There are 3 main things that make your social media posts instantly more attention-grabbing and they’re often not what people realise.
If you’d like to create more compelling posts that really catch people’s attention and stop them from scrolling past you, then you are in the right place.
People scroll so fast on social media that you are literally one scroll away from losing someone’s attention.
So, if you want to stop people scrolling and you want someone to stop and read your posts and absorb them, I’m going to share 3 things that you can do in your posts and these have been a game-changer for me.
These are three of nine things that I share in my full content on this topic, but in this video I’m going to be sharing the top three.
These are principles that you can use for social media posts, as well as any type of content creation, including emails, blog posts, and videos etc. If you have these 3 things in your content, you will grab people’s attention and hook them in and they will give you their time.
1 – Curiosity
Curiosity is that thing that hooks people in. It’s the thing that gets people to open your emails and to stop the scroll.
It’s the reason that the news readers always open a loop by saying something like, “After the break a woman got stabbed while she was on the roof of a car and we’ll tell you why…”
This builds curiosity and it makes you stay to learn more (if you’re that way inclined). Curiosity is the thing that makes you want to reply to something on Facebook, because a loop has been opened in your brain.
Our brain is designed to close loops. So for example, if someone starts saying something and then they get distracted, they’ve opened a loop in your brain. Your brain needs the closed loop to finish the story, and if something is unfinished, your brain often holds onto it.
There’s some really cool research that was done on waiters who were given the orders, and they discovered that they would only remember the order until the person actually paid. As soon as the person had paid, it closed the loop and they stopped remembering the order.
Their brain kept that loop open, because they needed to remember that information, until the person actually paid. Then their brain deleted that information to free up more space in their brain.
This concept of opening a loop in someone’s mind is your first line of your social media post is designed to hook someone in, like a fishing rod.
Once you’ve got them in, then you’ve got to keep them on the hook. So essentially if we fish someone in, we’ve got to hold on to them before they run away.
When you create curiosity, people can’t help but want to read more. Our brain is designed to close loops. So if we see something that opens a loop in our mind, our brain seeks to close it.
We can open a loop by asking a thought-provoking question or making a bold statement.
A bold statement makes someone say, “Hang on, what do you mean?” And they read the second line. The second line gets then to the third line and so on.
The subject line of an email, for example, is the most important part, because you need to grab attention with curiosity so that people actually come behind the door (so to speak) and read it.
When you speak your ideal clients language, they get curious. To do this, we’ve got to be super clear on what they want.
I recommend you create a quadrant of dreams, desires, fears and frustrations and have these in front of you when you’re creating content.
When we know these four things we can feed the curiosity. People only stop scrolling if they are curious and if the content is relevant to them.
You could use a bold statement like, I dunno “The Queen just ate a spider.”
That’s a bit of a bold statement, but if it’s not relevant to the person reading it, it will not grab their attention.
If you want to get someone reading your post, you have to speak their language – with things that matter to them.
You have to tap into the dreams, desires, fears and frustrations of your target market. So you might say something like, “Do you ever feel XYZ?”
Or you could state a bold statement like, “The ONE thing that I used to XYZ.”
This builds curiosity in a person so they think “I HAVE to know!”
2 – Contrast
Using contrast is all about showing the two different worlds – between someone’s current reality and future.
So, if you think about it this way – all of us have two different worlds that exist in our lives. You have your current reality and your future reality.
You want people to show people how they can come over to their new desired world, so you’ve got to really make it clear in the contrast between the two worlds.
For example, we all have a health bridge – where we are in our health right now, and then where we want our health to be.
We all have a financial bridge. A relationships bridge. We have it in every area of our lives. Where we’re at, and where we want to be.
The contrast is the two worlds and the bridge is the piece of content that we’re creating to bridge the two worlds.
So if you are someone who helps people manage their money for example, you’ve got to talk about the current reality, and you want to use visual and emotional language that is very specific and descriptive.
You could say something like, “When you open up your banking app, does your heart sink because you’re missing a couple of zeros at the end and you really need to pay rent?”
You are talking about their existing world and you’re building that picture of the current frustration. Then you start talking about how good it would feel to open your bank account and know that everything is sorted and you don’t have any financial burdens.
You can use kinaesthetic language that people can relate, like that feeling of relaxing, dropping their shoulders and knowing that everything’s taken care of when then open their bank account.
We’re building out some feeling and emotion, and we’re painting a visual picture between the contrast of now and the contrast of what’s possible, and we are highlighting the gap in between. We have to show people where they are and where they want to be.
And if you want to engage people and hook them in, you want to be really clear on those two worlds.
An example of highlighting the gap is this. Right now you’re learning about how to create more eyes on your post.
But you also need to know what kind of calls to action are most effective, how to create a landing page, how to set up an automated booking system to book clients in online. How do you actually convert those leads into paying clients?
