Growth Newsletter #134
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This week's tactics
Tell a story with a Minimum Viable Backstory
Insight from Wes Kao (Maven and altMBA).
Stories are powerful.
They capture our attention, and carry with them powerful lessons with enough context to help us envision how they're relevant to our lives and how to apply them.
Compare these two pieces of copy:
The first focuses on the what.
The second is a simple story that illustrates why someone should use the tutoring service.
But imagine instead the story was:
"Little Johnny, a 10-year-old boy in New Hampshire, liked to ride bikes, collect pennies in his stomach, and crush cans of Liquid Death.
Oh which reminds me, I don't really like the UX of Liquid Death. I can't close the can and throw it into my bag after opening it!
Anyway, did I mention Little Johnny was not doing so well in Math class? Well, his parents Suzy and Bob, an engineer and a doctor, are deeply ashamed...blah blah tutoring blah blah he's doing well now!"
Snore, right?
Wes Kao (founder of Maven and altMBA) says to find your story's MVB (Minimum Viable Backstory). Find the perfect amount of context to set the stage—and cut the rest.
For example, that camping trip where you almost got eaten by a bear:
So tell stories in your copywriting, but cut out excess context. Your audience will be more captivated. And your message won't get lost in a sea of irrelevant details.
The odd one out stands out
Insight from an old German Psychiatrist.
Which of these stands out the most? 🐶🐱🐭🐹🐰🦊🐻🍉🐼🐻❄️🐨🐯🦁🐮🐷🐸🐵
What about? desk, chair, bed, table, chipmunk, dresser, stool, couch
What about in this image?
I imagine most of you will say the 🍉, chipmunk, and the pink shoes (I know at least one of you won't—yeah, I see you)
In 1933, German Psychiatrist, Hedwig Von Restorff, discovered that when presenting someone with a bunch of pieces of information from a single category (animals), and one that isn't (fruit), people recall the "odd one out" (🍉) much better.
That makes intuitive sense, right? As Seth Godin points out, you'll notice and remember the purple cow in the pasture way better than the brown or white ones.
So what does this mean for marketers?
Easy, you can be clever with design. Make the thing you want people to notice and remember be visually different than the rest.
That can be your product or brand, a feature, a price option, or an ad.
Ways you can do this:
- For physical products in stores, be like a tube of Pringles instead of another bag of potato chips.
- For brands, choose an entirely different aesthetic than competitors, like Liquid Death's heavy metal vibe.
- For price options, make the tier you really want people to buy visually different than the other options.
- Comparisons, have your product compared to competitors and make them all black and white (drab) and yours in full color (exciting and noticeable).
Be as creative as you can be with this.
Most brands play it safe and do what everyone else does. But the wild and creative stuff will make you stand out and be remembered.
Community Spotlight
News and Links
News you can use:
- YouTube announced it will work with Universal Music Group to try to compensate musicians for AI-generated music trained off their work.
- YouTube is also cracking down on ad blockers.
- Amazon is going off platform with sponsored product ads on third-party sites like Pinterest and BuzzFeed
- The state of Illnois is forcing parents with child influencers to set aside their earnings in a trust fund rather than spending it themselves.
- The FTC updated its paid endorsement guideline for the first time since 2009. They want creators to be as upfront as possible that a post is a paid endorsement.
- Friend.tech is the latest crypto social network where you can own shares of your favorite influencers, and when you do the influencer earns trading fees. $55M has been transacted on it so far.
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Something fun
From 0xgaut. Here's the link to try it out.
Something fun
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— Neal & Justin, and the DC team.
