying 'buy me'.
Self congratulations, which portray a message to say, 'aren't we clever?'
Newsletters, I just don't get those anymore, they're such a complete and utter waste of time nowadays.
Repeat, repeat, repeat, repeat and even more multiple repeats of the same content. I'm guilty of this too!
No context around someone else's content you are sharing. Just sharing for sharing's sake. Ouch!
Live video here, live video there, live video here, there and everywhere. Too many notifications to suggest that everyone is joining the bandwagon. Although I have to say the Instagram version is attracting me a little!
Autobot messages via 'commun.it', oh dear what is everyone thinking? Autobot messages are so 2014. Stop them, stop them now!
Articles with the top 5, top 10, top 25 and even the top 50 of suggestions we really never take action on. Do share if you ever have please.
Adverts that have animals starring in it to jolt our emotional brain neurones into saying awwwwww and apparently remembering the product for longer. And now even giving away toys of said animals if you purchase the product. Readers in the UK, will know exactly what I'm talking about.
Re-marketing ads. They are really, really doing my head in, because unfortunately you can't get them out of your head. I bet a very clever psychiatrist at Google suggested this one. Aaarrrggghhh!

Okay that's enough for now, turned out to be a bigger list than I had expected.

Attracts

Videos that are educational. Ted-talks and Ted-Ed are brilliant and I could watch them all day long.
Content that answers my question when I search on Google for the answer to a problem I need to solve. Thank you to all those amazing trainers, coaches, educators out there, we appreciate you!
YouTube. For making my home feed relevant to what I like watching, coming up with new suggestions or ideas and allowing me to scrap them if I wish. Also making the list of new videos from my subscribed channels easy to navigate around. I love YouTube, it's visual, engaging and quick.
Animated GIFS, as long as they're funny and clever. I've even started to have a play with producing them myself. Great fun!
Comedy. Who doesn't like having a good laugh, there isn't enough laughter in the world and social media can be a real tonic for the soul.
Real-live stories. In the last year I have seen more real people stories coming through even on LinkedIn and as you would expect they are stories of overcoming adversity in some way. They are hugely motivational and at the same time make your so-called stresses seem so small.
Content that provides great learning for where you are in that moment and time, whether it be your personal or business life.

Right then do you have the answer? What content inspires you?

I'd love to learn and I am sure others would to, so help me out and share your answer below.

---

Regularly I will share one of the articles and illustrations from the eBook and give you my opinion, interpretation, insight and my meaning.

@stayingaliveuk 🚀

#contentmarketing #content #socialmedia #engagement #marketing #socialselling #sales #empathy

Online is great and talking is even better. Everyone's ultimate goal in business and life is to make real connections, where you meet someone face to face. Before that meeting a conversation is the ultimate icebreaker. I value my LinkedIn connections and realise that I don't really know you or what your goals are and how I might facilitate or support those goals. Feel free to click through and book a call with me (https://www.stayingaliveuk.com/discovery-call/). I have blocked out only Fridays each week, excluding holidays, for calls. Hope to speak with you soon.