So what I’m doing now is I’m highlighting the gap. I’m teaching you some cool stuff, then showing your there’s a gap of all this other information you need to learn. You’re seeing it in action.
3 – Credibility + Connection
To attract the right people, you want to use a balance of credibility and connection.
When your content has a balance between credibility and connection, people are more likely to feel drawn to you.
What I mean by credibility, is your experience, skills and knowledge. You are giving evidence that someone can trust you.
To add credibility, talk about how many years you’ve been in business, how many years you’ve been helping these types of people, or researching and studying and diving deep into this topic.
Telling how many people you’ve worked with, and giving numbers and dates are really powerful. If you read through my Instagram posts, you’ll see some examples of this my posts.
Also talk about some areas of vulnerability, show humaneness, show that you’re relatable. This brings a connection with your target market, alongside your credibility.
There has to be balance. If you just talk about how great you are, you’re going to put people off. If you’re constantly talking about how great your life is and how great you are, you don’t give people a point of connection.
Being real and showing your human side shows that you also have struggled and you know what it’s like having to struggle alone. You want to make your clients feel as though you get them.
When you’ve got that really nice balance and credibility and connection, people like you and connect with you. And they can also see you are skilled, knowledgeable have experience, but you also are not putting yourself up on a pedestal.
You want to put your program on a pedestal not yourself. Elevate your system. Elevate the thing that you’ve created, your signature system that gets people results.
Your experiences and learnings, have been absorbed into you like a sponge. You want to squeeze it out into your signature system. This is the system that you take people through which is a process that you take people from where they are currently, to where they want to be.
There is a great book called Compelling People which talks about the concept of strength and warmth. It talks about how people who are compelling and influential have a great balance between the two.
There was a whole lot of research on thousands of compelling people. And they found that they have this beautiful balance between being strong and warm.
We need to have a balance of being warm – compassionate and kind, but not going too far with it, as then we border on being fluffy and we don’t get taken seriously.
If we go too far on the strength side, we can come across as too authoritative; too direct and blunt. And we can put people off if we’re too far on the ends of those spectrums.
Compelling people sit in the middle, in the sweet spot.
The sweet spot is when you’ve got a beautiful balance of power and vulnerability. This is similar to the sweet spot in the middle of credibility and connection.
Think about how you show your authority and your expertise, but also balance it out with vulnerability and realness.
For example, I’ve shared about how I felt like an imposter, and I felt like I was ‘pretending’ to have a business and that I felt like I should be further along in my journey by now.
When we can have this realness of what life’s really like and that we not perfect, people feel more of a connection with us. So we’ve got the credibility plus the connection.
Curiosity, contrast, and credibility + connection – these are the 3 things that if you put those in your post, you can instantly grab people’s attention and have them reading your post.
These are three of nine methods I teach to create compelling content that engages people and makes an impact.
I’ll be sharing the other 6 methods which are based on psychology principles, in my upcoming, free online masterclass called the Client Attraction Accelerator.
It’s happening this Tuesday, the 15th of December, from 7pm to 9pm.
This is for you if you’re a coach or consultant or any type of practitioner or service based business owner and you know you’ve got the potential to help a lot more people and make a lot more money, then this is for you.
You’ll discover:
? How To Get 7 Clients In 7 Days, using a proven, step-by-step process (WITHOUT using any pushy or sleazy tactics)
? The 3 Powerful Client Attraction Methods that have people consistently asking “How can I work with you?” (without wasting money on ads)
? The Little-Known Content Creation Techniques that will adapt & transform your business in 2021, using my psychology-based influence hacks.
? A Simple Tool That Shows You INSTANTLY whether your target market is niched enough and if not, how to fix it.
? How To Map Out Your Ideal Client’s Journey so you can get people’s ATTENTION and connect with them authentically.
PLUS you’ll receive a BONUS GIFT for attending:
You’ll Get My Social Media Success Tool Kit Valued at $97 For Free!
With step-by-step guides and training on how to use social media to get new clients – ready for you to implement instantly!
So if you are sick of sitting behind your laptop, struggling and not knowing what to do and not knowing how to get clients, come and join us.
You can register here.
Hope to see you there!
Kat
When the world has challenges, there are always opportunities for us to grow, so you need to look for your growth zone. I want you to think about where your opportunity is for growth.
It’s important that we look for trends and patterns and this is something that I love doing. I’ve been looking at where we are headed, and right now, one-third of the population is online. And in the next few years the majority of the world is going to be online.
Now more than ever you have to be different. In order to stand out, you have to be known as an expert. You’ve got to make sure that people know what your USP is. What is your unique selling point?
When was the last time you actually updated your marketing plan or your business plan? Every great athlete, entrepreneur and business leader has a plan. If you want to achieve greatness, it doesn’t happen unless you plan for it.
Here they are:
The first captivation weapon is compelling content.
To grow your business, you need to create consistent content that’s valuable and relevant to your ideal client.
