The key to a good marketing strategy is to tell a story that evokes emotion from your audience. If you can make your audience laugh, smile or cry then this will help you build a relationship with them. 

This type of marketing is all around us and has been for years. A great example of this is the televised Christmas adverts that are created by the big brands. Every year people wait for the adverts that are going to make them laugh or cry. It has become a big part of the Christmas period. 

If you can make them laugh or smile and you are onto a winner. 

Innocent smoothies are a great example of a brand that uses humour on social media to build a relationship with their audience. Most of their posts have nothing to do with smoothies but they make their audience smile and laugh. This results in their followers tagging their friends in the posts, this is a free way of raising awareness of the brand and gaining more followers. 

This works really well because the next time you are in the supermarket and you see the Innocent brand you will remember how the posts on social media made you laugh or smile. This feeling will be associated with that brand and if you are out looking for a smoothie then you are more likely to go for the brand you feel understands you.  

Emotive marketing for small businesses. 

Emotive marketing isn’t just for the big brands. All you need is a good story to tell that tugs on the heartstrings. 

The story doesn’t have to be complicated, for example if you sell something that makes people feel good, for example shoes that make a person feel good and increase their confidence. Tell the story of how they succeeded because of this confidence brought on by these amazing shoes. 

Tapping into pain points will also help your emotive marketing campaign. For example beauty companies that sell anti-wrinkle cream tap into the insecurity of getting older. They use emotive marketing to address this fear and offer a solution. 

You can also use emotive marketing to tell other amazing stories. Work with a charity that appeals to your audience and tell the story of the work they do and the people they help. 

So if you are a small business or a start-up then it is worth spending some time thinking about emotive marketing and how you can use it to build a relationship with your audience.