Why you can’t sell to someone who doesn’t trust you. Part 1

People only buy from you when they know you well.

They have to really know you, like you and trust you.

And there’s a process for getting them from not knowing you even exist to knowing you well enough and trusting you enough to pull out their wallets.

Today I’m going to show you three steps to gaining the trust of your audience using great content marketing.

You see, no one wants to buy content marketing. Instead, what all business owners want – and NEED – is a great relationship with your audience.

And who is your audience? Those are people who are already in your world. People who mention to you they’re reading your material,  and who are engaging with you, or at least discovering you in one way or another.

That audience may come to you through ads, or referrals. And to build up that relationship, you offer them valuable information, or what is also known as content.

Content should be valuable, inspiring and educational

You’re the expert. You’re the authority.  Educate your audience to help them solve their problem in ways they haven’t thought of yet.

Instead of content marketing, many people also call it education-based marketing.

Use content marketing to build trust

So how do you develop this trust relationship? You have to go through a three step process:

You start with people who don’t even know you exist, and who barely even know they have a problem. What are they doing about it? They’re probably ignoring it and denying it.

Think about it….

How many times have you heard of somebody who’s had an illness, pain, or ache and a family member or good friend has said to them over and over again “you really need to go and see the doctor about that problem.”

Their problem is obvious to everyone else but that one person, and they’re in denial about it.

They first need to become aware of the fact they have this problem.

Your job as the entrepreneur is to identify their feelings, their pains and their problems. You need to do that in visceral terms. So they realize they have a problem and that they need to do something about it.

If they don’t do something about it, it’s just going to continue. Some people are happy to keep going that way, but most people want to solve their problems and there’s only one way they can do that.

The first step is to become educated that the problem even exists.

So step one is what I call ‘Problem Aware’. In very strong language, it’s your job to let them know they have that problem.

So now you’ve got them to the point where they say “okay I have a problem and it hurts! What do I do about it? “

You move them to step two which is to become solution-aware.

They need to recognize there are ways to solve their problem and there are many people who have already solved this same problem.

This is where you give them information that explains to them this is what the problem is.

So in the first step, you are talking about the problem: “This is why you have it and this is why it feels this way”.

Next you help them become aware that a solution exists.

In part two I’m going to share how you can present your solution to their problem so they see you as the person that can finally help them and lead them to become a customer.

So check back in and see what the next step is, in creating a trust-based relationship with your audience.

When have you – or someone you know – not paid attention to a problem that was really obvious to everyone else? What did it take to become “problem aware”? Please let me know in the comments!