It’s the type of content that your ideal client really wants.
Being consistent and constantly showing up and giving compelling content builds trust. People get to know you, like you and trust you.
We do business with people who we like, who we can trust, and who we feel gets us.
There are many people that have signed up with me as a client and said they just feel like I get them and speak their language.
There are a lot of people who watched my business over time before they decided to work with me and this built trust due to the consistency.
I never used to enjoy doing Facebook Lives. But I decided that I was going to do them consistently. There has to be a time where you get serious about your business and say, ‘I’m doing this and there is no ‘out.’ You have to decide to burn your bridges and go all-out in your business.
When I first committed to consistency, I assumed that consistency was going to pay off, but I had no proof. Now, I do!
The benefit of consistency is that you build trust with people who don’t know you. You’re not here today and gone tomorrow, you consistently show up because you want to help people.
When you’re consistently showing up with compelling content, you get to teach people what you do and you get to teach people new things. Through that, they will realise if they’re a match for you.
There’s a piece of research that was done recently where someone did a study that showed it takes seven hours of consuming content for people to make a significant buying decision.
So if you’re reposting other people’s quotes, you’re not really building that trust through your own consistent content.
You need to start increasing the time you are providing content. If you’re doing Facebook Lives, I encourage you to consider running a 60-minute Zoom event.
If you’re already doing 60 minute events, up it to 90-minutes then 2 hours, then commit to running a half-day then a full-day workshop.
Running online events and webinars with Zoom is one of the fastest ways to build up connections with people because when people book into an event, they’re more invested.
I recommend that you do both written and video content. If you’re better at one than the other, then just start with the type of content you are good at, and you will grow as a content creator the more you do it.
The more you put yourself out there doing videos, the less you will need notes, and the less nervous you will be.
Video is the way of the future. It’s also the way of NOW.
Putting out valuable video content builds your personal brand. You’ll get more people referring you as a go-to expert and you’ll be known as a reliable business owner.
One of my clients wanted to build her business, so we worked together. She was so committed to putting out regular content. She kept showing up and she now has over 40,000 followers on Facebook and she got them really quickly!
She was genuinely showing up and building her tribe and creating valuable, consistent content.
This is the first powerful captivation method
The second method is creating crafted online events.
Events are about organising your knowledge and having actionable steps for people to follow. It’s structured and organised.
You don’t have to be a great speaker. You don’t have to be an extrovert (I’m an introvert). You just have to have knowledge that can help people.
Repetition is the mother of increasing your skills and it’s the same with running online events. They are so powerful as you can reach more people at one time.
You can build rapport and connection with more people at one time by doing online events. It maximises and leverages your time.
Every hour that you spend with someone, you could spend that same hour helping 50, 100, or 500+ people via an event.
Doing online events allows you to educate people and inspire them. It can open so many new exciting doors of opportunity for you.
If you’re willing to run an event, people often start inviting you to speak in their groups and you become known as the go-to expert.
I suggested doing online events to one of my clients, Gaynor. She literally laughed, as she didn’t know how she could find the time, as she had her business and was also a busy mum.
I encouraged her to step out and when she did, her results were brilliant. Her first online event brought in $2,368. It was by no means perfect, but she still had people show up and get helped by it.
Since using that online strategy she’s gone on to make over $25,000 and now she has an online course. She used to run retreats in the UK and now she’s taken everything online. She never thought she could do it, but she did!
It takes work when you first start doing them and organising your knowledge, but the hard road gets easier and the easy road gets harder. Events are SO worth it!
The third marketing method to build more followers, engagement and trust is to have a client attraction funnel.
The thought of a client attraction funnel may freak you out, but they are actually simple once you know how to do it.
A funnel is basically an automated way to turn strangers into clients. They are where people can sign up to your services 24/7.
They may come across your post on a downloadable freebie that you created. They click to download the freebie and it takes them to a funnel landing page.
A landing page is a simple one-page website. The people opt-in, they put their name and email in your funnel and they get your freebie to download. In return, you get their details.
You capture people, get their information, and then you can continue to build a relationship with them. A lot of people get my emails and they don’t sign up straight away. But after nurturing them, they come to a point where they are ready to buy.
A funnel could also be a landing page that leads people to your event. A funnel could also be a landing page that’s a freebie that people download and they go into your email list and nurture sequence.
A nurture sequence is a series of emails that give more help and free gifts. Your ideal client will eventually work out if you are the right match to work with them.
Only 3% of people are ready to buy immediately when they come across you. Others need more time to build that rapport with you. A funnel is a way for you to consistently build relationship. You share and give value through your funnel system.
The right people will want to keep working with you. These are the people who see that you’ve sufficiently educated them and inspired them to actually take action.
These skills are all learnable and at some point, if you want to be a successful business owner, you do need to learn these skills.
Remember it’s all about just taking action, and it can be imperfect action.
It’s about making a decision and going for it.
