Here’s the hard truth: No one wants to buy your product or service. What your customers do want is an answer to one of their basic psychological motivations— needs, wants, desires and fears.

You can strengthen your market position by learning how these psychological factors, along with the psychological impact of your graphics and marketing message, affect your target audience. Change your strategy from marketing features and benefits to marketing the promise that you can satisfy at least one buyer motivation.

Thread your marketing promise into every element, including product image, advertising and promotion strategy, product packaging and display and even pricing strategy. Design and copy should lead the reader quickly to how you can meet a need, want, desire or fear. Graphics will have better recall than words so choose images that are harmonious with your copy. Color is an important emotional trigger, but you should select it carefully as every shade has both a positive and negative connotation. Red as the dominant color might successfully evoke an image of love and passion, but it might also tap into the darker feelings of rage and violence. Green can stimulate thoughts of money and self-actualization, but greed and envy are associated with this hue as well.

© Great Reach Communications 2010